Care less
“I couldn’t care less” is used to express complete indifference according to the dictionary I use. I always wonder how it could be interpreted this way while it sounds like a double negative though I have heard of this quite often.
Then I stumbled on to “I could care less” which has exactly the same meaning and usage but allegedly used by Americans only. No wonder I never heard it said where I live. However this one makes more sense to me.
How does the former get to mean what it means in the real world while it literally means the opposite, i.e. “I have to care”?
Top answer
healer I couldn’t care less. ~ It would not be possible for me to care less than I do care, that is, not at all. ) healer I could care less.
- healer I couldn’t care less.
- ~ It would not be possible for me to care less than I do care, that is, not at all.
- ) healer I could care less.
- ~ It would be possible for me to care even less than I do care.
- ) It's possible to understand this second form as an abbreviation of " There's no way I could care less" (which in fact paraphrases the first form).
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healerI couldn’t care less.
~ It would not be possible for me to care less than I do care, that is, not at all. (This is the literal meaning and the intended meaning of the quoted expression.)
healerI could care less.
~ It would be possible for me to care even less than I do care. (This is the liter
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