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Is it correct to write,

Agreed.

instead of,

I agree.

I am confused by this single-word sentence. Why is it in the past tense? Or is "Agreed" a (past-participle) adjective, like "Gone" or "Done"?

Can I thus write,

Concurred.

Consented.

Withdrawn.

Been.

Sample conversation:

He: "Agreed." is a complete sentence.

She: Concurred.

Community
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William C
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  • YES – FumbleFingers Mar 06 '14 at 16:14
  • Depends on what you mean by "complete". It's missing some parts, all right, so it's not complete by some definitions. On the other hand, the missing parts are easily supplied by convention, and it's a perfectly valid (and legally enforceable) performative utterance, under the appropriate felicity conditions. – John Lawler Mar 06 '14 at 16:14
  • @John: is "felicity conditions" the technical way of referring to "contextual surrounding affecting whether or not a native speaker classifies any given usage as 'happy'" ? (I'm assuming in such contexts, 'happy' as applied to a usage loosely translates to "native speaker is happy to accept the usage as valid/credible".) – FumbleFingers Mar 06 '14 at 16:18
  • "Happy" is J. L. Austin's term. He was looking for logic beyond the logic of statements (questions, orders, etc. can't be either T or F, so logic kind of leaves them blank). He talks about "performatives" in his book How to do things with words, and I was referring to the fact that "Agreed." constitutes a legal agreement, under the correct circumstances. You couldn't say it was "true", exactly; but it was felicitous. Felicity for a statement is T, at least as moderated by Grice's Maxims. – John Lawler Mar 06 '14 at 16:26
  • @FumbleFingers Agreed. – Elliott Frisch Mar 06 '14 at 16:38
  • Why is the word in the past tense? – William C Mar 07 '14 at 00:40
  • What is the answer? – Mohammed Joraid Mar 14 '14 at 18:44

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