I am looking for a comprehensive analysis of these three constructions:
- … for no other reason than X.
- … for no other reason that X.
- … for no other reason than that X.
Which is used when? Is this a question of register, dialect, style? How does the usage depend on what X is? Which of the constructions is the oldest, and what is the linguistic reasoning behind the other two variations coming about and happily co-existing — reanalysis, corruption, eggcorning?
I searched the Language Log, but to no avail. Google is of no real help, either — it returns few promising results, which upon closer examination turn out to be unrelated to the question at hand.
Best Answer
It seems to me that
takes a nominal complement, and if what follows is a NP (eg your intransigence) it is simply used.
When the complement is a clause, it needs the complementiser "that", (eg that I want to)
Your number 2, on the face of it, makes no sense to me, but I would be quite prepared to believe that people say it for number 3.