ABSTRACT
Conditionals have usually been studied as a kind of pro position, demanding analysis. This chapter proposes to deal with the conditional as a mode of asserting. The notion of asserting has been comparatively little discussed among logicians. To assert a proposition entails that language is being used. In this respect asserting seems to differ from knowing and believing. The chapter discovers two modes of asserting: the categorical and the conditional. Grounds of a proposition must not be confused with motives for asserting a proposition. It is important to emphasize that the distinction between potential and contrary-to-fact conditional asserting does not run parallel to a linguistic distinction. General conditional asserting, it should be observed, is not the same as intensional asserting of a general implication. The deductive case of contrary-to-fact conditional asserting may be analysed as a conjunction of two acts of categorical asserting.
