"inferior than" - Re: New to me

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

On Dec 29, 2007, at 11:21 AM, i wrote:

> ... MWDEU notes occurrences of "twice as many ... than" and "twice as
> much ... than" -- which it treats as syntactic blends (of "more ...
> than" and "twice as many/much ... as"), though they can be seen just
> as extensions of comparative "than" into new territory.

back in april i collected a pile of examples by googling on {"twice as
likely" than}, e.g.:

  Individuals with Genetic Conditions Twice as Likely to Report Denial
of Health Insurance than Individuals with Other Chronic Illness.
http://www.jhsph.edu/publichealthnews/press_releases/2007/kass_genetic_testing.html

  The study found that children ages 6 to 11 and ages 12 to 17 who
were obese were more than twice as likely to have diabetes than
children of the same age ...
http://www.ns.umich.edu/htdocs/releases/story.php?id=77

here there's material intervening between "twice as likely" and
"than".  but there are plenty of examples of "twice as likely than":

  ... patients with major depression appear twice as likely than those
who are not depressed to die or be re-admitted to the hospital within
12 months.
http://www.scienceblog.com/communityolder/2001/B/200111881.html

  MONDAY, July 24 (HealthDay News) -- Men with multiple sclerosis (MS)
are more than twice as likely than women with the illness to pass it
on to their ...
http://www.multiplesclerosis.com/admin/templates/news.aspx?articleid=348&zoneid=50

take note of the sources.

arnold

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