Short of / on

Question

"Let's get something quick and fast""We are short on /of time"Hello, I am interested in syntax and I am wondering if "quick and fast" modifies "something" or they modify "get" in the sentence or either way is fine and the meanings of the two are the same to native English speakers?And in "be short of /on time", "on" and "of" are interchangeable?I think considering meanings, "quick and fast" modifies "something" behind and "on and "of" are interchangeable. What do native English speakers think? Thank you as usual in advance.

Philip · Accepted Answer

Short of & short on can be used interchangeably. 'on' sounds a bit uneducated to my ear.

Quick& fast act as adverbs here, (modifying 'get') although quick is really an adjective only.

CalifJim · Answer

PhilipShort of & short on can be used interchangeably. 'on' sounds a bit uneducated to my ear.

This surprises me. I know a Google argument won't convince you, but according to Mrs. Google, twice as many people say "short on time" than say "short of time" -- which was about what I expected.

I wonder if this means twice as many people are uneducated as are educated.

CJ

CalifJim · Answer

Kwang Hee HanI am wondering if "quick and fast" modifies "something" or they modify "get" in the sentence or either way is fine and the meanings of the two are the same to native English speakers?

This is a good question. (We usually say that when it's a question that is difficult to answer.)

My first instinct is to say it's

Let's get [ something quick and fast ]. ~ Let's get something that is quick and fast to get.

At least that's how my brain works out the meaning.
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However, I can also see that it can be

Let's get [ something ] quick and fast. ~ *Let's [ quickly and fast get ] something.
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Though it may seem bizarre, it can also be

Let's get [ something quick ] and fast. ~ Let's get something that is quick to get, and get it fast.
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Logically, if you get something that is quick and fast to get, you probably get it quickly and fast. In that sense, the two interpretations lead to the same conclusion. So there are multiple interpretations, which suggests multiple meanings, but each interpretation leads to the same situation if you follow the consequences of the logic of each interpretation, and that suggests only one meaning. I think that the way out of this puzzle is to say that there can be differences in the details of the analyses, but that nevertheless the final result (meaning) can be essentially the same regardless of the details of the analysis.

CJ

Fivejedjon · Answer

CalifJimThough it may seem bizarre, it can also beLet's get [ something quick ] and fast. ~ Let's get something that is quick to get, and get it fast.

Although it is indeed a little bizarre, I think it's probably the most likely interpretation. It would sound a little strange to me if we used the two near-synonyms together in that way with the other suggested meanings ofthe sentence. In speech there would be a slight pause after 'quick', and a comma in the written form would help.

I think that most careful writers would write the full version suggested by CJ, not the rather ambiguous short version.

Philip · Answer

Interesting here.  When I first responded, I took "get" to mean "understand."  As CJ alluded, the mind doesn't always work the same way every day.  I saw the two parts of the original post as totally unrelated.

Short of / on

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