A phrase can be used to express or evoke a state of mind which is cognitive, and it can be used to express or evoke a state of mind which is affective or conative. In the former case it is the conceptual meaning of the phrase which counts, in the latter the evaluative meaning. These different 'pragmatic aspects of language' are related to the different purposes for which such a system of symbols is applied. Words are used on the one hand 'to record, clarify and communicate' (cognitive) thoughts, whereas they are used on the other hand to show or create feelings, or to incite people to act in a certain way. The first kind of use has been termed "descriptive", the second "dynamic".

The evaluative meaning of a word or phrase may be emotive or normative. It is 'emotive' on our terminology if, and insofar as, it is used to express a personal feeling, say, the feeling that something is beautiful or ugly, pleasant or unpleasant. It is 'normative' if, and insofar as, it is used to express the conviction that something is right or wrong, or good or bad in a normative sense. Emotive meaning is a kind of factual meaning. Beauty and ugliness, and all forms of pleasantness and unpleasantness, are facts, albeit relational facts with respect to one particular being that experiences something as pleasant, unpleasant, and so on. To say that something is nice or unpleasant does not describe the thing in itself, however, and therefore the use of words for this purpose is not descriptive (of the thing in question). Similarly, to say that something is right or bad (in a normative sense) does not describe the thing or action itself either, and therefore also the use of words for this purpose is not descriptive.

The concepts of denotation and connotation refer practically to the same distinction as that between conceptual or descriptive and evaluative or emotive meaning. The connotation is, then, what is implied apart from what is explicitly named or described. It is the subsidiary meaning of a word of which the conceptual or descriptive meaning is of primary significance. It may also be the case tho, that only the emotive or evaluative meaning of a word or phrase is important, and that it has no, or only a vague, conceptual meaning. In that case the term connotation does not properly express the essentially evaluative nature of the word or phrase concerned. The distinction between conceptual and evaluative meaning is also present where it is said that linguistic symbols are not only related to concepts in a narrow sense but also to so-called 'stereotypes'. These 'stereotypes' then underly the emotive meanings of terms.

The evaluative meaning of a word (or phrase) may be negative, indifferent or positive. If it is positive, the word is meliorative (or 'laudatory'); if negative, pejorative (or 'derogatory'). A word may have the same unneutral evaluative meaning in the whole linguistic community, it may also have a meliorative meaning for some people and a pejorative one for others, while having the same conceptual meaning. Altogether there are the following possibilities with respect to differences in usage between two groups or communities that in general speak the same language:

1. the phrase itself is only used by one group, not by the other (for example, the name of a religious institution or practise);
2. the phrase is used by both groups but the conceptual meanings are not the same, nor are the evaluative meanings (for example, the word religionist and perhaps ideological);
3. the conceptual meanings are the same but the evaluative meanings are different (for example, revolution and perhaps God and the Party);
4. the conceptual meanings are not the same but the evaluative meaning is (for example, freedom and democratic).

The evaluative meanings of a word can diverge widely, even when the word has no or hardly any established conceptual meaning. Thus the word god has a strong meliorative meaning for theists and a strong pejorative meaning for antitheists (and a nonmeliorative evaluative meaning for nontheists in general). There is no universal evaluative meaning of this word in the present language so long as there are enough speakers of this language who worship one or more gods besides speakers who do not. It is only because the word god did arouse in their time an extremely deep, positive feeling in most, or the most powerful, speakers that certain thinkers in the past decided to dignify the principal being of their world-view by the then-laudatory title god (or God), even tho that being did not look like the or a 'god' of their contemporaries in any way. This is a question of 'persuasive definition': use a familiar term without changing its evaluative meaning; give it an entirely new conceptual meaning, and thus alter the direction of people's interests -- hopefully that is. When the word god has acquired a strong negative evaluative meaning in later times, unsuitable for any meliorative persuasive definition, it is in the first place because of its association with the contents and historical records of what have been the dominant forms of theism. It may technically be possible to give the term god any descriptive or conceptual meaning one likes, but those who reject all irrational supernaturalism that violates the principle of truth and all discriminatory exclusivism that violates the principle of relevance are not capable anymore of using the term melioratively in an ideological context. And therefore we shall not apply the name god (with or without capital) to anything we value, even not --or rather, certainly not-- to a principal being, and least of all to (the) supreme being. (In a religionist society this may require some courage, because there one risks the wrath, not of any omnipotent god, but of the barons of the worshipbuilding industry.)

