I wonder if anybody has an idea of how to describe the different between "no more than" and "not more than". There is one clear difference, that "no more than" is sometimes used idiomatically to mean "merely". You can say "He had no more than touched the door..." but can't say "he had not more than touched the door." "Not more than" seems to be used exclusively to refer to a quantity.

Any other ideas?

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As above, so below

No more than = upper limit

Not less than = lower limit

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"Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it." — Terry Pratchett, Reaper Man

441!!!! :)

Yes, but that's not the question being asked.

When "not" is correct, "no" is also correct. However, when "no" is correct, "not" is not always correct. I know that "not" is the one used in legal documents.

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

So, if I'm writing an illegal document, I should use "no".

-- Jeff, in Minneapolis

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http://www.FreeMars.org/jeff/

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