> > > What's the difference between "then" and "than"? This has been bugging me for quite some time, and seeing as how most of you seem to be grammatical experts of one degree or another, would anyone mind filling me in?
> > >
> > > M"grammatically ignorant, as you can probably tell from the fact that I'm not putting a period at the end of this sentence"el
> >
> > I'm not sure but I think
> >
> > Then=time This happened, THEN that did
> >
> > Than=diffrence This is diffrent than that
> >
> > I may be wrong though
>
> You're almost right. The one problem is that things are never different *than.* The correct preposition is "from" - as in, "This is different from that."
>
> Had you picked another term, say, taller, you'd be fine. "This is taller than that."

Yeah, well, then what this Than vs. Then argument boils done to is that it's one of the quirks of the English language, where convention determines the usage. If that sounds silly, then consider that both Then and Than derive from the same etymological roots.

I'll bet I'm getting this wrong due to imprecision, but here goes. In modern syntax, you can differentiate the two as follows:

THAN = is a conjunction. It deals with *comparison* showing a difference in kind between two objects. i.e., "Love is greater THAN Hate".

THEN = is an adverb. It deals with *sequence* which shows what's next in order of time. i.e. "Leen ate the Oreos THEN brushed her teeth".