Distinctions between — proposition and sentence, proposition and judgment, proposition and fact, constituent and component

“It is raining” in English, “Baarish ho rahi hai” in Hindi, and “Il pleut” in French are three completely different sentences. Yet all three say exactly the same thing. If sentences differ but what they say is identical, then whatever it is that they share cannot itself be a sentence — and finding out what that shared thing actually is opens this entire module.

In two minutes

A proposition is the meaning or information-content a sentence expresses, which is why the same proposition can be stated in many different sentences; it is distinct from the mental act of judging it (judgment), from the state of affairs it is about (fact), and its parts are distinguished as constituents (the logically essential parts) versus components (any grammatical part of the sentence).

The rest of this chapter

The full explanation, the cheat sheet, every previous-year question at every mark weight, the quiz and the answer skeletons are part of Logic – I on LexBlox Semester. Sign in to unlock the subject, or read Module 1 of Legal Language and Writing free.