"Yes" VS. "No" isn't it interesting...
teacher:So,Jenny,are you married?

student:No.

teacher:Oh.So you are not married?

student:Yes.

teacher:You mean you are married?

student:No.

teacher:I see,so you are not married?

student:Yes.

teacher:Aaargh!

I know what the problem is...Jenny shouldn't have answered "Yes" when the teacher asked like:"so you are not married?" since she was really not married at the moment....which means she IS married when answering that question with "Yes".

she was thinking like:"I am not married,which is true,so I would say Yes!"
but actually native English speakers are not used to the way she did.

next is my question:

when someone says:"so you don't like Jenny because she's boring."
if I say yes or no, what exactly do I mean?...........

Question

"Yes" VS. "No"  isn't it interesting...
teacher:So,Jenny,are you married?

student:No.

teacher:Oh.So you are not married?

student:Yes. 

teacher:You mean you are married?

student:No.

teacher:I see,so you are not married?

student:Yes.

teacher:Aaargh!

I know what the problem is...Jenny shouldn't have answered "Yes" when the teacher asked like:"so you are not married?" since she was really not married at the moment....which means she IS married when answering that question with "Yes".

she was thinking like:"I am not married,which is true,so I would say Yes!"
but actually native English speakers are not used to the way she did.

next is my question:

when someone says:"so you don't like Jenny because she's boring."
if I say yes or no, what exactly do I mean?...........

Answer

"So you don't like Jenny because she's boring." 
No, I don't.
Yes, she is.
Yes, that's why.
If you answer like this, there is no ambiguity!!!!!

Answer

Eliot is spot on. I think the challenge is what we expect to hear as an answer versus the correct answers to questions with embedded negatives.   In your dialogue, the student answered each question with the appropriate logical answer, but it was still confusing.

So, you do not want breakfast? If you do not want to eat, the question is phrased in a way that "Yes" is the  correct, logical answer.  But, it is morning and I expect you to want breakfast.  So when I hear "Yes" I think "Yes I do want breakfast" instead of "Yes, you are correct, I do not want breakfast.". Frequently, informal conversations are more emotional than rational, so providing unambiguous answers like Eliot suggests can be necessary.

Answer

I think that depends on what would you say after "yes" or "no". You can say "Yes, I like her" or "Yes, she's boring", "No, I don't like her", "No, she's not boring", "No, she's boring but I like her" etc. We have many ways, just have to choose what say next to "yes" or "no".

Answer

I could not resist finding this video for you.  It is a classic in American comedy.  It is a dialogue between Abbott and Costello, a very famous comedy team from the 1940's to 1950's whose performances were on TV through my childhood in the 1960's and 1970's.

It is an example of your ambiguous dialogue but it concerns a baseball team whose players have the names; Who, What, I Don't Know, Why, Because, Tomorrow, Today and I Don't Care. The video is about 7 minutes long and is not difficult to understand, even though, as you will see, it is difficult for one of the people to understand the names of the players on the team.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sShMA85pv8M

Answers · 4

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