Declarative sentence

Definition and roles

In their role as the meanings of declarative sentences, propositions are the ideas or semantic contents expressed by assertions such as "The door is open". Declarative sentences express what is the case. They contrast with interrogative sentences, like "Is the door open?", which request information, and imperative sentences, such as "Open the door!", which issue commands. Different declarative sentences can express the same idea, like the English sentence "Snow is white" and the German sentence "Schnee ist weiß". Accordingly, propositions are not identical to individual sentences and do not belong to any particular language. Instead, they reflect the information content of sentences and track cross-linguistic sameness. The terms "proposition" and "statement" are sometimes used as synonyms. However, the word "statement" is ambiguous since it can also refer to declarative sentences themselves rather than their meanings. The term proposition also overlaps with the term judgment, with one difference being that judgments are more closely associated with mental processes that affirm or deny the truth of a content.