Timeline for Semantic drift: are the words "can", "could", etc becoming contranyms?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
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| Jun 15, 2020 at 7:40 | history | edited | CommunityBot |
Commonmark migration
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| Dec 1, 2015 at 4:16 | comment | added | Lawrence | +1 That's an interesting idea - that when the phrase as a whole is considered a negative construct, negating the polarity of the individual components doesn't change the polarity of the construct as a whole. Your second and third pairs of examples show this well, though the first pair do (not do not :) ) appear to me as opposites, particularly if the word would is stressed. I disagree with your statement, "This is what you should expect with a modal and a negative in the same sentence.", though I wish you used "you'd" instead of "you should" because then I'd have agreed with the NPI :) . | |
| Dec 1, 2015 at 4:16 | history | edited | John Lawler | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
added 79 characters in body
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| Dec 1, 2015 at 4:03 | history | answered | John Lawler | CC BY-SA 3.0 |