Hey O
Why do Americans express ambivalence by saying “I could care less if…” whereas the rest of the English speaking world says “I couldn’t care less if…”
I’m perplexed.
According to this link I found, it could be related to Yiddish. It also could be that American speech seems sometimes to be “lazier” than Brit-speak.
Laziness - the “not” (or “n’t” ) got dropped, as explained here. Confusing, since “could care less” means the opposite of “couldn’t…”
I’m American, and I still use “couldn’t care less”. It bothers me that so many people use the opposite, which really makes no sense.
I’m an American and I’ve always said “couldn’t care less.” Though it doesn’t really bother me when others say it the other way, I know what they mean.
“Couldn’t care less” is grammatical; “could care less” is idiomatic. Both are correct and both mean the same thing (the fact that “could care less” logically is different has no relevance – idioms follow their own rules).
Americans use both constructions.
“could care less” is not even illogical, if you see it as sarcastic. This may be a Yiddish / New York Jewish connection as stated by Quinion in the worldwidewords link given above. As he says, “I should be so lucky”, and “Tell me about it!” are similar sarcastic inversions. I have no trouble accepting “I could care less” this way, and if I say it, I’m inflecting it to indicate that.
yabob got it. A similar construction is, “I could give two shits what you think about my grammar,” meaning, “I don’t care what you think about my grammar.” People who say, “I could care less,” are generally people inclined toward sarcasm already.
Daniel
Replace “lazier” with “relaxed”, and you’ve got it right.
Or better yet, with “more relaxed.” 
I thought about that after I hit submit! 
But then I thought, It’ll be understood regardless. This is why I see our usage more relaxed then lazy. How many times have you of a ‘near-miss’ without an accident? But most Americans know what it implies.
Damnit, I did it again. :smack:
Another example of this malopropish type of statement is “What else is new?”, when what is really meant is “What’s new?” The former implies that the referenced statement is “new” when in reality, it is “old” and the asker is trying to find out what is actually “new” not “old”.
I strongly disagree with this theory. To state the exact opposite of what is meant can only be from laziiness or lack of thought, or the referenced sarcasm, though I can usually detect sarcasm and I never have when hearing the “I could care less.”
I have used “I could care more”. to emphasis the stress the true meaning.
Delete “emphasis the” in previous post.
Thank you. I’m sick of arguing this. Both constructions are fine, even if one seems illogical. The standard argument by some linguists, such as Steven Pinker, is that the “could care less” is a sarcastic statement, as indicate by the intonation used in saying it. It’s normally not delivered as a simple declarative.
This web site explains Pinker’s assertions, and links to Pinker’s own words on the matter. Personally, I find his argument compelling, whether the speaker is or is not aware of the irony inherent in his statement, its idiomatic usage makes the meaning clear.