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A double negative is a construction occurring when two forms of grammatical negation are used in the same sentence. This is typically used to convey a different shade of meaning from a strictly positive sentence ("You're not unattractive" vs "You're attractive").
In propositional logic, the double negation of a statement states that "it is not the case that the statement is not true". In classical logic, every statement is logically equivalent to its double negation, but this is not true in intuitionistic logic; this can be expressed by the formula A ≡ ~(~A) where the sign ≡ expresses logical equivalence and the sign ~ expresses negation.
The exact negation of this phrase would be expressed as "you don't have to go" or "you needn't go". The negation "must not" has a stronger meaning (the effect is to apply the logical negation to the following infinitive rather than applying it to the full clause with must).
Negative concord, also called "double negation", as in I didn't go nowhere; if the sentence is negative, all negatable forms are negated. This contrasts with standard written English convention, which interprets a double negative to mean a positive (although this was not always so; see double negative ).
In rhetoric, litotes (/ l aɪ ˈ t oʊ t iː z, ˈ l aɪ t ə t iː z /, US: / ˈ l ɪ t ə t iː z /), [1] also known classically as antenantiosis or moderatour, is a figure of speech and form of irony in which understatement is used to emphasize a point by stating a negative to further affirm a positive, often incorporating double negatives for effect.
/ He does own one! = No creo que él tenga coche. / ¡Sí lo tiene!). The word no is the standard adverb placed next to a verb to negate it (Yo no tengo coche = I don't own a car). Double negation is normal and valid in Spanish, and it is interpreted as reinforcing the negation (No tengo ningún coche = I own no car).
The actor previously said he really likes his "quiet life" and was "fairly serious" about retiring
Within a system of classical logic, double negation, that is, the negation of the negation of a proposition , is logically equivalent to . Expressed in symbolic terms, . In intuitionistic logic, a proposition implies its double negation, but not conversely. This marks one important difference between classical and intuitionistic negation.