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Guy Barry

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Nov 14, 2012, 2:22:17 AM11/14/12
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"Customers don't think so too" (just heard on the radio).

I'd say "customers don't think so either". Can you use "too" after a
negative verb like that?

--
Guy Barry

James Hogg

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Nov 14, 2012, 2:24:57 AM11/14/12
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John Lennon could: "No religion too"

--
James

Guy Barry

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Nov 14, 2012, 2:35:20 AM11/14/12
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"James Hogg" wrote in message news:k7vh08$vrp$1...@speranza.aioe.org...
"Either" wouldn't have rhymed (or scanned).

--
Guy Barry

Eric Walker

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Nov 14, 2012, 5:06:27 AM11/14/12
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No. But in spontaneous speech, people often do what is usually described
by the usage manuals as "changing horses in mid-stream", meaning finding
that as they near the end of a sentence it isn't saying what they thought
it would when they started it, so that they then splice the end of a
revised version onto the incomplete original.


--
Cordially,
Eric Walker

Athel Cornish-Bowden

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Nov 14, 2012, 1:22:07 PM11/14/12
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I think that's exactly what happens. It should be avoided in serious
writing, but it is unavoidable in speech, and if one tried to avoid it
in speech one would end up speaking in a very stilted way.


--
athel

Robin Bignall

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Nov 14, 2012, 4:45:09 PM11/14/12
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As, indeed, Enoch Powell did; but he was unbelievably good at sounding
just like a talking textbook.
--
Robin Bignall
(BrE)
Herts, England

Stan Brown

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Nov 14, 2012, 8:40:34 PM11/14/12
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Hmm. I would interpret that as "someone believes A, but customers do
not share that belief". "Customers don't think so either" I would
interpret as "someone does not believe A, and customers likewise
don't believe A."

I might write or utter "Customers don't think so either", but not
"customers don't think so too" -- it seems a bit odd to me.

--
"The difference between the /almost right/ word and the /right/ word
is ... the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning."
--Mark Twain
Stan Brown, Tompkins County, NY, USA http://OakRoadSystems.com

John Holmes

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Nov 15, 2012, 2:45:14 AM11/15/12
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Yes, provided that it is parallel to something else of the same polarity
before it.

"I don't think so. The customers don't think so too."

--
Regards
John
for mail: my initials plus a u e
at tpg dot com dot au

Glenn Knickerbocker

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Nov 15, 2012, 3:53:29 PM11/15/12
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On 11/14/2012 8:40 PM, Stan Brown wrote:
> On Wed, 14 Nov 2012 07:22:17 -0000, Guy Barry wrote:
>> "Customers don't think so too" (just heard on the radio).
> Hmm. I would interpret that as "someone believes A, but customers do
> not share that belief".

I'd understand it the same way.

If I wanted to make a positive statement that customers agreed in not
thinking so, I'd say, I'd put the adverb before the verb: "Customers
also don't think so" or "Customers, too, don't think so."

ŹR
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