Talk:Double negative/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Behavioral guidelines

@Vormeph: please be aware of the Behavioral guidelines in Wikipedia:Disruptive editing. These issues tend to take on a life of their own, and start processes beyond the control of the parties involved, and take up enormous amounts of time and attention. No one wants this. I urge you to consider:

Researchers have identified several factors in linguistics which affect the use of the double negative. In summary, the various dialects of English occupy the spectrum of use of negative concord, from none at all, to obligatory. Standard English has lost Negative Concord, but African_American_Vernacular_English#.22Deep.22_AAVE still has Negative Concord . There are several citations, William Labov (1972) "Negative Attraction and Negative Concord in English Grammar" (via JSTOR) and Amel Kallel (2011) The Loss of Negative Concord in Standard English, which directly contradict your position.

(Parenthetically,William Labov is the subject of an article. His views about Negative Attraction show that negative concord is a variable feature in English. In contrast, negative attraction to the word 'any' is invariant across all dialects of English. For example, in Labov 1972 on page 777 "Anybody doesn't sit there anymore" is invariably rejected as nongrammatical across all dialects. But the Standard dialect and the African_American_Vernacular dialect display two different solutions for fixing the ill-formed sentence of p.777.)

--Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 14:21, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

The 1972 source is too old for use; English has evolved considerably since then. As for the cambridge article, it fails to take into account the use of English among the general population. Unfortunately they refuse to take that into account because they ideologically hold the belief in so-called "Standard English" which makes no sense. I was raised with "Standard English" in mind, but the fact of the matter is that this "Standard English" is in fact a contradiction of itself because no language can ever be accounted to a standard without taking into account what the general population converse in. There are so many things people say in English which constitute as non-standard English, but they are still used in Standard English anyway. A language isn't a book of grammar rules; it's just a language. The polarising argument pertaining to double negatives isn't a grammarian one, but a social one. Just because double negatives aren't socially acceptable doesn't mean that the language therein is devoid of negative concord. That's the point I am advancing. If you want a citation for that, I then urge you to walk through the streets of your English-speaking village, town, city or part, and take into account how and what people usually use as their own standards for how they converse. The notion of "Standard English" has lost significance because from an individualistic point of view no one should ever be forced to conform to a standard of how to speak, how to write, nor how to interpret a sentence. What is amazing is that there's so much hypocrisy coming from other editors regarding double negatives, and through it all the argument I advance still stands. It would be wrong to say English lacks negative concord; Standard English, to appease those, be it as it may, may not have negative concord; but English as a whole does. When it comes to language, we refer to the language itself, not a Standard thereof. Take this into account. I am sorry for my bitterness erewhile, @Lambian: --Vormeph 16:43, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

Vormeph, you still do not understand. You argue from your personal observations, but the point is that if you want to edit Wikipedia articles, you must do so in accordance with the Wikipedia policies. Whether you are correct in observing that the notion of Standard English has lost significance is utterly irrelevant here. So you can stop arguing this point: it simply doesn't matter whether you are right or wrong. Only that which has been published in reliable sources is relevant. Your statements on talk pages do not count; they are not publications in reliable sources. If you write an article in which you present the position that any standards for English have lost their significance and that today's English has regained the negative concord it lost some centuries ago, and succeed in getting your article published in a peer-reviewed journal, then we'll be happy to include this point of view in the article (together, of course, with the contrary point of view, which is well-attested, also in quite recent publications, since we have to adhere to the Wikipedia policy of maintaining a neutral point of view).  --Lambiam 21:41, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

I will take your suggestion gladly with a pinch of salt. With regards to the discussion as to negative concord, it's a bit of a dark area on Wikipedia's side where the general consensus of a language's mechanics goes into conflict with what the few would have to publish against it. You're saying that in order for there to be an argument that negative concord exists in English, then there has to be a source for there to cite it. But I am a native speaker of English, and so are many people who edit this page, and so are many people who read this article. How can we cite that which we converse in? It doesn't make sense to me at all; it's not about my not understanding Wikipedia guidelines, it's more a case of actually acknowledging that the real Standard English doesn't belong to those who publish works for it to be cited; but rather it belongs to all of us. Thus, if we know that double negatives are indeed popular in the English-speaking world then that factually only means negative concord exists in the English language. If we were to completely stick to Wikipedia's guidelines then much of the content in the double negatives section would be lost, and then it wouldn't be an impartial article because in itself there wouldn't be an argument in favour of double negatives.

