Thank you. (imerative sentence?)

[sitifan]

1. Thanks a lot.
2. Thank you very much.
Are #1 and #2 imperative sentences?

 

[jutfrank]

1 isn't. 2 arguably is.

Does it matter? Why are you asking this question?

 

[sitifan]

I have found an answer on the Internet.
https://www.quora.com/Which-type-of-sentence-is-Thank-you-very-much

 

[Tarheel]

My answer:

I don't know, and I don't care.

Such questions do not get you where you want to go.

Native speakers do not ponder such things.

 

[emsr2d2]

It could only be an imperative as "Thank me/him/her/us/them very much". A speaker can't demand that "you" thank "you". If, in a very convoluted context, you need to tell someone to do that, you'd say "Thank yourself very much!"

 

[Charlie Bernstein]

It's not imperative because it's not telling someone to do something.

"Go to bed" is imperative.

" thank you" is a simple statement.

 

[jutfrank]

It is the speaker who is expressing thanks, not the person addressed. It can't be imperative.

Yes, absolutely. I don't know what led me to say that it arguably is. There's no argument to be made at all. That was a case of impatiently responding without thinking carefully about what I said.

Sorry, sitifan, to dismiss your question like that. It's a perfectly reasonable one.