It was a pleasant, sunny day, the sort of day Cog and Noncog always hoped for when they arranged to have lunch. They settled themselves down to eat, Cog with his regular choice, soup and salad, and Noncog with his standard order of fish and chips.

Noncog was unusually quiet. He had had another terrible morning wondering how to explain the role of the sentence “It is desirable to eat snails” in the conditional statement “If it is desirable to eat snails then Cog will know all about it.” His official view, which he had defended in print for some time, was that when people sincerely utter evaluative sentences they do not express their beliefs, but rather express their desires. Noncog had thus argued that, contrary to appearances, sentences like “It is desirable to eat snails” are not really truth-assessable, and that this particular sentence therefore means pretty much the same as “Hooray for eating snails!” He had to admit, though, that such sentences certainly appeared truth-assessable, which is why he had been worrying about its appearance in the conditional statement. How could the sentence figure in the antecedent of the conditional if it wasn't truth-assessable? Interpreting the conditional statement quite literally he was obliged to see it as meaning “If hooray for eating snails then Cog will know all about it,” which didn't seem to make any sense at all.