The Volokh Conspiracy
At The Volokh Conspiracy, Neal Whitman writes
1. Everyone can’t fit on the bus.
I was confused. Did she seriously mean to say that not a single one of us could fit on the bus? How was that possible? Oh, wait—she must mean that not everyone could fit on the bus. But even when I’d figured out what she’d really meant, mentally attaching the intended meaning to the actual utterance was like trying to push two magnets together the wrong way.
Neil goes on to analyze this in some detail. I certainly see the ambiguity, but if I were trying to convey Neal’s preferred meaning it would never occur to me to say 1. I’m pretty sure I would always say
No one can fit on the bus.
Thursday, June 24th, 2004