Berichten: 36
Taal: English
sudanglo (Profiel tonen) 19 december 2010 16:37:30
Now, I am not clear that 'ought' carries this meaning.
In The English Verb, Michael Lewis says "The modal auxiliary 'should' is associated with the speaker's perception of what is desirable; 'ought to' is associated with what is externally, objectively desirable. ... it carries connotations of what is right or wrong."
Swan, in Practical English Usage says "We can use 'ought' to advise people to do things, to tell people that they have a duty to do things"
He also says that should and ought are very similar and can be used interchangeably. Both can be used to talk about obligation and duty and to give advice.
Another use is logical probability - '3 loaves ought to be enough'.
I agree that there is a difference in force between 'you must do this' and 'you should do this', but the difference lies in the force of the expression not necessarily in the force of the obligation.
It's a bit like the difference between open the window, will you open the window, and would you open the window.
The use of the conditional for moderating the definiteness of assertion is well established in Esperanto - think of the difference between 'mi supozas ke .. and mi supozus ke .., or ĉu vi povas min helpi and ĉu vi povus min helpi.
So you can use the us-form to be more tentative. But to talk about a 'deveto' is to say that the devo is weak, a sort of minor obligation not really compelling.
That's not what I mean if I say I ought to stop smoking. I mean that it is the right thing to do even if I am not going to give up the fags. I am not weakening the case for not smoking.
A 'devo' in Esperanto aready covers a multitude of 'musts' from necessity to desirability. A deveto really would be a little thing.
Roberto12 (Profiel tonen) 19 december 2010 18:26:55
sudanglo (Profiel tonen) 19 december 2010 23:17:53
Actually, now I see a new problem here.
If 'ought' is often used in connection with what is right or wrong, and I want to capture this shade of meaning, then perhaps I should know how translate right and wrong in, for example, 'He doesn't know right from wrong'.
I not sure of the answer to that.
sudanglo (Profiel tonen) 20 december 2010 11:27:54
The question is what space should deveto and devego occupy.
Ĉu vi vere devas iri? Jes mi devegas.
Mi kredas ke mi povas esti kun vi antaŭ la sepa. Mi nur havas ankoraŭ kelkajn devetojn kiujn mi devas plenumi.
I found some usage of 'devegi' on Googling.
ceigered (Profiel tonen) 20 december 2010 12:47:28
Luckily, this might be one case where EO helps English speakers fully express themselves the exact same way they would in English.
Anyway, it might be that I'm an English speaker, but I thought those example sentences fit well with deveti and devegi in them. When those ones are used in verbs (egi and eti) they always seem to act as adding emphasising or deemphasising the meaning of a word (essentially emphasising whether the action is important or not
). Thus it seems perfectly good with "devi".RE wright and rung
, perhaps:"Li ne povas vidi/kompreni la diferenco inter ĝusto/la ĝusta kaj malĝusto/la malĝusta."
I dunno how "differentiate" works in EO, but:
"Li ne povas diferencigi inter la ĝusta kaj la malĝusta"
And even more experimental: "Li ne povas intervidi la ĝustan kaj la malĝustan", although i honestly don't know if that works quite so well.
Miland (Profiel tonen) 20 december 2010 13:09:53
sudanglo:If 'ought' is often used in connection with what is right or wrong, and I want to capture this shade of meaning, then perhaps I should know how translate right and wrong in, for example, 'He doesn't know right from wrong'.For "ought" in the moral sense I would suggest indas ke... 'He doesn't know right from wrong' might be Li ne havas moralan senton.
sudanglo (Profiel tonen) 20 december 2010 17:34:14
Bona and malbona seem too tepid.
Must come up in the Bible though somewhere, what to say, since that text must be full of moral prescription.
Ĝusta, Ceiger, means right in the accurate sense, which is something else.
I think on the whole that I'm quite happy with 'devus' for 'ought'. I can always say Morale vi devus if I want to emphasise where I'm coming from and distinguish it from 'should'.
Miland (Profiel tonen) 20 december 2010 18:11:32
sudanglo:Something like 'li ne havas moralan senton' will work quite nicely Miland, but if I want to assert that something is the right thing to do, or that eating people is wrong, I find myself floundering a bit for the words in Esperanto for right and wrong.I agree about sento and have corrected my previous message - thanks. For 'right' in this sense I would use fari la justan, or malutili aliajn homojn estas maljuste.
sudanglo (Profiel tonen) 21 december 2010 08:16:42
ceigered (Profiel tonen) 21 december 2010 08:39:13
sudanglo:I don't know Miland. You could argue that something that was unfair (maljusta) was still the right thing to do (morally).Thus my use of "ĝusta", but as you said it doesn't have any connection to morals then, so 'tis quite the problem...