Stop him from smoking/Stop him or his smoking

[Hansman]

1) Stop him from smoking.
2) Stop him or his smoking.

I have learned that the two sentences carry the same meaning although the structures are different.

I think that 'smoking' in #1 is an object of 'from' and 'smoking' in #2 is an object of 'stop' and 'him' in #1 is an object of 'stop' and 'him' in #2 is a subject of the gerund 'smoking' in meaning and 'his' is replaceable with 'him' in #2. Is this right?

Is it right that two sentences with different structures carry the same meaning?
Is there a case when the two structures can be different in meaning?

 

[emsr2d2]

Who told you that "Stop him or his smoking" is a grammatical sentence? I wonder if you meant to indicate two separate sentences there - "Stop him smoking" and "Stop his smoking". Is that right?

 

[Tarheel]

You can make the second one make sense only if you change it radically, thus: Stop him!

 

[Annabel Lee]

1) Stop him from smoking.

I wouldn't expect to hear this sentence in a normal context. In a normal context, we'd say, "Get him to stop smoking"; the smoker himself is the agent of cessation. In "Stop him from smoking," by contrast, we have an outside agent of cessation. The order seems to be to do something to prevent the smoker from smoking, whether by physically blocking a cigarette from reaching his mouth or by enacting a rule forbidding smoking in whatever area the speaker may have in mind.

 

[Tarheel]

More natural would be:

Get him to stop smoking.

Or something like that.

 

[Hansman]

Who told you that "Stop him or his smoking" is a grammatical sentence? I wonder if you meant to indicate two separate sentences there - "Stop him smoking" and "Stop his smoking". Is that right?

You are right.
I am sorry for it.