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I continue seeing sentences that (based on my knowledge) seem to contain conflicting usages of だろう・でしょう.

「妻はルイヴィトンのバッグを欲しがっているんだけど、そんなもん、買えるわけないでしょう! 」

To my understanding わけがない is an expression that denotes absolute certainty, so it seems counterintuitive that it is followed by でしょう (a word that demonstrates a much weaker degree of certainty). My best guess it that でしょう is used here in order to soften the overall tone of the statement.

「そうしたらきっと馬鹿にされてしまうのでしょう。」 If I did that I would be made fun of.

This one confuses me because it isn't translated as "If I did that I would probably be made fun of." The "probably" part is omitted. This is not a unique example, though. I've seen lots of relatively simple sentences including だろうthat end up being translated without using "probably".

I'm sorry that the format of this post is a mess; my thoughts are jumbled and I couldn't figure out a great way to organize it.

So to conclude I guess I'm asking if someone could explain why だろう・でしょう is included in the examples I've given/similar cases. Thank you!

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  • ~わけないだろう etc. are だろう・でしょう in the 'isn't it?/right?' sense. It's rhetorical here, implying the statement is obvious. It doesn't weaken but strengthen the statement.
    – Angelos
    Commented Sep 1, 2018 at 22:00
  • Do you also consider the English sentence "It might never happen." contradictory?
    – user4032
    Commented Sep 2, 2018 at 2:33

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