Well, 以上 is used after a speech to indicate that the speech has been concluded (i.e., 'Everything before this has been said.'). 以上 is used in numbers to mean 'or more', as in 八十%以上 (as in, 'Everything after this is included.'). If you want to say, "80% or less", you say 八十%以下 or 八十％以外 for "anything but 80%". Are 以上 and 以上 only homonyms and homophones, or are the words somehow synonymous, by definition?
4 Answers
In both examples, 上 means 'above'. When you are talking about something that already has a scale, that naturally applies. Towards the higher end will be 'above' and the lower end will be 'below'. In case of speach or writing, there is no inherent scale, so a scale has to be added. And the normal habit is that, in writing, the flow goes from the top of the page to the bottom, so if you refer to something previously mentioned, that corresponds to 'above'. That is carried over to speech.
Don't they both refer to a range measured from a point on a scale? For numbers:
80％以上 80% and every percentage above
80％以下 80% and every percentage below
For text:
以上略 everything above this point has been cut out
（文章はここから始まる） (the text starts here)
以下略 everything below this point has been cut out
So when you say 以上です, it's like a shortcut for saying 私が言いたいのは以上です。 ("The things I want to say are above (before) this point.").
answered Aug 10, 2011 at 17:50
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Well there-in lies the issue. 'Everything above this point is included in cutting,' in text. 以上です at the end of a speech seems the reverse of the numeric sense, in your explanation. So, some of my friends and I are thinking that they're homophones and homonyms, but they're not synonyms. In terms of text, though, 略 means 'shorten'. So, 'shorten everything above' is 以上略. It's counting the words as numbers would be considered. 以上です -> 'things I wanted to say were before'..., and before means above? Interesting....– 千里ちゃんAug 11, 2011 at 1:20
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And to answer your question, I guess that depends on whether you think of a speech or a document in terms of a scale.– 千里ちゃんAug 11, 2011 at 1:21
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I guess 'are above' is what you would write if you were referring to something earlier in a text, so that makes sense. :)– 千里ちゃんAug 11, 2011 at 1:25
I thought about it a little. Maybe 以上です means, "Everything up until now has been included," and, "８０％以上" means, "Everything up until now has been discarded." So 以上 could just mean, 'Everything up until now has been {some verb for 'excluded'}'. You can't really say '上から', either, I think.
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I just wonder why 'from the top' and 'from the bottom' both result in the same meaning, when dealing with percentages and combining 以上 or 以下.– 千里ちゃんAug 10, 2011 at 17:07
I always think of it like this. 以上 means "more than", so with numbers it's the obvious definition as you pointed out. When meaning "finished" or "that's all", I like to think that it's an abbreviation of これ以上はない which would mean "there's nothing more (than this)". I don't know if this is true or not, but maybe it would help to think of it this way.
answered Aug 10, 2011 at 17:53
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I agree with your idea of abbreviation, but I don't think it is an abbreviation of a negative form. It is simply "言いたいことは以上(で全て)だ".– user458Aug 10, 2011 at 17:59
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Maybe it's true, but it only kind of makes sense to me.... How does it mean 'more than' when you say 以上です after speaking? It actually means the opposite, 'There's no more.'– 千里ちゃんAug 11, 2011 at 2:46
話すことはこれ以上ないmeans, 'I have nothing more to say.' Even though it's kind of a negative form of 以上です, it has the same meaning. People don't say, 以上じゃないです, though. There's no real negative form....パーティのお知らせ, and you write the dates below, you use 以下に. Then when you say 'I love eating,' you say,いっぱい食べれたらこれ以上幸せなことはない。meaning, "Nothing makes me happier than being able to eat a lot!" It considers the empty possibility of eating more.話すことはこれ以上ない, seems backwards because it's like, "I don't need to talk, anymore. Everything has already been said," in consideration of the filled space, before. Even when people explain it to me, it seems like they always explain themselves backwards and forwards.