tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Nov 22 15:36:06 2000
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Re: negating a comparative
ja' De'vID:
>How do I negate a comparative, i.e. how do I say, "It's *not* more
>this and that" or "It's *not* the most something of all"?
For a simple comparative, you can swap the two nouns you're comparing.
{nItlhpachwIj tIq law' ghIchwIj tIq puS}
"My fingernails are longer than my nose."
{ghIchwIj tIq law' nitlhpachwIj tIq puS}
"My nose is longer than my fingernails" says essentially the same thing as
"My fingernails are not longer than my nose." It does ignore the
possibility that they are the same size, of course.
Negating a superlative is a little trickier; you don't want to turn "A is
the most Q of all" into "A is the least Q of all." The logical negation
can be stated as "Some are more Q than A."
{nItlhpachwIj tIq law' Hoch tIq puS}
"My fingernails are the longest."
{'op nItlhpach tIq law' nItlhpachwIj tIq puS}
"Some fingernails are longer than mine" says essentially the same thing as
"My fingernails are not the longest."
-- ghunchu'wI' 'utlh