One of my senior colleagues is very active in many technical forums and comes across technical questions from around the globe. He asked me recently - “Why do some people from India use the word ‘doubt’ in place of ‘question’ in their questions?”
For instance – “I have a doubt on indexes”. What s/he actually meant was that there was a question on indexes and not really that s/he is apprehensive about indexes itself.
I immediately recollected how I used to make the same mistake a couple of years ago. A very Sr. colleague was kind enough to correct me and explain the difference. Since then I doubt if I have used doubt for questions 
I was analyzing about the cause for this wrong usage. God bless the teachers/faculty in schools for they have done a good job and continue to do so. However, I cannot help but link a certain portion of this problem to some of the teachers – “Do you have any doubts”; “Please clear your doubts”
It perhaps stems from the probable common fact that there are no separate words for “doubt” & “question” in Indian languages. And since most of Indians’ mother tongue is not English, they tend to transliterate until they reach an age when they start thinking in English completely. By this time, the habit is so set that one doesn’t realize the mistake until pointed out by someone or the individual goes through an extreme case of unlearn and relearn!
Anyway let’s see if we clearly understand the actual difference between ‘doubt’ and ‘question’. Dictionary.com defines:
Doubt: to be uncertain about; consider questionable or unlikely; hesitate to believe, to distrust, to fear; be apprehensive about, to be uncertain about something; be undecided in opinion or belief, a feeling of uncertainty about the truth, reality, or nature of something.
Question: a sentence in an interrogative form, addressed to someone in order to get information in reply, a problem for discussion or under discussion; a matter of some uncertainty or difficulty; a subject of dispute or controversy; query, to ask (someone) a question; interrogate, to make a question of; doubt: He questioned her sincerity, to challenge or dispute.
I have pulled only a subset of the definitions. As we can see in some cases question and doubt can be used interchangeably but in most others one can easily apply the following rule:
If you (as in YOU) are sure that something doesn’t work or will not work, use ‘doubt’ else use ‘question’.
To continue on the earlier example: The correct question is “I have a question on indexes” which means that you didn’t understand some feature/aspect of indexes and not that you don’t trust indexes work!
Do you doubt this rule or do you have any questions?
Disclaimer: All of my blogs and its comments are merely & solely the authors’ own general opinions. It neither represents nor is directed towards any individual or company or country or ethnicity or community or group.
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