Before I started editting Double negatives for the first time over a year ago, there was so little mentioned regarding double negatives in a favourable way. True, I got a warning from a moderator or two, but I am still continuing with argument in favour of double negatives. I insist that the article aims to be as impartial as possible, and if anything I have received a thorough reception from users on my page and from this article to suggest that the article should instead be favourable to those who hold the view that double negatives are non-standard English and that negative concord doesn't exist in English. That is hypocrisy for ya. I will continue to find sources regarding double negatives. In the meantime, edits should be as impartial as possible. --Vormeph 23:23, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

204.112.125.238 (talk) 00:49, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Ancient and Modern Greek exceptions

In the ancient Greek section it says that double negations result in positives and then in the modern Greek section it states: "In Modern Greek, negative concord is standard: Κανείς δεν μίλησε, literally "No one not spoke", is far more common than Κανείς μίλησε, "No one spoke". An exception is the pronoun ουδείς, also meaning "no one", which does not allow negation of the verb it governs."

- however this is generally, but not always true, because you could say "ουδεις ου δε εμιλησε ου δε εφανη" for example and is applicable both in the ancient and the modern.

204.112.125.238 (talk) 00:51, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

23.1.2016

It is a profound inaccuracy to translate "κανείς" as no one. "κανείς" does not have an independent negative function in a sentence. "Κανείς" literally means "even one", "someone". Only when "κανείς" is combined with the standard verb negators, then it acquires the meaning of "no one". This can be proven- a contrario- also by the fact that when someone asks "Κανείς εδώ;", the meaning is "(is) anybody here?". Therefore, any postulation that negative concord is standard in Modern Greek is at least ambiguous and debatable, if not false at all.

85.75.28.117 (talk) 16:34, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Examples in Spanish

Should some examples in Spanish be added in the Romance languages section? I see that other examples in other Romance languages don't have a source, should I add them outright (along with an explanation of the usage? —Giratina000 ^¡Hola! 16:50, 31 January 2016 (UTC)

Image used herein

Evrik, You've been summoned here to explain why you are insisting this image: file:I wont not use no double negatives.jpg at the blackboard in the opening sequence of Hello Gutter, Hello Fadder should be considered for inclusion within the article. Firstly, although the image refers to double negatives its opinion derives from a TV show which however comedic is not appropriate here. Vormeph (talk) 23:25, 21 March 2016 (UTC)

I've been summoned? First of all, I restored the image. It should stay until this discussion is complete. Your comment actually is the justification for why the image should remain - the images is from a TV show and directly references a double negative. It takes a relatively dry subject and shows it's context in popular culture. By what standard do you think it is not appropriate? Please tell us. --evrik ^(talk) 16:06, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

@Evrik: There's a chance I might put up a picture of an ass on your page because I think it may be relevant; but that doesn't mean there's a correlation between the two, not that I know of at any rate. Conversely, you placing a picture of something you think is relevant is no pretext for you to insist that the subject whereof is relevant to the article. This article is specifically about double negatives not specifically at English but also in other languages. As the article should also be unbiased, a picture that condones or condemns such usage is best avoided. Ironically you've also archived a trove of topics which are about this matter; the fact you've moved them without having established a presence in this article is not only rude but extremely unwelcoming. You wouldn't move furniture when you're a guest at someone's house would ya? Vormeph (talk) 17:05, 22 March 2016 (UTC)

I'm not going to dignify that with a response. --evrik ^(talk) 02:25, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

I have full-protected the article for 24-hours to forestall any further edit warring. The problem with File:I wont not use no double negatives.jpg is that it doesn't have a particularly good non-free rationale at the moment. A free example could exist of just the blackboard writing, which would fall under the threshold of originality for copyrighting. I don't understand what Vormeph is complaining about exactly, though, and it doesn't appear to be anything with non-free rationales. If the reader's understanding of a topic is aided by a popular culture example that many will be instantly familiar with, great. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 13:20, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

