A new edition of the Fowler is out.
It's an "From A to Z". One of the entries under 'a' is 'absolutely'.
"About "absolutely", the Fowler says, "it is no exaggeration to say that it
has altogether ousted ‘yes’".
Only that they carry different implicatures.
"Absolutely" carries what I call a Hegelian implicature.
A: Is it raining?
B: Absolutely.
A "Yes" is, rather, Aristotelian.
Cheers,
Speranza
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