Discussion Groups / English Usage / May 2009

It is odd.

"in so much" is in the OED as a single word. It is not marked obsolete,
but I'd describe it as dated.

   insomuch, adv.

   1. absol. To such an extent or degree; so much, so far. rare.
   
   2. insomuch as.
      a. Inasmuch[1] as, in that, seeing that, since.
      c. To such an extent as, so as: see 1.

   3. insomuch that: To such an extent that, so that. (The most usual
      construction.)

I'm familiar with sense 3. Sense 2.a., which I haven't met before, is
the one that seems to fit.

   Quite apart from all the bother that this was going to cause, I felt
   a twinge of regret that I had not managed to control Uncle Giles
   more effectively: *seeing that* (or *since*) I had been brought up
   to regard any form of allowing his head as a display of weakness on
   the part of his own family.

For me there is potential ambiguity in the sentence. Does "seeing that I
had been brought up to regard" qualify "I felt a twinge of regret" or "I
had been brought up to regard"?

This ambiguity is enhanced by the fact that the "...brought up to
regard..." clause is set off from the rest of the sentence by a colon
when it might be better to attach it to the clause to which it refers
with no intervening punctuation:

   Quite apart from all the bother that this was going to cause, I felt
   a twinge of regret that I had not managed to control Uncle Giles
   more effectively *because* I had been brought up
   to regard any form of allowing his head as a display of weakness on
   the part of his own family.

[1] inasmuch, adv.

   I. In phrase inasmuch as.
   
   1. In so far as, to such a degree as, in proportion as, according
      as.
   
   2. In that; in view of the fact that; seeing that; considering that;
      on the ground or for the reason that; since, because.

[...]

IFYPFY.

Did you not like my suggestion in the previous thread, that it was a
mixture of "inasmuch as" and insofar as"?   "Because I had been
brought up to regard... and to the extent that I had been brought up
to regard...".  Can't think of anything else it would mean.  Well,
maybe "the more so, because" is slightly different, but I got that
from context, not because the words of the phrase lead to it.