休む時間でもない

Hello,

I have a problem with でもない again. I was looking at this page: でもの類語・シソーラス - 類語辞書 - goo辞書 . In the table at the bottom, it says that 休む時間でもない is not correct. Why is that?

At first I thought that it had the same meaning as など ("or something"), then I remembered I've had a similar problem before （好きでもないのに・・・つきまとったり、プロポーズしたりしたの？), and for this sentence it meant "even". My guess would be that it is incorrect because of the ambiguity.

休む時間でもない is valid, but the meaning is different from 休む時間さえ/だって/などない. It's similar to 休む時間ではない vs 休む時間はない.

Thank you! I wasn't consciously aware that でもない cannot be used as がない can. Can you check my understanding of さえ・だって・など as well, please?
さえ and だって both mean "even" in this case. など signifies that 休む時間 is just an example.
休む時間でもない = This is not the time to relax or something.
休む時間さえ/だってない = There isn't even time to relax.
休む時間などない = There isn't time to relax (and do other things).

休む時間でもない can mean "This is not the time to relax or something." especially when 休む時間でもないのに or like that, but 休んだりする時間ではない is more common for this meaning. 休む時間でもない is more often used as "This is not the time to relax, either."

休む時間などない means "There isn't such a time to relax." This is その例を軽んじて扱う気持ちを表わす, as in お金など欲しくない. "There isn't time to relax and do other things" is for 休むなどの/休むといった/休んだりする時間はない.

Toritoribe said:

休む時間などない means "There isn't such a time to relax." This is その例を軽んじて扱う気持ちを表わす, as in お金など欲しくない. "There isn't time to relax and do other things" is for 休むなどの/休むといった/休んだりする時間はない.

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Thanks. I actually only found out about this meaning of など a few days ago but I wasn't familiar with it. Usually, I see なんか used for that purpose. As far as I understand なんか is the same as など, just more colloquial.

Toritoribe said:

休む時間でもない can mean "This is not the time to relax or something." especially when 休む時間でもないのに or like that, but 休んだりする時間ではない is more common for this meaning. 休む時間でもない is more often used as "This is not the time to relax, either."

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This is embarrassing, but it finally hit me today...でもない is not でも+ない, but で+も+ない(coming from ではない). This makes so much more sense now. I know you also told me something like this once but at that time I really didn't get it.
So all these meanings of でもない, "it is also not", "it isn't even...", "it's not...or something", they all come from the basic meaning of も, but the translation changes in order to make sense in english.

好きでもないのに・・・つきまとったり、プロポーズしたりしたの？
先生でもないのに、上から目線で言うなよ！
しかし 問題は天理だ・・・天理がいなきゃこの対決は できないが、今までみたいにじっとしていればいいって 訳でもない
Grammatically, there is no difference between the でもない in these sentences, right?

raikado said:

Usually, I see なんか used for that purpose. As far as I understand なんか is the same as など, just more colloquial.

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Yes, that's right. You can also use なんて.

raikado said:

でもない is not でも+ない, but で+も+ない(coming from ではない).

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Yeah, I meant it by "休む時間ではない vs 休む時間はない" in my previous post.

raikado said:

Grammatically, there is no difference between the でもない in these sentences, right?

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Yes. Grammatically, (i.e., except the difference in nuance) this でも can be replaced with じゃ/では in all those examples.

Yeah, I couldn't connect the dots right away. Thank you very much! I am really happy that it finally makes sense now.