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- Path: sparky!uunet!pipex!demon!pizzabox.demon.co.uk!gtoal
- Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
- From: gtoal@pizzabox.demon.co.uk (Graham Toal)
- Subject: another opposite in action (or is that 'inaction'?)
- Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 18:15:11 +0000
- Message-ID: <9301251815.AA19694@pizzabox.demon.co.uk>
- Sender: usenet@demon.co.uk
- Lines: 20
-
- Paraphrased from someone's posting on another group:
-
- : On a related note, does anyone know if <organisation name deleted>
- : have net access yet ? Much as I
- : would like to sell them <my product>, I doubt it would be
- : beyond their means.
-
- Clearly the use of 'I doubt that' here means 'I'm afraid that...'
- or 'I have no doubt that...'
-
- Whereas if wanted to say what he wanted to say, I'd have said
- "I doubt it would be within their means".
-
- Is the use above strange? The original poster like me is Scots,
- so that doesn't really give me any clues as to where this usage
- came from.
-
- G
-
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-