ceigered:True but we're talking about learners here - we don't want to create confusion

I'm sorry, where exactly is the confusion? I say again, the fact is -ado often translates to -ing in English. I would have thought the greater confusion would come from somehow ignoring that by disassociating two equivalent forms when that equivalence is clear to see. Sorry but I just don't see your logic here.

As for "Mi volas tion skribite", it means what horsto said it means, and nothing else. This alternative interpretation you suggest as a means of "avoiding confusion" would merely have the reverse effect of adding confusion to something where none even existed in the first place!

tommjames:

ceigered:True but we're talking about learners here - we don't want to create confusion

I'm sorry, where exactly is the confusion? I say again, the fact is -ado often translates to -ing in English. I would have thought the greater confusion would come from somehow ignoring that by disassociating two clearly equivalent forms when that equivalence is clear to see. Sorry but I just don't see your logic here.

[/quote]I've already said - ing and ado are not the same thing. They do do the same thing from time to time as eachother but just look at all the places you find the English "ing", then look at all the places you find the Esperanto "ado". Furthermore, while for most English words the gerund is always -ing, "ado" itself is not a gerund. ado is in fact a word.

And I'm not saying what I'm saying is less confusing, I'm saying that saying "ado means -ing" isn't exactly a perfect explanation. I personally found "ado" extremely hard to understand before I properly grasped how verbs turned into nouns and how suffixes like ado, ajxo, etc affected that. Anyway, I've been in half-asleep mode for god knows what reason for the entire week so forgive my bad sentence-constructing and logic here and there.

As for "Mi volas tion skribite", it means what horsto said it means, and nothing else. This alternative interpretation you suggest as a means of "avoiding confusion" would merely have the reverse effect of adding confusion to something where none even existed in the first place!

How would it add confusion? It's no more confusing than the other example "Mi iras hejme". I personally like "Mi volas tion skribita" more stylistically, but when that was mentioned someone said it should be "Mi volas tion skribitan" (I want a written-that - I want a written one of those?), then someone said "Mi volas tion skribita" could be read as "I, who is written, want that". How is "I want that writtenly/I writtenly want that" worse? Once again there's still the pair of possibly confusable meanings. But at least with -e there's no contest over the adjective at the end being in the accusative or not.

If it's really all too confusing to use the much-loved Esperanto -e, "Mi volas tion esti skribita" (I want that to be written) might as well be used. Only 2 extra syllables anyway.

ceigred:They do do the same thing from time to time as eachother

Yes, which is why I do not understand why you recommend disassociating them.

ceigered:I'm saying that saying "ado means -ing" isn't exactly a perfect explanation.

Fine, although as far as I can see nobody has suggested that.

ceigered:How would it add confusion?

Because it doesn't mean what you're suggesting it means/can mean.

ceigered:How is "I want that writtenly/I writtenly want that" worse?

Because it would be interpreted (correctly) as -you- having been written, not the tion, which is not the intended sense. You might argue it is theoretically possible (not convinced myself) but it's irrelevant because nobody speaks that way. Presumably you want to learn Esperanto as it is actually spoken in the real world?

ceigered, it seems to me that you're creating problems where there actually aren't any. The fact is that adverbial participles relate to the subject of the phrase. Always. Mi iras hejmen isn't comparable as it's not a participle.

(I have some problems with this rule myself, as I tend to praise good beginners with vi bone skribas konsiderante ke vi eklernis nur antaŭ x tagoj. Which is a nonsensical phrase, as it would mean that the beginner themself(*) considers that they started to learn only x days ago. I have to get rid of this erroneous custom.)

(*) Thanks to tommjames for explaining to me that this needs to be themself and not themselves - jen la angla.

tommjames:

ceigred:They do do the same thing from time to time as eachother

Yes, which is why I do not understand why you recommend disassociating them.

Because I didn't see that connection as being connective enough if that makes any sense.

ceigered:I'm saying that saying "ado means -ing" isn't exactly a perfect explanation.

Fine, although as far as I can see nobody has suggested that.

I apologise, I misread things that way. Attribute that to my tiredness

ceigered:How would it add confusion?

Because it doesn't mean what you're suggesting it means/can mean.

ceigered:How is "I want that writtenly/I writtenly want that" worse?

Because it would be interpreted (correctly) as -you- having been written, not the tion, which is not the intended sense. You might argue it is theoretically possible (not convinced myself) but it's irrelevant because nobody speaks that way.

I must add - I just trying to stay relative to the rest of the discussion, and to me "Mi volas tion skribita" and "Mi volas tion skribite" seemed as logical. But as you've mentioned that it now makes sense (I've also been talking to another Esperantist about this) and I completely missed the -_nte and -_te functions of filling in for "while" (erm... I don't think I've got the write word there, but I forgot how to say it in English, but I think we say "while reading, I ate" and "while having been shot, I talked to a little butterfly" etc).

Presumably you want to learn Esperanto as it is actually spoken in the real world?

(this is actually where I tripped up - my EO mindset tends to be that "when in doubt, use -e". The -it- part completely went over my head).

