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Double negatives

curious_s :lta, 27. syyskuuta 2009

Viestejä: 16

Kieli: English

curious_s (Näytä profiilli) 27. syyskuuta 2009 17.03.30

Im new to esperanto, and im already hooked onto its simplicity. After trying out the first few courses i have a few questions. I don't know if they have already been asked so here goes...

1. Double Negatives.

We know bella = beautiful. Add a "mal" in front of it and it becomes the opposite. that is malbella = ugly. Now what if we add two "mals". Does malmalbella mean beautiful?? Or is there a rule against double negatives???

2. My second question is? We know adding an "et" as suffix makes it small. Plurals end with "oj". Objects with "-n". So in Esperanto, "I love small cats" will be " Mi estas catetojn" Right??

cheers

Oŝo-Jabe (Näytä profiilli) 27. syyskuuta 2009 17.21.36

1. There is no rule against adding mal- as many times as you like. In general, you would only use the root and mal+root, but if you had a joke or something that was supposed to confuse the listener you could do something like that.

2.It would be "mi ŝatas/amas katetojn." Amas is usually used for the kind of love you feel for humans. Ŝatas on the other hand is the kind of love/enjoyment you feel for a hobby. "Mi estas katetojn" would be "I am small cats."

RiotNrrd (Näytä profiilli) 27. syyskuuta 2009 17.22.09

1)
Technically, "mal-" isn't a negative - it makes a word into its opposite rather than negating it. There is a rule against double-negatives, but "mal-" doesn't enter into it.

You CAN put one "mal-" after another in front of a word, but there's really no reason to do so as they would simply cancel each other out. So I would consider doing so to be more playing with the words than anything else. I certainly wouldn't use a multi-mal word in ordinary conversation.

2)
Love = "ami", not "esti"
Cat = "kato", not "cato"
So: Mi amas katetojn.

Rogir (Näytä profiilli) 27. syyskuuta 2009 17.47.43

Also, it's bela, not bella.

Pharoah (Näytä profiilli) 27. syyskuuta 2009 19.54.22

So, a related question I've had for a while, is whether we should or can use double negatives to answer questions (like they do in Spanish for example).

Let's say somebody asked me if I am a college student:

--Ĉu vi estas universitata studento?

Can I/should I respond with this?

--Ne, mi ne estas universitata studento?

Miland (Näytä profiilli) 27. syyskuuta 2009 20.43.45

Pharoah:Let's say somebody asked me if I am a college student:
--Ĉu vi estas universitata studento?
Can I/should I respond with this?
--Ne, mi ne estas universitata studento
That sounds fine to me. I wouldn't say that you are using a double negative here, but rather adding an explanation to the answer Ne.

Rogir (Näytä profiilli) 27. syyskuuta 2009 23.04.09

The comma is crucial there, it separates two sentences that each have one negative in them.

Pharoah (Näytä profiilli) 28. syyskuuta 2009 0.27.33

R2D2!:
Pharoah:(like they do in Spanish for example)
Actually a Spanish-like usage would be something like
*“Mi ne faras nenion” (No estoy haciendo nada / I'm not doing nothing).
Although it is “correct” in Spanish, it is incorrect in both English and Esperanto.

—Ilhuıtemoc
I think that was also a part of what I was wanting to ask, but didn't think of it. Thanks!

jchthys (Näytä profiilli) 28. syyskuuta 2009 1.33.48

Oŝo-Jabe:"Mi estas katetojn" would be "I am small cats."
“Mi estas katetoj”, actually…not that it makes sense anyway.

Oŝo-Jabe (Näytä profiilli) 28. syyskuuta 2009 3.30.57

jchthys:
Oŝo-Jabe:"Mi estas katetojn" would be "I am small cats."
“Mi estas katetoj”, actually…not that it makes sense anyway.
I was simply quoting the original poster (with the minor correction of "catetojn" to "katetojn.") I wasn't saying that "I am small cats" becomes "Mi estas katetojn," I was trying to say that "Mi estas katetojn" becomes "I am small cats." English lacking the accusative, my example seemed to read "I am small cats" when I was really trying to say "I am small cats." okulumo.gif

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