Questions tagged [negation]
"Negation" is the process that turns an affirmative statement into its opposite denial.
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Of course I will to a negative sentence
If you say to someone
"I hope you won't stop checking in on her"
And this person answers
"Of course I will"
Does it mean "Of course I won't stop" ?
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Usage of the word "don't" + "Substitute"
"It's important to support business, but meal deal vouchers don't substitute for effective public health messaging and measures"
The above excerpt is from a political advert and was ...
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I will call somebody else, not neither him nor you
I have a sentence
I will call neither you nor him
I guess it means
I won't call neither you nor him
Out of it it's not clear whether I will call anyone at all but I want to say that I will call but ...
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What is the difference between “I got stuck” , “I was stuck”, “I'm stuck"?
What is the difference caused by using “I got stuck”, “I get stuck”, “I was stuck”, “I'm stuck"?
Could anyone please advise which is more natural and when should one use over the other with sentences?...
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What is the difference between “yep” and “yeah”?
What is the difference caused by using “yep” instead of ”yeah”?
Is it used because “yep” sounds better and not straight like “yeah”? In some situations, it feels like "yes" is better to use than no ...
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She hoped to have done [duplicate]
I saw a sentence
She hoped to have done
Or a sentence, created with the same structure. I don'tunderstand how it works. Then I saw a full version of it:
She hoped that she had done
So, it's like a ...
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She hoped to have done
I saw a sentence
She hoped to have done
Or a sentence, created with the same structure. I don'tunderstand how it works. Then I saw a full version of it:
She hoped that she had done
So, it's like a ...
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Why is there no article after "no" in "I have no car"
Examples. "I have no car", "I have no TV". BUT "I have not a car"
There was a thread on it, but the answers were pretty superficial to say the least and only based on someone's opinion. I read a ...
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What does “not one of them“ mean?
Does "not one of them" mean “more than one of them” or “none of them”?
Example:
Not one of them thought it necessary to avoid dogmatic statements about unicorns because he had never seen one of ...
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Using non before compound word
I have the word peer-reviewed. I need to use non before it. Is it:
non-peer-reviewed
Or
non-peer reviewed
user101837
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Is there a difference in meanig between "as someone told you to" and "as someone told you"
a. You didn't come home late last night, as your Dad told you to.
b. You didn't come home late last night, as your Dad told you.
Do these mean:
Your Dad told you to come home late last ...
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"It may not seem" vs "It may seem not"
Are these 2 examples both grammatically valid? Are there any differences in the tone or the meaning?
A. It may not seem strange.
B. It may seem not strange.
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Does "not" modify main verb or adverb?
I was trying to understand why can't we say I have not money, and the answer was that have doesn't mean possession here, it is an auxiliary verb(AV) to make a perfect tense, which requires main verb --...
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Is this grammatically correct? : Something is not A nor A', neither B nor B'
'To love is not demanding nor taking advantage needless to say, neither is it giving up nor sacrifice.'
Is this sentence correct?
Is there any room for improvement?
How about the following ...
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What is the correct sequence of negatives for this use case?
Which of the following sentences is most grammatical for US English, or are all of them ungrammatical and should be written differently?
I will not allow anyone to do something to him or her.
...
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Which one is correct? Double negatives
Which one is correct?
1. I cannot do not eat for 5 days straight
2. I cannot not eat for 5 days straight
3. I cannot not to eat for 5 days straight
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didn't happen since
Tom says: My God, Jeff, you have lost a lot of weight!
Jeff replies: Twenty pounds! New Year's resolution.
Tom says:
a. You can't have lost twenty pounds since New Year's. You must have started ...
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What is this actually saying? Written sentence: “This is not a story about wine, well not totally.”
What is this actually saying? Written sentence: “This is not a story about wine, well not totally.” The writer means "There's more to this story than just wine." It's a voiceover attempting to be ...
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"no one apart from her sister" or "everyone apart from her sister"
The outing was canceled and no one apart from her sister, who wasn't up-to-date, came.
I'd rather say - 'everyone apart from(=except for) her sister ......'
I'd be grateful whether someone could ...
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Correct placement of "not" next to "to" disambiguating a sentence
I asked a question on another site and got corrected by someone. Them being NSE and me not, I appreciated the improvement except in one regard - placement of the negation. So I asked about it and as ...
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Negation of a Negative Statement
My understanding that negating a negation is proof.
like:
They are not uncooperative = They are cooperative.
I understand that the use of the negative statement could slightly change the meaning ...
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How would I negate "I used to be able to do it"?
i)
"I used to be able to do it."
What's the negative form of the abovementioned sentence? Is it natural to say - "I used to be able to not do it."?
ii)
is there any grammatical (like ...
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Sentence structure ambiguity
I lower myself to show humbleness.
I lower myself, in order to show my humbleness.
To lower oneself is a way of showing humbleness, and I lower myself.
I don't lower myself to show humbleness.
I ...
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What do we call these kind of structures?
I don't have Instagram installed on my phone.
Does it mean the same as
I haven't installed Instagram on my phone.
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Ask about the reason of not giving money to people by banks
Suppose you live in a country, and an economical issue was happened, and the country's banks refuse giving money back to people ... what is the best way to ask about the reason?
Why are not banks ...
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How to use 'not'? Can you use 'not' after a verb?
