Felicity conditions

In J. L. Austin's formulation of speech act theory, a performative utterance is neither true nor false, but can instead be deemed 'felicitous' or 'infelicitous' according to a set of conditions whose interpretation differs depending on whether the utterance in question is a declaration ('I sentence you to death'), a request ('I ask that you stop doing that') or a warning ('I warn you not to jump off the roof'). In J. L. Austin's formulation of speech act theory, a performative utterance is neither true nor false, but can instead be deemed 'felicitous' or 'infelicitous' according to a set of conditions whose interpretation differs depending on whether the utterance in question is a declaration ('I sentence you to death'), a request ('I ask that you stop doing that') or a warning ('I warn you not to jump off the roof').