Re: "on" vs. "under"

[David R. Linn]

>> From: Joerg Anders <address@hidden>
>> Date: Fri, 13 Jul 2001 13:12:05 +0200 (CEST)
>> 
>> On Thu, 28 Jun 2001, David Raleigh Arnold wrote:
>> 
>> > There are some spelling errors in the docs easily correctible with
>> > search.
>> > Don't feel bad, many for whom English is the mother tongue have
>> > problems with this mess.  :-)
>> >
>> 
>> I don't know how welcome was this mail. But I found it very
>> interesting.
>> 
>> Perhaps I could append still 2 other language questions
>> (Excuse, I know that's outside the mailing list's topic! But it
>> has to to with creation of documentation for music related
>> software):
>> 
>> Is it:
>>      "The software runs/works only on Linux."
>> or:
>>      "The software runs/works only under Linux."
>> ?
>> 
>> I found both in Internet.
>> 
>> -----------------------------
>> 
>> Somebody told me that: "I'm afraid, it won't work.", is a synonyme
>> for "I'm sure, it won't work.". That's surpising for a German
>> because I'd guess it means "I'm in doubt whether it will work." ?


I'm afraid that, if you asked 10 native English speakers about "on"
versus "under", you'd get at least 11 opinions :-)

You can often find "I'm afraid that" as an introduction to a statement
that the speaker believes the hearer will find unpleasant and this phrase
is intended to "soften the blow", i.e. make the statement at least a little
less unpleasant.  Paradoxically, you'll *also find it used when the
speaker is *trying* to be unpleasant in a falsely polite manner.