[What/ How high] are the odds of that?

Question

1. What are the chances of finding intelligent aliens?2. What are the odds of that?3. How high are the chances of finding intelligent aliens?4. How high are the odds of that?I'd like to know why #1 and #2 are used, not #3 and #4.Thank you in advance for your help.

AlpheccaStars · Accepted Answer

3. How high is the probability of finding intelligent aliens?
4. How good are the odds of that?

Probability is a gradable measure. It can be high or low; small or large The probability of finding intelligent aliens is 0.01%. That's pretty small.

Chance and odds are more discrete measures. The chance / odds of finding aliens is 1 in 10000.
We use the descriptors good, poor or no.
There is a good chance of finding life on other planets, but there is practically no chance of finding intelligent life.

Anonymous · Answer

The first pair are simply more idiomatic. But #3 doesn’t sound that bad.

Park sang joon · Answer

Thank you, AlpheccaStars, for your very helpful answer.

Then I'd like to know in my examples if "what"s indicate adjective complements, not noun complements.

AlpheccaStars · Answer

What are the odds?
What's the chance?
What's the probability?

What is a pronoun.

Park sang joon · Answer

Thank you, AlpheccaStars, for your continuing support.

Probability is a gradable measure. It can be high or low; small or large The probability of finding intelligent aliens is 0.01%. That's pretty small.
What's the probability?

I'd like to know if I can use "what" for measuring a probability.

What is a pronoun.

Then I was wondering if the pronoun "what" can indicate "no/ poor/ good."

[What/ How high] are the odds of that?

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