Re: Translation pattern of `to have'?

I'm joining this thread late, but I'm seeing a lot of what seems like
syntactic smoke and mirrors propogated, and I have to object.

> Nik:
> > At any rate, "A dog is had by me" doesn't sound anywhere near as bad
as
> > "A dog is been with me", which is completely senseless.
>
> That should be "A dog is been with by me".
>
> *"No dog may be had by convicted felons."
> = *"No dog may be been with by convicted felons."
This doesn't prove anything.  To begin with, although "No dog may be had
by convicted felons" is awkward, I wouldn't discount it as
ungrammatical.  Secondly, the second sentence is ungrammatical for a
reason that has nothing to do with possession.  You're trying to treat
"be with" as a transitive verb to equate it with "have," but the fact
remains that "be with" is BE + preposition in English, and BE does not
have a passive sense for obvious reasons.  Showing that "be with" cannot
be passivized shows only that BE cannot be passive in English, and does
not really indicate anything about the verb "have," especially since the
example you give for "have" above seems grammatical to me.  In fact, I
would take this to prove the non-equivalence of "have" and "be with."

> > "A dog is had by me" sounds grammatical to me--but only under an
> > unintended (and, in this context, rather dirty) reading of "have".
>
> I agree. And note that "the man with a dog" cannot mean "the man who
> has/had sexual congress with a dog". Therefore this is a different
homonymous
> HAVE, perhaps related to HAVE 'enjoy' in Nik's earlier "a good time
was
> had by all".
No, no, no.  All of the HAVEs here are in fact the same HAVE, only in
different idiomatic constructions.  Just because a verb can be
understood differently in various contexts does not mean that it is not
the same verb.  A quick mental search for idioms with GIVE, for example,
brings up give up, give out, give way, give head, give a damn, give
away, give in.  Are we then to posit at least seven different homonyms
GIVE in English?  Obviously not, and likewise 'have [sex with]' and
'have fun' are not different homonyms for HAVE, but various idioms
involving the same word HAVE.

Jesse Bangs