Grice and Searle take as a premise that virtually all conversations are a cooperative undertaking and that they require both literal and implied meanings to be processed. Grice systematized and categorized the various rules by which ordinary, cooperative speech is conducted, helping to illuminate the mechanisms by which indirect speech acts work. The four Gricean maxims are: Quantity. Make your contribution to the conversation as informative as required. Do not make your contribution more informative than is required. Quality. Do not say what you believe to be false. Do not say that for which
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