can't

alternative obsolete ca'n't · alternative Southern US dialectal cain't

1. Cannot (negative modal auxiliary); be unable to; not have the ability to (whether due to lacking relevant strength or skill or knowledge or supplies, or due to logical impossibility, etc).

   Shut up, can’t you?

   4 more examples

   I can’t quite get it to work.

   The butler can’t be the murderer — he can't have killed her — because he was in London that evening.

   To make Capons […] [S]ome for this Purpoſe make it their Buſineſs after Harveſt-time to go to Markets for buying up Chickens, and between Michaelmas and All-hollantide caponize the Cocks, when they have got large enough to have Stones [i.e., testes] of ſuch a Bigneſs that they may be pulled out; for if they are too little, it can't be done; […]

   1750, W[illiam] Ellis, The Country Housewife's Family Companion: Or Profitable Directions for Whatever Relates to the Management and Good Œconomy of the Domestick Concerns of a Country Life, According to the Present Practice of the Country Gentleman's, the Yeoman's, the Farmer's, &c. Wives, in the Counties of Hertford, Bucks, and Other Parts of England: Shewing how Great Savings may be Made in Housekeeping: … With Variety of Curious Matters … The Whole Founded on Near Thirty Years Experience, London: Printed for James Hodges, at the Looking-glass, facing St. Magnus Church, London-Bridge; and B. Collins, bookseller, at Salisbury, →OCLC, page 157

   Shepard: Mordin, walk away. Mordin: Can't do that, Shepard. Shepard: I don't have a choice here. Walk away, or I will fire.

   2012, BioWare, Mass Effect 3 (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →OCLC, PC, scene: Tuchanka

   Antonyms: be able to, can

2. To be forbidden to; to be not permitted to.

   You can’t enter the hall without a ticket.

   Antonyms: be able to, can, have to, must

3. euphemisticslangTo be unwilling to; to not have the desire of; to don’t want to.

   Will you come to dinner with us tonight? Can't; already have plans this evening.