sudanglo:PM-K - quite often the definitions and examples in PIV will be enough to set you on the right path. But if they aren't sufficient it can be very useful to hop across to the Tekstaro, and quite simple searches (without the complex syntax) will often be adequate..

Remember that clicking on the search results will give you more context and a further click even more. If you want help with interpreting any search result, just ask.

By the way, just looked in PIV and found this on -us usage for devi.

Rim. Ĉe la indikativa preterito, devi signifas, ke oni obeis la devon: mi devis vin puni (k mi vin efektive punis). Por esprimi, ke oni ne obeis la devon, oni uzas kondicionalon: mi devus vin puni (sed mi vin ne punas); mi estus devinta vin puni (sed ne punis vin).

Cool, thanks a bunch for the guidance. I appreciate it.

I will definitely start using these, though all-Esperanto resources are difficult for me to use right now. Not impossible, but difficult and time-consuming because I first have to figure out the literal meaning of the words and then interpret the meaning of what I've translated.

But I'm sure it will get easier over time.

nornen:

PrimeMinisterK:And what I am saying is that if "My devus aĉeti melon" means "I should buy a badger," then shouldn't "Vere mi devus aĉeti la aŭton" mean "I really should buy the car"?

After reading through this thread, I think it is safe to assume that "should" plays various, quite different roles in English, and that there is no 1-to-1 mapping or recipe for translating it into Esperanto without further context.

Maybe a rule of thumb could be: If any notion of obligation (devo) is implied, go with devi. If it is not about an obligation (if it is about the best option in a list of possible actions, as riot very aptly worded it), keep your hands away from devi.

"Vere mi devus aĉeti la aŭton": I really would have the obligation to buy the car. For example: Estas bone, ke mi ne subskribis antaŭaĉetkontraton (pre-purchase contract). Ĉar se mi surkribis ĝin, mi vere devus aĉeti la aŭton.

"Mi vere aĉetu la aŭton": I really want me to buy this car. Or somebody else wants me to buy this car. This is really hard to render in English, because you don't have an optative/jussive/hortative in English (except in some ritual phrases like "Long live the queen" or "thy kingdom come").

There can certainly be a hint of obligation to some uses of "should," though to build on what RiotNrrd was saying, I think more often it's used to essentially mean "it would be a good idea."

"I should buy the car" = "It would be a good idea," essentially. The price is right, it looks cool, it's fast, it only has 30,000 miles . . . I should buy it.

Of course there's also another use of should: Something that "should" happen due to the various circumstances that are in play. For instance, there are dark clouds in the sky, there's lightning, there's thunder, the weatherman is predicting bad weather . . . yeah, it SHOULD rain today. It's not a guarantee that it will rain today FOR CERTAIN, but under the circumstances it SHOULD rain.

PrimeMinisterK:Of course there's also another use of should: Something that "should" happen due to the various circumstances that are in play. For instance, there are dark clouds in the sky, there's lightning, there's thunder, the weatherman is predicting bad weather . . . yeah, it SHOULD rain today. It's not a guarantee that it will rain today FOR CERTAIN, but under the circumstances it SHOULD rain.

This is a nice example where "devus" surely doesn't work. You can't order rain around and it doesn't care about what we think it "should" do. Hence, "hodiaŭ plej probable pluvos".

nornen:This is a nice example where "devus" surely doesn't work. You can't order rain around and it doesn't care about what we think it "should" do. Hence, "hodiaŭ plej probable pluvos".

Thank you, Nornen. I tried to say this earlier with

To summarize

• la imaga modo (the us-ending) expresses imaginarity
  
• la os-finaĵo expresses uncertainty in future

Thanks for all the information in this thread. If anything though, I went from thinking I kind of had a handle on this to feeling like I don't really understand the conditional at all.

I think what I am going to have to do is just start over from scratch on this topic, try to rebuild my understanding from the ground up, and go back through this thread while I'm doing so.