Travis Calvert

According to the laws of logic, a person cannot both have money and have no money in the same sense at the same time. Either one has money or they don't. "Do" means "do", "don't" means "don't", and those are opposite from each other. This is basic logical English. So, when someone says they don't have no money, it can't mean they don't have any money.
 
Consider this double negative principle:


- If you don't have money, then you have no money. But if you have money, then you don't have no money.


This is simply an application of logic and basic English. If you have money, then of course you don't have no money, you do have money! You have what you have!
 
Words have meanings. Double negative statements logically end as positive statements. To say you don't have no money is to deny the notion that you have no money - which is to logically affirm that you do have money.

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If you teach this to your friends like I did, and they challenge you like they did me, then you will be hit with a thought provoking question:

"I didn't not, not, not, not, not, haven't, did not, didn't haven't not seen the movie. So did I see it, or not?"

There are two good ways you can reply to this. One way, is: "What?"

Another way is to directly answer their question. You can do this by counting the number of negative words they speak. Remember the simple rule that two negatives cancel each other out. If there is an even number of negatives, then all negatives have been canceled out, so the answer is positive. If there is an odd number of negatives, then one negative did not get canceled out, so the answer is negative. So the answer to your clever friend's question is, "Duh, they did not see the movie".

But, perhaps the best answer would be to throw a book at your friend, and say, "Dude, what just happened to your English?".