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も - softening nuance

raikado

先輩
29 Oct 2012
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Hello,

Some time ago I asked what the purpose of も was in もうじき嵐過ぎるだろう, and the answer was that it softens the nuance of が or は. {LINK}

Consider this sentence: チーズが好物とよく思われているが実際はそうでない。
As far as I know, 実際はそうでもない translates to "that's not really the case", which seems like a softened version of "that's not the case".
So I was wondering... Is this an example of the same "softening nuance" that I encountered in the first sentence?
 
Yes, I think so. As for your case, そうではない is a strong negation, so it denies that the subject likes cheese, i.e., the nuance is closer to "the subject dislikes cheese". On the other hand, そうでもない means そんなに好物でも/好きでもない, so it's closer to "cheese is not a favorite food, but it's not like that the subject dislikes it."
Off the topic, but is that sentence an explanation about mouse/rat, maybe?
 
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