Re: pro-anything

FFlores wrote:
> Almost. You can't modify a pronoun with an adjective
> (in English, at least), except in constructions like
> "Angry and frustrated, he walked" which would be more
> like short for "Feeling angry..." (i. e. adverbial, not
> adjectival).
Granted.  And pronouns can't be preceded by definite articles, i.e.,
*_the he_ is completely senseless.

> Of course your argument is true with respect to "do" as
> a pro-verb: it is not one. But it comes close -- it can
> take almost any meaning!
But, as I said, it's debatable whether those aren't simply contractions
of "did kill", etc., as the do auxiliaries have very odd behavior in
English, obligatory in all but positive statements (at least in higher
registers), when they can only be used emphatically!  "do you see?" not
*"see you?", and only in colloquial registers, "ya see?", and even in
colloquial statements, it can't be used for negation, "you don't see",
not *"you not see".  BUT in a positive statement it suddenly becomes a
very awkward word!  "You do see" is of questionable gramaticalness in
most dialects, unless the "do" is emphasized.  Anyhoo, my point is that
"do" is a *very* strange word overall.

--
"It's bad manners to talk about ropes in the house of a man whose father
was hanged." - Irish proverb
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