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The Captain grimaced when he heard the seaman called his name. It was the seaman's maiden voyage and he was clearly eager to please, but he was overly verbose and literal, the Captain didn't feel like dealing with that right now.

"I don't have much time, make this as simple as possible" he ordered.

The Seaman snapped to attention and eagerly replied "Negative Sir!"

The poor Seaman didn't understand why the Captain seemed upset by his reply, after all he was doing everything the Captain had asked.

Can anyone help explain the poor Seaman's confusion?

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I'd guess

What he meant to say was "man overboard." In this case, "negative sir" meant that the boat was down by one man.

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My guess is

The Seaman kept is simple by saying, "Negative" which was referring to the boat sinking. This would explain while the captain was upset and that the seaman thought he was following orders.

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Perhaps

They were going to be delayed from going into and so the captains statement that he didn't have much time was inaccurate.

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