Can you use not after a verb? Is there a correct way to use not? Are these examples correct/ interchangeable? If not what is the difference?
Speak not against my father / do not speak against my ...
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looks not easy, seems not easy
Are these sentences correct?
It looks not easy.
It seems not easy.
Or do I need to say like these?
It doesn't look easy.
It doesn't seem easy.
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"Why can I not carry this?" or "Why cannot I carry this?" - which is the correct phrasing?
I'm playing a game and it doesn't let me pick up an item. At some point I asked "Why cannot I carry this?"
My friends are telling me my question is grammatically incorrect. I feel like it might be ...
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Meaning of "no <things> must/should [...]"
I want to write a code comment that means "every line in this file must be shorter than N". I wrote this:
No line in this file shall be longer than N
...then considered using "must", which is more ...
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"It's you, not Tom, who {is/are} to blame for what happened"
It's you, not Tom, who is/are to blame for what happened.
The model answer here is "is". When I search for the reason, I come across a rule as follows.
If your sentence compounds a ...
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How to use the adjective "absent"?
Can the adjective "absent" which has a negative meaning to it be used with the phrase "there is" or "there are" as, in their affirmative form, these are meant to assert the presence and not the ...
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How to use" everyone" or "everybody" in a negative sentence with verb "be"?
When checking if all the students are present in a class, may the teacher ask "Is everybody/everyone here today?" or "Is everyone/everybody present today?"
And if not so, must the students reply "No, ...
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so much not alike [closed]
a. Those twins are so not alike.
b. Those twins are so much not alike.
c. He was so not in a hurry.
d. He was so much not in a hurry.
(Meaning of (c) and (d): He was not in a hurry at all.)
Are ...
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Negative with subjunctive in that clause
I was wondering, why exactly is it correct to use "not" without a helping word instead of "do not" with the subjunctive in the negative after the "that" clause, after words like "suggest" or "...
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Difference between not and don't in the next sentence [closed]
“In the period we not enter, Romanticism, the Account became the
preeminent formula for literary production.”
In the sentence above, does the ‘not’ make sense? Should I use ‘don’t’ instead?
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Meaning of "I will not kill you due to your talent"
What is the meaning of:
I will not kill you due to your talent.
Does that mean:
[I will not kill you] [due to your talent].
Because you are talented, I will not kill you.
[I will not] [kill you ...
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Is contraction obligatory in negative interrogative sentences?
I know that a verb and "not" are usually contracted when together in a negative interrogative sentence. Example:
Aren't they lovely?
Is it grammatically wrong to avoid the contraction? Example:
...
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Questions with "do" vs. "do not" -- is "not" required?
I read an example of the term "ipso facto" in Merriam Webster Dictionaries which was:
If we refuse to tolerate bigotry, do we become, ipso facto, as intolerant as those whom we condemn.
I think ...
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not all vs all not
First, I know that "not all" is partial negation. For example, "not all the numbers are 0" means there may be a number that is nonzero.
And to me, a non-native speaker of English, it seems that "all ...
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Did not I do it VS Was it not me who did it
I discovered something interesting, guys, look:
I did it
It's a usual sentence. We can negate "it" by:
1) I did not it
We can negate "did" by:
2) I did not do it
Also we can negate "I" by:
3) ...
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Not educated VS Uneducated
Is there any difference in
1) He is not educated
2) He is uneducated ?
And if there is no, is it possible to make negation with other words by putting "not" in front of them?
If you have different ...
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Why did not I do this sooner?
I read some philosophy stuff about life and found some text with such a sentence at the end:
Why did not I do this sooner?
Shouldn't it be
Why didn't I do this sooner?
Why did I not do this sooner?...
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Usage of "unless" [closed]
A: He just said he could help B. But right now, he doesn't seem willing
to help B.
B: You just said you wanted to help me. Oh, unless you weren't
being serious, which I would get. I have been ...
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No. VS Not? He had a pen not a pencil
I know that we use not to negate a verb and we use no to negate a noun!
he had no pencil
Why do we use not in this sentence?
He had a pen not a pencil
Why don’t we use “no” ...
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Negation after the to-infinitive
Do the following sentences mean the same?
He seems to have not eaten for ages.
He does not seem to have eaten for ages.
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Is this sentence considered a double negative "Neither scenario does not involve fractions."? [closed]
Is this sentence considered a double negative "Neither scenario does not involve fractions." ?
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Is there any word for unlisten (negative of listen)?
I would like to know if is there any word for saying unlisten (not to listen).
Edit
I am working on some programming code where the author has named one function listen() and another one unlisten(). ...
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What's the negation of "Sooner or later"?
I find the following sentence in need for the "Sooner or later" but in its negative form.
The sentence:
This is what I don't intend in disclosing. Not sooner or later.
The speaker wants to ...
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Which is grammatically correct, "I'm no Lord Ram" or "I'm not Lord Ram"? Why?
I'm reading "Immortals of Meluha" and while reading I encounter a sentence that was delivered by Shiva, he said "I'm no Lord Ram". What I'm thinking is that he should have said "I'm not Lord Ram". ...
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‘Were reports not taken seriously’ or ‘ Were not reports taken seriously’
One of my homework is changing sentences into question sentences. The original sentence is:
"Reports were not taken seriously."
I am not sure where the ‘not’ should be put.
‘Were reports ...
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