I am satisfied with the edits made thus far. It's just that the picture of a Simpsons character was inappropriate to be placed beside an introduction and should best be under the 'Film and television' sub-section. That said, I look forward in cooperating with @Evrik: to see how the Double negative article can improve in content. Everyone is welcome to contribute, but randomly placing images can emit a wrong impression, especially when edits are made without referring to the talk page thereof; on that where the entire talk page is being archived without due regard for active discussions clearly indicated. Vormeph (talk) 23:26, 23 March 2016 (UTC)

Japanese might not be a good example

The article seems to indicate that Japanese normally uses double negative. This is not true. Normally Japanese does not use double negative. I believe there is only one grammatical construction in Japanese that could be considered double negative, which is when the word "keshite" (by no means) is used. It seems like exaggeration to include Japanese in the introduction. --Westwind273 (talk) 03:32, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

OK since English is negative concord because...

some dialects have this feature does this mean I can edit wiktionary to add "dumb" and "stupid" as synonyms to "ridiculously". I frequent websites that have many AAVE speakers and the phrases "stupid thick" and "dumb thick" are quite common. Also, many people all over the world use "infer" to mean "imply" and are understood. So, can they be synonyms? Yoga Conflagration (talk) 01:31, 5 February 2016 (UTC)

You should ask your conscience that. If speakers refer a word through another meaning then it should be raised as thus. Vormeph (talk) 22:59, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

Damn dude, the concept of negative concord existing in AAVE seems to have triggered an existential crisis in you. Is anything real at all anymore? Do things even have any meaning? Like Ivan Karamazov said, "If there is negative concord in AAVE, everything is permitted". Look, a dictionary doesn't define a language, it is meant to be concise usually and concentrates on the meanings present in higher status dialects, which are usually the ones that people want to replicate, I'm not sure about the inclusion policy but I'm pretty certain that definitions only present in low status (or regional) dialects would be marked as such to avoid confusion. You would have to ask them, making a passive aggressive comment on the wikipedia talk page isn't going to accomplish this. Dialect is the language of the soul, it is not generally taught for the purpose of replication, though it is studied in higher level linguistics obviously because examination of dialectical syntax is extremely useful in figuring out how languages evolve. For instance, convergent evolution with features in other languages. The presence of negative concord in dialects of English is obviously of interest to the subject and I have no idea why the information would be worthy of suppression. It is not a claim that all English has this feature, you are not being persecuted and forced to recite rap lyrics under penalty of death, it is a factual description of some dialects of English. It's not even an exclusive feature of AAVE anyway, we have it too in the southern dialect, in fact, they get it from us, you know, when we held them as slaves, we taught them to speak our dialect and it branched from there. So you can blame us. You don't just hear it in southern English either, it is common in regional accents throughout the United States. For some odd reason, don't know why (truly clueless here), specifically its feature in AAVE causes people to freak out and go into paranoid, passive aggressive rants. Maybe we should make a more exhaustive list in the future, including dialects from, errrr, snowier locales, to avoid these unfortunate incidents of sensitivity.2601:140:8900:61D0:44F5:CA36:B2AA:6DC7 (talk) 06:24, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

Incorrect very first sentence in English section

"When two negatives are used in one sentence, the negatives are understood to cancel one another"

"If not X then not Y" is not the same as "if X then Y". That is two negatives used in one sentence that don't cancel each other. That's not even two independent clauses. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:602:9D00:D58B:8C23:6C0A:77F0:9A58 (talk) 06:52, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

Well first off your syntax doesn't actually follow English syntax, or the syntax of any natural language. I assume you're aping a system of formal logic, but systems of formal logic have their own syntax, it's a limited well defined syntax more similar to a formal mathematical syntaxes, and you can't draw conclusions about English syntax from them. For one thing, like, do X and Y represent nouns or verbs? Either way it doesn't parse because generally English sentences have to have both. To reconstruct what you seem to mean, "I am not Susie, then I am not the moon". In this construction both are phrases, so I would think the double negative behavior would be confined to the phrase (i.e. "I ain't no Susie, so I ain't no moon", kind of weird trying to replicate these meaningless formal example sentences in dialect but whatever). Maybe it should be changed to reflect that. The definition of a sentence is kind of vague anyway, it's really more of a way of organizing written language. Spoken tends to be just a string of connectors that can look a ghastly and repetitive endless run on sentence when actually written down literally. You can construct a sentence in a way that it basically consists of an endless number of phrases, it's discouraged but it parses. So to specify double negatives as applying to sentences seems overly broad, you can definitely construct sentences strung together with connectors where the grammar is independent enough that double negatives don't cascade.2601:140:8900:61D0:44F5:CA36:B2AA:6DC7 (talk) 07:18, 19 October 2019 (UTC)

French last example incorrect

This has evolved further, so that in French colloquial speech, ne is often left out, leaving pas to serve as the sole negating element: "Je sais pas" or "sais pas" mean "I don't know."

