The main goal of this article is to argue for the existence and crosslinguistic stability a phenomenon that I call “negation-licensed commands” (NLCs), in which commands can be interpreted as such only presence negation. explores morphosyntactic properties NLCs small number unrelated languages. It stops short an analysis phenomenon, will have await future research.

Abstract In this article, we take into consideration two semantics of the future tense: linearism, according to which future-tense sentences are interpreted on a single history, and universalism, they evaluated by universally quantifying plurality histories that radiate from present instant. Specifically, focus objection advanced against universalism: if universalism were correct will , negated...