Use of Much with Adjectives

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{quote=MrPedantic}
[1'] She isn't greatly to be admired.
[2'] She isn't greatly missed.
[4'] She isn't greatly missing her family.

Yes, those are all fine. But a strange thing: without context, the positive versions of these sentences sound 'straightforward'. They mean what they say. But the negative versions have an air of irony – in other words, they aren't simple 180 degree negations of the positives.

'She is greatly missing her family' – she feels a little tearful when she thinks of them.

'She isn't greatly missing her family' – she spends every night clubbing and doesn't give her family a second thought. (Perhaps not even a first thought.)
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Hello MrPedantic, Thank you for your reply, it's viognier, ... it's 'alter ego' of Roro, kind of. Sorry, but let me make a comment.

For me it seems interesting that we cannot quantify some 'negative' state, in a usual combination of 'not' + 'intensifier.'

(# ?She is missed at all.)
# She is much/greatly missed.
# She is not much/greatly missed.

# She is not missed.
# She is not missed at all.

There's one more thing which seems interesting for me; we discussed over 'verbal character of pres./past participles,' somewhere long-long before. It appears that I didn't realise the issue then. I mean: if participles work as a part of progressive/passive constructions, then they are not adjectives, so we cannot modify it by much, .... no?

Seems sentences should be 'stative' in order to be modified by some intencifier.

(I don't know, maybe I'm wrong or talking a matter of course for you all. I'm afraid I made your discussion disordered. I'll agree with any proposal. We'd better take a rest?)

Roro / viognier

Roro wrote:

We can say [I ran a mile slowly yesterday], but not [I ran a mile very much/a lot(/greatly) yesterday]. What do 'slowly' or 'a lot' modify...? Do they work differently..? I got interested in such a kind of question now!

Hello　Roro/Viognier

As Nona pointed out and you too know it, "He walked seven miles a lot yesterday" is wrong. It is because "seven miles" and "a lot" (= a long distance) come to the same position syntactically (please compare "He walked senen miles yesterday" and "He walked a lot yesterday"). So the two phrases semantically conflict each other. On the other hand, there is no oddness in "He walked a lot slowly yesterday"). "Slowly" here clearly modifies "walked" as a manner adverb. According to the traditional grammar, "seven miles" (or "a lot") is also categorized as an adverbial. But is it true "slowly" and "seven miles" are the same in the syntactic position? I don't think so.

Let me take another sentence: "He walked two hours yesterday". This sentence should sound natural to native speakers' ears, and we can add "slowly" to this sentence too: "He walked two hours slowly yesterday". And again, if you use the knowledge from the traditional grammar, you can categorize this "two hours" as a duration-connoting adverb. If we use "seven miles" and "two hours" in the same single sentence, we might make a sentence like "He walked seven miles two hours yesterday". Does it sound natural to you? I think it may sound weird to most native speakers. They would say rather "He walked seven miles in/for two hours yesterday" or "He walked two hours at seven miles yesterday". Why is it so? It is because the sentence "He walked seven miles" or "He walked two hours" is actually not a <S+V+M> construct but a <S+V+O> construct. In these sentences "seven miles" or "two hours" functions not as a modifier (M) of "walked" but as an object (O) of "walked" (some grammarians call "adverbial objectives"). The traditional grammar classes "walk" in such sentences as an intransitive verb. But actually native speakers often use it as a transitive verb especially in spoken English. The verb "walk" can take a construct of <S+V+O>, but it never takes a double objective construction, i.e.,<S+V+O+O>. This is the reason that "He walked seven miles two hours yesterday" sounds weird to native speakers. By the same reason, they would say "He walked the street" or "He walked the street for ten minutes" but they wouldn't say "He walked the street ten minutes".

paco

Hello paco again.
I have an elementary question: what's the difference, 〖 in meaning 〗, between:
#1 He walked two hours.
#2 He walked for two hours.

I've learned that #1 is more natural. But #2 is natural too, isn't it?

I think if there's some conflict in combination, it should be explained【 semantically】❒
In my most humble opinion.
Thus we take a different point of view. I'm not good at arguing my opinion, but I really hope that you're enjoying this talk as mush as I am!

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Hello paco again (and again), just one word:
This point of your's is interesting.

#1 He walked seven miles two hours yesterday...{?}
But
#2 He walked seven miles in/for two hours yesterday...{ok}

Although I'm not sure about if we should consider [He walked two hours] as [SVO]. Not to be rude to you, paco.
I remember your former argument. I'll take a look them again.

(Semantically, I guess, we are forced to ignore the difference between [two hours] and [for two hours]. As far as I know. And there's no marked distinction neither in Japanese nor in Russian, generally speaking.)
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Summerizing: there's still room for me. But I repeat: I'd better come out again after first forgetting all my opinions. After that my idea would be rearranged.

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