twice more or twice as many

[Kotfor]

Are both correct?

1) This bag is twice bigger.
2) This bag is twice as big.

Plus do you agree with this article

This is something that has been bugging me a long time, so I just had to make a write-up to clarify the subject a bit.
A very common mistake, or just something people don't really pay attention to or care about, is to say "two times more" (or any number of times, two is just an example here) when they actually mean "twice as much".
"But they're the same, what's the difference?" I hear people already murmuring inside their heads. Wrong, they're not the same, and the difference can be (in a very concrete, real-life way) huge. I'll give you a couple of examples to clarify the difference.


If you have one dollar and I promise to give you one time more (meaning 100% more) it's very easy, grade-school math to calculate that 1 + 1 * 1 = 2. When people say "it costs two times more" they often mean that something, which used to cost 1 dollar now costs 2 dollars. But, how could that be when it was already shown that just "one time more" already makes that 1-dollar item cost 2 dollars; how could "two times more" be as much as "one time more"? The answer is simple: it isn't - "two times more" would make that 1-dollar item cost 3 dollars (1 + 2 * 1 = 3)! "X times more" means addition on top of what you already have!

http://everything2.com/title/Two+times+more+--+or+twice+as+much%3F

 

[charliedeut]

Are both correct?

1) This bag is twice bigger.
2) This bag is twice as big.

I would say only #2 is correct (if you add something to compare this bag to; "this (red) bag is twice as big as the blue one", for example).

 

[Raymott]

They're both correct. Obviously there's something missing in both though.
The literal meaning is different, but they are more often than not used to mean the same, ie. twice as big.

 

[charliedeut]

I had never seen "twice bigger". I had seen (and even used) "twice the size of". It never occured to me that "twice bigger" could be an option. May its use be exclusive in AusE?

 

[Raymott]

May its use be exclusive in AusE?

Could it be? No. It's not. We get this question occasionally. "Twice bigger" is not often used, but larger numbers eg. "ten times bigger" to mean "ten times as big" is used wrongly everywhere.

 

[charliedeut]

Oh, I see. Thanks for clarifying.

PS: I did not intend to bug you (or anyone else, for that matter) when I asked about it being solely used in Australia. My ignorance was not in the least feigned. Sorry if my wording did not make that clear enough.

 

[Raymott]

PS: I did not intend to bug you

You didn't bug me. I rephrased your question because "May its use be exclusive in AusE?" is wrong.
If I thought your ignorance was feigned, I would not have bothered explaining it. Did my answer bug you?

 

[charliedeut]

Not at all. I wouldn't have thanked you for it if it had bugged me. I mistook your rephrasing for sarcasm That was all. :up:

 

[SoothingDave]

Charlie, "twice bigger" strikes me as odd as well. Like Raymott said, it is not as likely or natural as something like "ten times bigger."

As for the original poster, I would avoid the entire structure of "two times more" because of the potential for confusion about exactly what is meant (and what people may understand).