Words such as good, right, nice and pleasant, which are used to express a positive evaluation or emotion itself, are typically meliorative, whereas words such as bad, wrong, awful and unpleasant are typically pejorative. Such words may have an evaluative meaning, they have no fixed descriptive meaning at all. A term such as just or justice belongs to the first category as well. While it can conceptually be defined in many different ways (like the word god), it has been pointed out that it is not trivial which definition is chosen, since 'to choose a meaning is to take sides in a social struggle', because of the universal meliorative nature of just and justice in the present language (unlike the word god). 'Everyone' is in favor of justice, and this is why the term justice has a 'universal' meliorative meaning. And 'everyone' is against injustice, and this is why the word injustice has a pejorative meaning, even if there is no unanimity whatsoever with regard to its conceptual content. Justice has a built-in rightness or goodness, and injustice a built-in wrongness or badness.

When words have a built-in negative evaluation (like injustice) they do not merely describe, if they describe at all. To say that acts or situations denoted by these words are bad or wrong is an analytical statement which does not convey any substantive, normative or other evaluative information independent of the time that and the place where the proposition is uttered. Thus in the present language taking something is only called "stealing" when it is wrong, or judged to be wrong, and therefore stealing is wrong (and also you should not steal) is an analytical truth. Similarly, killing someone is only called "murder", and telling something that is not true "lying", when it is wrong, or judged to be wrong, and therefore murder is wrong (or you should not murder) and lying is wrong (or you should not lie) are analytical truths as well. To say, for example, that you are against stealing, or that one ought not to steal, is empty rhetoric. If it serves any sensible purpose at all, such a statement can only serve another purpose than the direct transmission of substantive information. What it may tell us at the most is that there are ways of taking something which are wrong and ways which are not wrong. But this is a truism. What would be interesting to know is what criterions to apply to distinguish the wrong ways of taking and having from the right ways of taking and having.

A speech community is not a monolithic herd of people who use all words in the same way and with the same feelings. (At most a community of linguists could be such a herd.) For example, the word suicide may have a definite negative connotation for some and not for others. This may be a question of a different moral outlook, but also a question of a different linguistic usage. Those who do not condemn self-killing (in general) as a form of killing or self-killing, just cannot use the word suicide, if it has a negative connotation for themselves or for the group they relate to. Similarly, those who do not condemn erotic contact between (adult) (close) relatives as a form of erotic contact, just cannot use the word incest, if it has a negative connotation for themselves or for the group they deal with. (As the original meaning of incest is impure it is not surprising that the word incest does have a negative connotation.) If a term such as suicide does indeed carry a pejorative load in the language used, people will start calling certain acts of (intentional) self-killing "sacrificial" instead of "suicidal". Self-killing is , then, 'sacrificial' (or heroic), if it is (believed to be) good, right, justifiable or excusable, and 'suicidal' if it is (believed to be) bad, wrong, not justifiable or not excusable. However, these differences in terminology have no bearing on substantive normative issues, for the question remains whether self-killing, or for that matter, erotic contact between relatives, is ever wrong, and if so, why. And the same applies to all other forms of killing and intimate physical contact.

Those who do not morally condemn certain acts of taking would not call them "stealing"; and they would not call certain acts of telling a falsehood "lying"; and not certain acts of killing "murder"; and not certain sexual acts "perversion". All these words have a negative, emotive and normative meaning. It only makes sense to say that a particular act described by means of a phrase with a clear conceptual and no definite normative meaning is right or wrong, or neither right nor wrong. The revelation that 'everyone' or 'all reasonable people' (or 'everyone who has no perverted mind') agree that murder, theft, lying, incest, perversion, injustice, and suchlike, are wrong is an intuitionist platitude. Those who start from such statements lack any insight into the functioning of language and the pragmatic aspects of the diverse meanings of its constituents. Those who finish with such statements express a type of moral thought which is too shallow to allow for any worthwhile perspective on normative affairs.