Grammar help you are please giving me (if vs. whether)

[Hipolito]

I am reviewing a draft legal form for which the person filling out the form will have to check Yes or No below this sentence: "Indicate if you intend to follow the regulations."

I think it would be better to say "whether" instead of "if," but I'm not sure about that. I'm also not sure whether "whether" or "whether or not" is better.

(I do realize that a mere Yes/No answer is not a grammatically correct response to the statement, but we're kind of stuck with that.)

Help me, OObi-Wan Kenobi, you're my only hope, etc.

[The Meal]

If you intend to follow the regulations please select 'Yes.'

99% of awkward phrasings, in my estimation, are not due to word selection but the order in which they are arranged.

[Grundbegriff]

1.
"Indicate whether you intend" is most correct among those options, but The Meal is right. Rephrasing is better. "Do you intend to follow the regulations?" followed by a 'yes' box and a 'no' box should be sufficient.

2.
"Whether or not" means "whether"; the "or not" is redundant.

3.
"If" sets up the antecedent (the protasis) of a conditional statement. For this reason, the imperative sentence "Indicate if you intend to follow the regulations" is grammatically analogous to the imperative sentence "Dance if you're happy". (In casual usage, people tend to use "if" in place of "whether"; the latter will probably die out along with proper sequence of tenses and other nuances of counterfactual and modal expression.)

"Indicate if you intend to follow the regulations" can be rearranged to make its logic more clear: "If you intend to follow the regulations, then indicate."

Of course, "indicate" expects a direct object, and the thing being indicated is the fact that "you intend to follow the regulations". So the rearrangement can be expanded to "If you intend to follow the regulations, then indicate that you intend to follow the regulations."

That leaves open what should be done if you do not intend to follow the regulations. Presumably, indicating that would be helpful, too. So a better instruction would be "If you intend to follow the regulations, then indicate that you intend to follow the regulations, and if you do not intend to follow the regulations, then indicate that you do not intend to follow the regulations." Indicate if you do, and indicate if you don't. Indicate X or indicate the contrary of X. If only the language afforded a way to capture both sides!

That's where "whether" comes in. Reveal whether the victor is China. Do it if China is the victor and do it if China is not the victor.
Explain whether this grammatical form is proper. If it is proper, then explain; and if it is not proper, then explain.

[TiLT]

If a sentence sounds wrong no matter how much you replace words in it, there's something wrong with the sentence and it should be replaced.

If you think that is hard, imagine how it is for writers who ditch entire chapters from books.

[dbt1949]

You should start it off with "Listen Asshole" . After that correct grammar doesn't matter.

[KKBlue]

The amount of wisdom this guy has... DBT, nail on the head yet again

[Hipolito]

Thank you, grammar Jedi, for your help. For the document, I did advise rephrasing the sentence as a question per Meal's suggestion, and suggested as an alternative the "whether" option in case that would be too radical. I also enjoyed reading Grundbegriff's analysis. DBT's suggestion might not be appropriate on the form but we'll try it over the phone.

I'm also glad a couple of you are open to sharing snacks with Heather Lagenkamp.