Technically 'minus' means: to negate, or to subtract. And it's almost always used as a verb (even if it's a noun)>>> Five minus Five equals Zero. But when you say something is less than zero then it's negative; you can say 'negative Five plus Seven' but you shouldn't say 'minus Five plus Seven'. It's a common mistake. Please try to change the clue :)
What nonsense! :) In my maths classes growing up, we said 'minus five plus seven' just as often as we said 'negative five plus seven'. Aside from that, think of the clue in the context of temperature: five degrees less than zero is minus five, eg.
HatemAli is correct, if a little pedantic. Just because one says it in maths classes growing up, or is in common usage, doesn't make it right! Though in the context of giving clues in a quiz, if it leads to many people getting the answer (and those who know "better" surely would think to try the "common, yet technically incorrect" response), I don't have a huge problem
I dare you to look up the definition of 'minus'. When used as an adjective that describes temperature, 'minus' (just like 'negative') means 'less than zero'. The clue is completely accurate.
I'm with kiwirage. I tried negative first and then I tried minus. It's an accurate definition of the word, if a somewhat informal one, much like reading +5 as 'plus five'.
Agree with kiwirage and aesthus. Never heard such nonsense as spouted by HatemAli and ChipOtley. Of course you can say "minus five"! Never heard anyone say "negative five" (such tortured prose!) in my life and I'm 63.
This may be a cultural thing? I did not get the answer. Growing up as an American, we would say "negative five plus seven" but not "minus five plus seven." At least I've never heard it put that way. I don’t care if you change it or not, just pointing that out.
I'm Australian and it made perfect sense to me. To say that it is "almost always" used as a verb is simply ridiculous. It is clearly also an adjective and a noun.
First one where I got them all. These are hard, in that if you miss even a single one of the short clues, you're almost certainly dead in the water. Tough stuff.