Anyway, as I put forth at the end of the last post I did, wouldn't just adding esti to the phrase be better? I had confusion with discerning the differences between "-nta" and "-nte" before so could the same problem occur in this sentence?

@ Darkweasel - cheers, as sort of explained then I got confused by what was actually be said (in English ).

darkweasel: (*) Thanks to tommjames for explaining to me that this needs to be themself and not themselves - jen la angla.

Actually I think I may have been wrong there, this page I stumbled on seems to suggest so, if I'm reading it right anyway.

ceigered:Anyway, as I put forth at the end of the last post I did, wouldn't just adding esti to the phrase be better?

If you wanted to use esti personally I'd go for "mi volas, ke tio estu skribita" in preference to "mi volas tion esti skribita". As with any subkomprenataĵo (sorry ) it's always clearer just to state the thing that is implied, but I don't think there's any confusion to worry about from leaving it out in this instance.

tommjames: if I'm reading it right anyway.

Canadian Department of Justice:its use does not seem widespread enough to justify advocating it in legislative texts for the time being.

You and Darkweasel aren't planning on going to canada and writing legislature are you?

As with any subkomprenataĵo (sorry ) it's always clearer just to state the thing that is implied, but I don't think there's any confusion to worry about from leaving it out in this instance.

Ok, cheers for that. I was wondering if "I want that written" was more English-idiomatic rather than a common thing in many other languages, and if it might warrant the use of a more explicit phrase.

I wouldn't recommend adding "esti" to the phrase, because we don't normally talk that way either.

But I personally think that it's not that hard to explain to a beginner, the reasoning of why "skribita" doesn't have the -n in "mi volas tion skribita".

And in fact, in this specific case (not in every case that is formatted like this, however), I think that it would be correct to say "Mi volas tion skribitan".

There can be a difference in meaning, in sentences formatted like this.

Mi farbis la domon ruĝan (I painted the red house)
...means something very different from:
Mi farbis la domon ruĝa (I painted the house red - we don't know its original color).

But in this case, you're ok with or without the -n.

There is discussion of this topic at this page in the PMEG.

The relevant section is entitled "Eble tamen N-finaĵo", which discusses cases in which it is correct to include or to leave off the -n ending, with little or no difference in meaning.

tommjames:"vidis la knabon kuranta"

I suppose the full sentence could be:

"Sally vidis la knabon kuranta" - but this can be misunderstood. Who does the 'kuranta' refer to? Sally or the boy? I suppose the word order could suggest that it refers to the boy, but it's not entirely clear. According to PMEG, it can indeed have either meaning, and so it suggests that the addition of the accusative ending would make it more clear. (see the page you mentioned, the section titled "Eble tamen N-finaĵo"Perverba priskribo

"Sally vidis la knabon kurantaN" - in this case we can clearly see that the 'kuranta' refers to the boy. So it means 'Sally saw the boy that was running"

PMEG gives this example:

Ofte en vespero ŝi vidadis lin forveturantan sub la sonoj de muziko. = Ŝi vidadis lin, kiam li estis forveturanta.

As I mentioned, PMEG states that the accusative 'forveturantaN' is not necessary here, although to my mind it becomes much more difficult to understand the sentence without the accusative form here.

Another example from PMEG:

Li pentras ŝin nudan. = Li pentras ŝin, kiam ŝi estas nuda. Se oni dirus nuda sen N, la signifo estus: Li pentras bildon, en kiu ŝi estas nuda. Sen N la signifo eĉ povas esti: Li pentras ŝin, kiam li mem estas nuda. Sed por tia signifo estas pli klare diri: Li nuda pentras ŝin.

"Li nuda pentras sxin" = He is painting here when he is himself nude.

And if we can say 'Li nuda pentras sxin' then how about 'Sally kuranta vidis la knabon'? - here, the word order and the lack of the accusative ending certainly shows that 'kuranta' refers to Sally.

In the last example I would say that "Sally kurantE vidis la knabon" = "Sally kurantA vidis la knabon" (both sentences mean "Sally saw the boy while she was running"

But, I'm not so sure about this, though:

"Li nudA pentras sxin" and "Li nudE pentras sxin". 'nudE' seems to suggest 'painting in a nude way', so it could mean that he is painting picture, in which the woman is nude. Or could it also mean that he was nude during the process?! Very unclear, so perhaps better avoided?

I would interpret "Sally vidis la knabon kuranta" as Sally saw that the boy was running. If it was Sally who was running it would be more usual to use the adverbial participle, so I don't see it as all that confusing in practice.

Incedentally I recently read an article by Ken Miner where he discusses this very example. The page is at Lingva Kritiko http://lingvakritiko.com/2008/03/21/kuri-kuranta...

I have to say I find myself disagreeing with some of what he asserts in this essay as he seems to be saying that vidis la knabon kuranta and vidis la knabon kurantan have "no detectable difference", something which conflicts with my basic understandings of how the language works. Or perhaps I've just misunderstood what he's saying; I'd certainly welcome people's comments on that.