Rules governing scientific discourse are prescriptive, not denotative, claims

Evidence

But its postmodern development brings a decisive “fact” to the fore: even discussions of denotative statements need to have rules. Rules are not denotative but prescriptive utterances, which we are better off calling metaprescriptive utterances to avoid confusion (they prescribe what the moves of language games must be in order to be admissible). The function of the differential or imaginative or paralogical activity of the current pragmatics of science is to point out these metaprescriptives (science’s “presuppositions”) and to petition the players to accept different ones. The only legitimation that can make this kind of request admissible is that it will generate ideas, in other words, new statements. — Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition, 448

Categorization

• QUESTION: The status of ‘metaprescriptive utterances’ — how do they get their own legitimacy? Lyotard answers only by ‘generating ideas’; this is the stress point Jameson will probe.
• DEFINE: Introduces the technical term ‘metaprescriptive’ — the prescriptive rules that govern admissible moves in a language game.
• XREF: connects to: Disciplinary discourse rests on norms, not juridical rules — Michel Foucault, Society Must Be Defended, 56; Scientific legitimation rests on consensus among experts about language rules — Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition: A Report on…, 324; Language enables conventions rather than being constituted by them. — Alex Callinicos, Against Postmodernism: A Marxist…, 420 (+2 more)

Broader Connections

• Disciplinary discourse rests on norms, not juridical rules #expands (0.82) — Michel Foucault, Society Must Be Defended, 56
• Prescriptive rule choice hardly affects speech intelligibility outcomes #corroborates (0.80)
• Scientific legitimation rests on consensus among experts about language rules #expands (0.75) — Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition, 324
• Language enables conventions rather than being constituted by them. #corroborates (0.72) — Alex Callinicos, Against Postmodernism, 420