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river1974
Joined: 20 May 2003 Posts: 525 Location: Taiwan
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Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 7:53 pm Post subject: and/but |
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Dear teachers:
(a) She uses the money to purchase mutual funds, and not shares.
(b) She uses the money to purchase mutual funds, but not shares.
What is the difference between the two, and which one is more natural? Thanks. |
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lotus

Joined: 25 Jan 2004 Posts: 862
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Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 10:21 pm Post subject: |
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Hi river1974,
An extremely subtle difference I think.
(A) She use(d) the money to purchase mutual funds, and not (stock) shares.
(B) She use(d) the money to purchase mutual funds, but not (stock) shares.
The structure of A implies that she had a choice (or the ability) to buy either mutual funds, or stocks, or both.
The structure of B implies that she could purchase mutual funds or stocks, but not necessarily both. This structure is what we call "mutually exclusive."
If, in reality, she had enough money to buy one or the other or both, then A is probably more appropriate.
If we knew that she only had enough money to buy one or the other but not both, then B would be more appropriate.
--lotus |
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river1974
Joined: 20 May 2003 Posts: 525 Location: Taiwan
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Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 6:13 pm Post subject: |
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Thanks lotus. Your explanations are so clear that the difference between the two sentences is now clear to me.  |
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