Differences

[kahhong]

helo!

what is these two sentences mean?

1-1 i do not know any about him.


2-2 i do not know much about him.



the sentences above is countable or vice versa?

thank.


Warmest Regards,


-kahhong

[hector51]

helo!
what is these two sentences mean?
1-1 i do not know any about him.
2-2 i do not know much about him.
the sentences above is countable or vice versa?
thank.
Warmest Regards,
-kahhong

When you say:"I do not know any about him" ,that means you have no idea who he is.
But when you say:"I do not know much about him" that can be known from this sentence that you know very little about him.
So,that's the difference between the two sentences.

[rewboss]

The first sentence is wrong: it should be, "I do not know anything about him."

If you read "anything" for "any", then hector51's answer is very good. "I don't know anything" means the same as "I know nothing". Maybe I know his name and what he looks like, but that's all. "I don't know much about him" means I know a little bit about him -- but only a little bit.

[kahhong]

thank.. hmm.. why we could'nt use i do not know any about him instead of anything?

[rewboss]

Because "any" cannot function as a noun. It is an adjective, and it needs a noun it can modify. The word "anything" is a pronoun, and a pronoun is something that can be used in place of a noun.

"Anything" belongs to the same class of words as "something" and "nothing"; "any" belongs to the same class of words as "some" and "no" (when used as an adjective).

Here are some examples:

"I didn't buy any eggs today." ("any" is the adjective, "eggs" is the noun it goes with)

"I asked you to buy a dozen eggs. Why didn't you get any?" (It looks as if "any" is wrong here. But we know that we are talking about eggs -- we already mentioned that in the previous sentence. So "any" really means "any eggs".)

"It was very dark. I couldn't find anything." (We need a pronoun here. If you said, "I couldn't find any", the noun would be missing, and the other person would ask: "You couldn't find any what?")