This is incorrect. "Je sais pas" is a langage mistake, not a colloquialism. I realize that the frontier between familiar language and mistakes is a gray zone, but "je sais pas" would be tagged as "incorrect language" (or "lazy language") and not familair. The colloquialism would be "Je n'sais pas", the first negation being present. It is equivalent to "I dunno" in English. I will remove the quoted section if there are no comments. Wsw70 (talk) 16:15, 2 May 2017 (UTC)

Done Wsw70 (talk) 15:34, 8 May 2017 (UTC)

Well, no. Colloquial French is what the French happen to say; and, believe me, this is Je sais pas (in this case, actually, usually "j'ais pas" or even "j'pas"). Leaving out the "ne" is no more unusual in spoken French than, in fact, using "dunno" for "don't know" in English (good example) or "gonna" for the future tense "going to" in American.--2001:A61:2085:9F01:FC0A:40A:BB4E:684B (talk) 23:07, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

I disagree. People say or write all kind of things and they do not automatically become "colloqualisms". "T'as vu se film?" is incorrect not because of the "t'as vu" but because of the "se". The "se/ce" or "é/er" mistake is extremely frequent - whcih does not make it a smaller mistake. You mention "J'ais pas" as being used for "Je ne sais pas"? Where? My 47 years of being French do not agree. I have never heard "J'pas". "J'ai pas" could possibly mean "I do not have" (still incorrectly, though, but in widespread use) Wsw70 (talk) 10:41, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

I quite agree that "se" for "ce" is a mistake, and not a colloquialism. Why? because the s-sound in se and the c sound in ce actually are the same sound. Failure to write down the spoken thing as it ought to be written is simply a mistake; writing down something as it is spoken may be a colloquialism, especially if the thing is in so widespread use as "je sais pas" (as you yourself say on a related issue). It would be a clear mistake to write "je ne saie pa" or what not, even with the ne.

As for "j'ais pas", I heard something in between a "j'ais pas" and a "je pas" with markedly spoken schwa sound (unlike all the other schwas which tend to fall away in colloquial language even where they don't in standard French) in the department of Moselle and it definitely was an abbreviation for "je ne sais pas". "J'pas" was less frequent and more colloquial.-- 2001:A61:20CD:AA01:B96C:E846:2EEF:3AC9 (talk) 17:00, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

(Note by the same: Why I wrote "j'ais", not "j'ai", is simply because we learnt in school that what is written "j'ai" without an -s (or an -e for e.g. the subjunctive) is, in standard French, spoken "jé" as opposed to "jè". (Of course, most French say "jè" though.)--2001:A61:260D:6E01:FD44:66FE:20FD:AB22 (talk) 19:51, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

"This is incorrect. "Je sais pas" is a langage mistake, not a colloquialism" Exactly, this article is full of mistakes from people who are not fluent in the languages studied here. " "T'as vu se film?" is incorrect not because of the "t'as vu" but because of the "se". "

Really, stop saying nonsense, if you are not a fluent speaker, or a French teacher, don't spread absurdities. Check in grammar books, or Projet Voltaire, on the Académie Française site, or in any dictionaries before spreading errors here. If you write nite in English, do you think it's correct? The French negation, to be proprer, and not colloquial, still requires the "ne", make some researches if you don't know. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.91.51.235 (talk • contribs) 22:36, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

Andalusian

I don't know how to work it into the article, but it has been brought to my attention that in Andalusian Spanish ¡No ni na'!, despite literally meaning "No nor nothing" is an emphatic "Yes!". --Error (talk) 12:19, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

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Please remove unsourced interpretations

I don't believe "ne pas" is a double negation, it is a simple negation. The simple negation in French occurs with 2 particles. When the author says that it occurs in Romance languages, that's totally wrong, the double-particle French negation (and not double negation) is not present in Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, etc... The sources for this are "See the article regarding Romance languages explaining this form of double negation."

