On Tuesday 11 December 2018 12:31:46 Greg Wooledge wrote: > On Tue, Dec 11, 2018 at 06:22:56PM +0100, Thomas Schmitt wrote: > > Dan Ritter wrote: > > > The English use it more than Americans do. > > > > In school it was a big deal to distinguish "will" and "shall". > > (I was very eager to forget the exact rules when nobody cared any > > more.) > > Americans (at least in my part of the country) never use "shall" at > all. To us, it simply sounds archaic. We'd expect it in the King > James Bible, or in certain kinds of fantasy literature.
Or in legal here in the US, where "may" tends to mean never for personal/political reasons on the part of the county official in charge and "shall" says will without a personal choice in the matter. We only changed one word in a law from may to shall, 20+ years ago which the same statewide. That was huge. -- Cheers, Gene Heskett -- "There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order." -Ed Howdershelt (Author) Genes Web page <http://geneslinuxbox.net:6309/gene>
