Talk:immediately
category[change]
@Brett: In CGEL, it is viewed as an adverb which can license a content clause. What's the justification for its prepositional entry here?
--Victor Bob [talk] 14:41, 13 November 2023 (UTC)
- Yes, p. 572 has it and directly as adverbs. It seems to me less plausible that there are only two adverbs that take clausal complements than that these two words are prepositions in these contexts. Unfortunately, you can't test it with modification with right because of the semantic overlap, and there's no context in which it would plausibly be a goal complement, again because it doesn't have a goal semantics. I can't think of another test to do, but, again, why only two adverbs with clausal complements?--Brett (talk) 14:54, 13 November 2023 (UTC)
- I note that in OMEG, they are also regarded as clause-taking adverbs. In their clause-licensing use, is there any possibility that they are actually ellipses of immediately after and directly after? That possibility would suggest that they originally were intensifiers so they of course cannot be modified by some other intensifier like right. Victor Bob [talk] 15:09, 13 November 2023 (UTC)
- That is likely their historical evolution, but a word's origin can't tell us what category it belongs to today.--Brett (talk) 17:48, 13 November 2023 (UTC)
- I note that in OMEG, they are also regarded as clause-taking adverbs. In their clause-licensing use, is there any possibility that they are actually ellipses of immediately after and directly after? That possibility would suggest that they originally were intensifiers so they of course cannot be modified by some other intensifier like right. Victor Bob [talk] 15:09, 13 November 2023 (UTC)