It is not a source!!! The author confuses the French negation, and the double negation, and doesn't give any sources! "French is the only Romance language to use double negation for its standard negation." ==> That's true

It's really ambiguous to use French to explain the difference between the English double negation and Romance languages, as French seems to have a double negation when it's not, this article is really explained poorly, the examples are not good. I added that "pas" only is not grammatical or proper, as your article seems to say it's normal and modern French and doesn't explain when. It's confusing for people who want to learn the language and read your article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.91.51.235 (talk • contribs) 22:26, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

The Romance examples are not true double negatives, as words like "personne" and "rien" could equally be translated "anyone" and "anything" rather than "no one" and "nothing". "Rien" comes from the Latin for "thing" (as in "I didn't see a thing"), while the primary meaning of "personne" is obvious. Similarly, words like "pas", "point" or "du tout" could be translated as "at all". --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 14:09, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

Slavic languages

I don't agree with what the article says about Russian and other Slavic languages. It says that multiple negatives affirm each other. That is just wrong. Double negatives - that is, double negative particle "не"/"ne" - cancel each other so that the sentence with double "ne" becomes positive. Examples: "не мог не прийти" ("ne mog ne pri'ti", lit. "could not not come") = had to come; "нельзя не сознаться" ("nel'zya ne soznat'sya", lit. "not possible to not confess") = "must confess", etc etc. Such double negatives are not infrequent.

The examples used in the article, such as "я ничего не знаю" ("ya nichevo ne znayu" - "I know nothing") and others are not double negatives, because they have only one negation particle "не"/"ne". The other parts of these examples use a different particle - "ни"/"ni" - which is not a negation particle by itself, it is just an auxiliary particle used in negative sentences, therefore it doesn't create "double negation" (in which case the negatives would cancel each other and the sentence would become positive, like in the examples above). TheInevitable (talk) 12:23, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

That would be an improvement to the article, but we need a citation and plausible examples of sentence clauses using the particles you have identified, please. --Ancheta Wis   (talk | contribs) 16:58, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

I tried. Maybe someone else can provide true double negative examples (where two negatives cancel each other) in other Slavic languages. TheInevitable (talk) 16:00, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

The listed Russian sentences are not examples of a double negative! They all express a single negation; only, the sentence object also happens to be a negated verb. Likewise, I do not want to misrepresent him is not a double negation, even though it contains not and mis-; similarly, I don't like him not following the guidance is not a double negative.

I will remove the Russian examples as misleading. — kashmīrī ^TALK 01:58, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

— Removed. — kashmīrī ^TALK 02:28, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

I fully disagree with your analysis of Я ничего не знаю. Ничто means "nothing", and Я ничего не знаю / I don't know nothing are good examples of double negatives in Russian and English respectively. To be clear, nothing, nobody, nowhere, never, etc., are considered negatives (negated pronouns or adverbs) for the purpose of this article. — kashmīrī ^TALK 02:23, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

"neither… nor…"

Even formal Standard English has some constructions where negation is expressed more than once, e.g. "neither… nor…" --Backinstadiums (talk) 18:15, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

But there the two negatives do not apply to the same thing, so it is not a true double negative. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 12:26, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

@Sirmylesnagopaleentheda: Backinstadiums Makes a valid point: "neither… nor…" is a double negative according to the article's definition, currently asserted as "a construction occurring when two forms of grammatical negation are used in the same sentence." Your post also makes a valid point, however, since I think the article's definition is misleading due to its generalization. Kashmiri intimated above (and I agreed) that a better definition might assert how a double negative is an aggregate negation that creates an affirmative effect vis-à-vis the same referent. Anyhow, that's how I look at it, and I bet mathematicians would agree. --Kent Dominic·(talk) 14:44, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

I shouldn't be surprised

How would you describe the extremely common usage "I wouldn't be surprised if it didn't rain today", where the speaker actually means that he or she would not be surprised if it did rain? It seems to me to be a form of double negative (or at any rate of the addition of an unnecessary negative). Any ideas? --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 14:05, 22 October 2020 (UTC)

