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楼主: Effyue

求解释!!Often major economic shifts are so gradual as to be indistinguishable at fi

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发表于 2020-10-17 12:03:02 | 显示全部楼层
来源: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/180776/the-use-of-so-x-as-to-be-y


'so (x) as to (y)' and 'so (x) that (y)'
The Original Poster noted that so (x) as to (y) and so (x) that (y) constructions are similar. They are, but they are certainly not the same. There are important semantic and grammatical differences. First, however, let us consider the similarities. Firstly, the function of the as and that clauses are the same. They both provide an index for the interpretation of the adverb so. Secondly, the clauses both describe some kind of result.

However, as the OP also noted, the grammar of the two constructions is different. Here is how it’s different: firstly, as in the first construction is obligatory, that in the second is not:

so foolish as to be amusing.
so foolish to be amusing. * (wrong)
so foolish that it is amusing.
so foolish it is amusing.
This mirrors the fact that as in the first construction is a preposition and heads the phrase. That in the second is a subordinator and merely marks the phrase that follows as subordinate. Moreover, the verb in the as construction, as we noted, is non-finite. It has no tensed verb. Instead it uses an infinitive. The clause cannot stand on its own:

To cause her to burst into tears. (not a full sentence).
The clause marked by that on the other hand is a finite clause with a verb that has tense. The clause can stand as a sentence in its own right:

It is amusing.
Lastly, we previously noted that the subject in the as phrase is omitted in a so (x) as to (y) sentence. The subject in the clause with that contrastingly must be overtly stated:

It was so foolish as to be amusing.
It was so foolish that it was amusing.
It was so foolish that was amusing. * (wrong)
So much for the grammar. The OP also wondered about the semantics of as and that. Well, as, as discussed above introduces some kind of benchmark which is met or exceeded. That appears to have no meaning at all - a point reinforced by the fact that we can miss it out altogether without it affecting the meaning of the sentence. More fundamentally important however, is that the two constructions do not mean the same thing. They do not have the same truth values. Consider the sentence below:

My pet cobra had a venom so powerful as for its bite to kill a grown adult in less than thirty seconds.
Because the verb in the subordinate clause is an infinitive, it gives a theoretical meaning to the proposition it introduces. The proposition may or may not have actually occurred. The result shown, which is of an adult dying from the venom within thirty seconds of being bitten, is hypothetical, not factual in the sense of describing a real individual who died. In the construction with that the verb is tensed. This usually encodes that the sentence be considered as a factual state of affairs, not a hypothetical one. Compare the example above with the following:

My pet cobra had a venom so powerful that its bite killed a grown adult in less than thirty seconds.
This sentence is rather more alarming than the first, because it involves a factual, not notional fatality. The so (x) as to (y) construction implies a notional result, the so (x) that (y) sentence on the other hand entails a factual result.

Conclusion
In so … as to sentences, so is a deictic adverb of degree. So receives its interpretation from its intensity being indexed by a notional result (which may or may not be interpreted as having actually happened). This result is described in a non-finite clause headed by the preposition as. Where to follows the preposition, the subject of the clause is omitted, and is interpreted as being identical to the subject of the main clause. The to in this construction is part of an infinitival verb phrase, it is not part of an as to idiom, or an as to subordinator. Although so … as to sentences bear certain similarities to so … that sentences, they are materially different constructions, both in terms of meaning and form.
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