it doesn't behoove you

[Laurence Horn]

At 12:19 PM -0400 9/3/10, Dan Goncharoff wrote:
>Just a thought -- isn't the use of "behoove" part of a more general
>confusion between the concepts of "not required to ..." and "required
>not to ..."?
>
>Even sticking with a definition of "advantageous", saying something is
>not advantageous doesn't mean it makes you worse off. If you say it is
>advantageous not to do something, then you are better off not doing
>it.
>
>DanG

Well, the literature on neg-raising does worry about such issues,
although generally not by regarding the strengthened meanings as
simple confusion.  (The question would then arise as to why some
concepts are confused and others aren't, and why some concepts are
confused in one dialect but not in another. And when we say "I don't
want to" are we virtually always confused about the difference
between not-wanting and wanting-not?)

Now, it's generally acknowledged that even when a the stronger,
neg-raised reading (or as Aristotle would call it, a contrary
reading) is available, as with "it's not advisable to go" = 'it's
advisable not to', the weaker, literal ("contradictory") reading is
also available, so the result is ambiguity.  Note that here as is
often the case, the prefixal form ("it's inadvisable to go", "it's
disadvantageous to go") removes the ambiguity and allows only the
stronger meaning.  So saying that something is not advantageous
(unlike "disadvantageous") can be taken either way--a denial of the
claim that it makes you better off, or a suggestion than in fact it
makes you worse off.  But I'd say "not required to" doesn't really
exhibit this ambiguity.  If I tell you "You're not required to apply
in writing", there's no specific reading "You're required not to
apply in writing" the way there is with "it's not advantageous
to"--or with "you're not supposed to" (where in fact it's pretty hard
to take the negation as simply denying supposed-to-ness).  The
question then is why does "behoove" pattern (for some) with "supposed
to" or "be advantgeous to" rather than, as we might expect, with "be
required to".

LH

>
>On Fri, Sep 3, 2010 at 11:10 AM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:
>>  ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>-----------------------
>>  Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>  Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>>  Subject:      Re: it doesn't behoove you
>>
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>  At 12:11 PM +0100 9/3/10, Lynne Murphy wrote:
>>>I don't really see why the Ciudad Juarez example is remarkable.  Seems like
>>>an application of the sense 'be advantageous'.  It would not be an
>>>advantage to you to go to CJ. And an easily accessible implicature from
>>>that statement is: 'it would be a disadvantage to you to go'.
>>>
>>>Lynne
>>
>>  Right, but I agree that it's a bit odd given the environments in
>>  which "neg-raising", i.e. the association of a higher (main clause)
>>  negation with a lower (embedded clause) meaning, tends to occur.*
>>  The classic instances of this phenomenon involve verbs like "want" or
>>  "think/believe" (or both, as in "I don't think she wants to leave"
>>  meaning "I think she wants to stay").  But we do get these readings
>>  with modals of weak obligation like "ought to", "should", "better",
>>  or "supposed to", so "you're not supposed to go" will usually be
>>  interpreted as "you're supposed to stay".  The thing is that
>>  "behoove" might be expected to pattern with stronger obligation verbs
>>  like "have to", which doesn't license such interpretations (in
>>  English), so "you don't have to go" isn't read with the meaning "you
>>  have to stay", nor is "it's not necessary/obligatory for you to go"
>>  read as "it's necessary/obligatory for you not to go".  (Compare
>>  French, where "il ne faut pas que tu ailles" does mean "il faut que
>>  tu n'ailles pas".)  What's remarkable here, if anything is, is that
>  > "behoove" is used in the CJ example as a "neg-raiser", even though
>>  its meaning is more like "be obligatory/required to" or (an
>>  impersonal version of) "have to".  So you'd think that all "it
>>  doesn't behoove you to" should mean is that you're under no
>>  behooving-type obligation, as with "it's not incumbent on you to go".
>>  Instead it's more like "it doesn't suit you to..." or other verbs
>>  whose meaning is a bit weaker than than of "behoove".  On the other
>>  hand, the fact that (as noted upthread) we don't really use "behoove"
>>  a hell of a lot (compared with our Dutch cousins, who are quite fond
>>  of their "hoeven"), and even less when it's negated (compared with,
>>  say, "have to" or "be supposed to"), may have resulted in the meaning
>>  of "it doesn't behoove" being up for grabs.
>>
>>  LH
>>
>>  *Whether this association is an instance of "easily accessible
>>  implicature(s)", semantics, or grammar has long been up for grabs,
>>  but it's clear that the verb matters, so there's a difference
>>  between, say, "I didn't think the Red Sox would collapse" (= I
>>  thought they wouldn't) and "I didn't claim the Red Sox would
>>  collapse" (=/= I claimed they wouldn't).  Or "I don't want to see
>>  you" vs. "I don't hope to see you".  And (ObADS) there's the role of
>>  dialect as well; compare "I don't guess the Rays will finish ahead of
>>  the Yankees" (= 'I guess they won't') as uttered in Alabama vs. New
>>  Jersey.
>>
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