Mesaĝoj: 15
Lingvo: English
RiotNrrd (Montri la profilon) 2008-januaro-12 02:26:26
mnlg:I am eating an ice cream and I like that (= I like eating ice creams).Hi, mnlg,
I know this site is about learning Esperanto, not English, but I so RARELY get the chance to correct you that I just can't stop myself.
In English (or, at least, in the American variety of English) "ice cream" is one of those terms that's both singular AND plural without changing form. The sentence should be "I like eating ice cream", which covers both liking eating one variety or all the varieties (again, at least - and perhaps only, I don't actually know - in the American usage).
mnlg (Montri la profilon) 2008-januaro-12 10:51:09
RiotNrrd:I know this site is about learning Esperanto, not English, but I so RARELY get the chance to correct you that I just can't stop myself.That's fine, thanks. I appreciate your help.
"ice cream" is one of those terms that's both singular AND plural without changing form.Oh, just like advice and news, then. I didn't know that. Woe on you English, hitting me with irregularities at every step!
Thanks again.
stefanspaul (Montri la profilon) 2008-januaro-12 11:38:59
mnlg:Oh, just like advice and news, then. I didn't know that. Woe on you English, hitting me with irregularities at every step!I did notice your sarcasm there, mnlg
Since you live in Italy and I like Italian food so much, let me help you with one more word with an irregularity concerning the formation of the plural:
SPAGETOJ
1. Bongusta manĝaĵo, preparata el pasto faruno kaj akvo, kiu ankaŭ kelkfoje inkluzivas ovon kaj salon.
La spagetoj estas preta! Venu mangxi!
Now, every Englishman would translate these short sentences with
The spaghetti is ready! Come and get it!
But I, since I am not a native English speaker, said to the person I was cooking for at the time
"The spaghettis are ready".
Apparently, this is incorrect because she said "No dear, you say the spaghetti is ready! Whereupon I said "But I cooked more than one spaghetti for the two of us."
To cut a long story short, spaghetti is another of these funny words that look like singular, but are, indeed, plural.
Just like police, fish, information kaj tiel plu, kaj plu, kaj plu...
mnlg (Montri la profilon) 2008-januaro-12 12:18:28
stefanspaul:To cut a long story short, spaghetti is another of these funny words that look like singular, but are, indeed, plural.This is going quite off the topic, however I would file this under a different section... This is about a plural word being adopted into English as singular. Just like biscotti, panini, broccoli, zucchini, graffiti and cannoli (all of them are plural, but the average English speaker has no clue about that). Apparently there is a price to pay when you do not take words carefully from other languages, that is, you are going to have a lot of incoherent, irregular behavior and exceptions (not to mention the pronounciation, of course!). As long as the native speakers are comfortable with that, who am I to say anything. I do not really expect English to respect the Italian plural rules by adopting "cannolo" alongside "cannoli": there are too many plural rules or exceptions already (foot, feet; ox, oxen; nucleus, nuclei; iris, irides; stigma, stigmata; curriculum, curricula; criterion, criteria; ...). IMHO it's a little late to introduce careful planning.
RiotNrrd (Montri la profilon) 2008-januaro-12 18:10:42
But it does illustrate one of the nicest features of Esperanto - you never have to worry about whether or not a particular word follows the rules or not: they always do!