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I faced a problem to answer a negative question, for example, when someone asks you:

Don't you have any money?

It's a yes/no question but how should one answer the question without ambiguity?

When you answer "yes", does it mean "yes, I don't have any money"? or the other way "Yes, I do have money"? the questioner may think you are agreeing to the negative, that yes, you do not have any money.

I know it's better to answer with "on the contrary" but is it possible to answer yes or no?

Justin
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Gigili
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    "Yes, we have no bananas - we have no bananas todaaaaay..." – MT_Head Jun 04 '11 at 22:21
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    Have your stopped beating your wife yet? – mplungjan Jun 05 '11 at 08:50
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    @mplungjan That famous example actually demonstrates a quite different problem - it's a question that hides presuppositions, the Loaded question -fallacy. Unlike this one, it can be easily answered unambiguously. – Ilari Kajaste Jun 05 '11 at 12:32
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    I know. Then answer is MU – mplungjan Jun 05 '11 at 15:06
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    I know you are trying to agree with the asker with a "yes" response. But the truth is, when answering a polar question, a native Engligh speaker would always reply to the polarity used in the question instead of the truth-value of the situation. That means, a "yes" is always "positive" and a "no" is always "negative". So consider "Don't you have exam?" = "Do you have exam?". –  Jun 12 '12 at 04:31
  • It's the peculiar way that English questions are formed. Don't you have an exam? This implies in most cases Do you have an exam? Or arent you coming? If you answer yes then you mean that you are going. If you say no* then it means that you are not going. – Noah Jun 12 '12 at 07:10
  • @Noah That's because Aren't you coming? doesn't translate to Are you not coming?; it translates to You're coming, aren't you? or, in other words, Is it correct that you are coming? – starsplusplus Apr 15 '14 at 14:28
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    We don't usually answer yes or no to don't you have any money? That would be viewed as ambiguous. We answer yes, I do or no, I don't, as in F'x's answer. I suppose this might be considered redundant in some languages (but isn't redundancy better than ambiguity?). – Peter Shor Jul 24 '15 at 14:36
  • I myself tend not to bother with the yes or no when it's ambiguous. Either "I have money" (or some negative version of it when I've spent it all that month), or I'll often respond with "true" to that type of question. I suspect (and secretly hope) I'm in a minority, though. – mwardm Dec 04 '17 at 20:04

4 Answers4

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  1. Use short answers:

    Don’t you have any money? — No, I don’t.
    Don’t you have any money? — Yes, I do.

  2. Let context guide the listener:

    Don’t you have any money? — No, I gave it all to Lucy.
    Don’t you have any money? — Yes, but not enough for this item.

  3. Use quantifiers, or intensifiers:

    Don’t you have any money? — None or None whatsoever.
    Don’t you have any money? — I have enough.

  4. In Early Modern English, there were specific words for that.

Community
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F'x
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    In German, there's a word "doch" for cases like this, which makes the answer clear. Is there any equivalent term in English? – Gigili Jun 04 '11 at 14:09
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    @Gigili No, but there was once. See the wiki link in my answer. – z7sg Ѫ Jun 04 '11 at 16:44
  • In Russian you may answer: "yes no, maybe" That means: "no". That does not make things clearer, it is polite way to say "no", but that's interesting option to answer. – ses Jan 03 '14 at 16:21
  • In French like in German, you still have a specific word "si". To answer a positive question, you can use "oui" or "non", while to answer a negative question you can use "si" or "non". Still, some people make mistakes. – user276648 Dec 18 '16 at 00:24
  • So in English it is not related to affirmativeness/negativeness of a question. It seems absolute. – Константин Ван Apr 22 '18 at 12:46
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    Can we say only *"Yes"* instead of "Yes, I do"? (Similarly only *"No"* instead of "No, I don't"?) – Mir-Ismaili Feb 15 '19 at 12:13
  • if my only option is to say yes or no. what is best option ? – Anmol Mar 04 '19 at 13:08
  • @Anmol If you only have one option as your comment posits, that one option is by default your best option as well as your worst option. – Lawrence Dec 31 '19 at 12:22
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The most unambiguous way to answer would be:

I do have money.

English used to have four affirmative and negative forms (yes, yea, no, nay) to answer negatively formed questions like this but it was itself confusing, even for literary scholars of the time.

z7sg Ѫ
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You're talking about Negative Questions, Sb Sangpi.

The rule here is: there is no special rule in answering Negative Questions. How you answer Negative Questions is exactly how you answer positive ones.

So,

Do you have a class? = YES, I do. Or, NO, I don't.

Don't you have a class? = YES, I do. Or, NO, I don't.

I understand that most non-native speakers get confused by this. Because you're reverting to how you would answer it in the local language.

Hope you got it!

Cool Elf
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  • Oh WoW! The question now is WAY different from how it was originally posted. :-D – Cool Elf Jun 12 '12 at 13:36
  • (Hope my answer still holds) – Cool Elf Jun 12 '12 at 13:36
  • This answer was originally posted on another question which has been merged with this one (see the edit history on this question). All answers on the merged question arrive here, the merge destination. And yes, it's still fine. – Andrew Leach Aug 25 '16 at 08:38
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As said by yourself, simply answering "yes" or "no" causes ambiguity. I would suggest using:

"Some", if you have money

or

"None, if you don't have any.

Thursagen
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