Litotes. --Kent Dominic·(talk) 23:33, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

I don’t think so. In litotes the two negatives cancel each other out. Here one of them is meant and the other one is redundant. —Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 11:50, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

"I wouldn't be surprised if it didn't rain today" = Litotes. Don't be unsurprised if if I'm not shaking my head. --Kent Dominic·(talk) 17:17, 22 December 2020 (UTC)

That means that you expect that it won't rain. The usage I am talking about is where you mean that you expect it will. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 16:38, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

@Sirmylesnagopaleentheda: If so, then avoid using a double negative in the example: "I would be surprised if it didn't rain today." --Kent Dominic·(talk) 14:24, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

This is not a good example of a double negative. This is a compound sentence in which the first not negates the superior verb surprised, and the second not negates the subordinate verb rained. So, this is an example of two single negatives in two sequential sentences (the relationship between the sentences is not relevant here). Although the current wording of the article doesn't make it clear, double negative occurs when both negations relate to the same construct. — kashmīrī ^TALK 16:58, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

@Kashmiri: Look again: The article says, "A double negative is a construction occurring when two forms of grammatical negation are used in the same sentence." There's no requirement of negation regarding the same referent. Is your definition better than the article's? Perhaps. It's completely rational but contrasts the consensus (so far). For what it's worth, my WP:OR take on it is aggregate negation that creates an affirmative effect. So, "I'm not unsure that I'm right" (standard English) means "I'm sure I'm right"; "Don't make no mistake" (nonstandard English) literally means "Make a mistake" but the colloquial interpretation is pretty obviously "Don't make a mistake. Personally, I'd back you up if you changed the article according to what you've posted. Would you garner more support than just mine? Try it (or suggest it) and see. --Kent Dominic·(talk) 14:24, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

@Kent Dominic: The definition needs to be slightly modified to: A double negative is a construction occurring when two forms of grammatical negation are used in the same clause, so as to exclude compound sentences, such as: "I didn't tell her that I've never been to Canada" or "Nobody could foresee that so many guests will be unwell", which clearly do not contain double negatives. — kashmīrī ^TALK 15:15, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

I'd word it as, A double negative is syntax including two forms of grammatical negation that apply to the same referent, resulting in an affirmation of the referent. It goes beyond just clauses and can apply, off the top of my head, to predicate verbs ("That can't not work) and to a ADJP (e.g. "She's not unwell"). --Kent Dominic·(talk) 15:35, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Yep, much better than mine. But I fear this will be ignotum per ignotius for most readers... — kashmīrī ^TALK 17:46, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Oh, and without the latter part ("affirmation") – the article is precisely about explaining the differences between languages, and that in many of them double negation does not equal affirmation! — kashmīrī ^TALK 17:47, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

True. My observations are limited to English. I know that in a language like Spanish, my comments don't apply. --Kent Dominic·(talk) 20:40, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

@Sirmylesnagopaleentheda: In informal standard spoken English, a negative verb (without a negative meaning) is sometimes used after expressions of doubt or uncertainty, I wonder whether I oughtn't to go and see a doctor - I'm feeling a bit funny. --Backinstadiums (talk) 18:20, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

Very good point, and may well be the origin of the confusion.

The doctor example is really a case of an indirect question: in the direct form it would be "Shouldn't you go to the doctor", which expects the answer "Yes I should". "I wouldn't be surprised if it didn't rain" is not an indirect question at all, but just a case of miscounting the number of negatives: taken literally, it is the exact opposite of what the speaker is trying to say.

Again this is not uncommon in other languages. In Italian you say "finche non e arrivato" to mean "till he has arrived" (probably by association with "for as long as he hasn't arrived"). --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 12:25, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

I sense there is a high degree of confusion. The article is not about cases when a negated verb construct is used to express affirmation; nor about cases where a main clause contains a single negation of a subordinate clause that also happens to to be worded in a negated manner. For me, the concept of double negative refers strictly to the phenomenon when a single clause contains two (or more) negations with respect to the same referent: Je ne sais pas, Я ничего не знаю, You don't know nothin' [1]. — kashmīrī ^TALK 15:58, 2 July 2021 (UTC)