The Thoughts Of Kant Through Systemic Functional Linguistics [2]

Russell (1961: 679):

[For Kant] an 'analytic' proposition is one in which the predicate is part of the subject; for instance, 'a tall man is a man', or 'an equilateral triangle is a triangle'.  Such propositions follow from the law of contradiction; to maintain that a tall man is not a man would be self-contradictory.

Blogger Comment:

From the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistic theory, these analytic propositions are statements of class membership, realised by attributive declarative clauses.

Carrier	Process	Attribute
a tall man	is	a man
an equilateral triangle	is	a triangle
Subject	Finite	Complement
Mood		Residue

That is:

• a tall man is a member of the class a man
• an equilateral triangle is a member of the class a triangle

Viewed at group rank:

a	tall	man	=	a	man
Deictic	Epithet	Thing		Deictic	Thing

an	equilateral	triangle	=	a	triangle
Deictic	Classifier	Thing		Deictic	Thing

That is:

• a sub-classified Thing is a member of the class Thing