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We ought to stop talking about this...

از Roberto12, 18 دسامبر 2010

پست‌ها: 36

زبان: English

sudanglo (نمایش مشخصات) 21 دسامبر 2010،‏ 9:23:58

Perhaps, the Bible never actually uses the words right and wrong. I just tried a bit of Googling and couldn't determine a passage to consult, to see how Zamenhof (or the London Pastors) handled the translation.

Well, I suppose we can always talk about moral devo or something not being morale pravigebla.

Mi tion faris ĉar mi taksis tion morala devo. Manĝi homon estas neniam morale pravigeble.

I hesitate about saying that something is morale ĝusta.

Miland (نمایش مشخصات) 21 دسامبر 2010،‏ 12:11:13

sudanglo:You could argue that something that was unfair (maljusta) was still the right thing to do (morally).
I wouldn't differentiate the two myself in that way. What kind of situation did you have in mind?

ceigered (نمایش مشخصات) 21 دسامبر 2010،‏ 12:15:58

Miland:
sudanglo:You could argue that something that was unfair (maljusta) was still the right thing to do (morally).
I wouldn't differentiate the two myself in that way. What kind of situation did you have in mind?
While I'm not Sudanglo, perhaps a king having to sacrifice an entire town to save the rest of the kingdom or something like that, which is terribly unfair on the people of that town, but you save many more people in the process. Not quite an everyday scenario mind you, but I'm sure it'd show up in fiction (well, I've seen it show up in fiction at least).

yugary (نمایش مشخصات) 26 دسامبر 2010،‏ 10:17:13

I think Sudanglo covers this issue quite well. You can't expect other languages to express such nonfactual assertions (i.e. verb phrases with will, would, shall, should, can, may, ought to, and the like) in one-for-one equivalent way. Even closely related languages like English, German, French, Italian, and so on differ greatly in their handling of such expressions (and East Asian languages like Korean handle such expressions totally differently), so there's no reason to expect Esperanto to have an exact equivalent of "ought to."

T0dd (نمایش مشخصات) 29 دسامبر 2010،‏ 13:19:58

sudanglo:
I hesitate about saying that something is morale ĝusta.
I have no such hesitation, myself. It seems to me that E-o "ĝusta", like English "right", can be used in both moral and non-moral contexts. The idea of "right", as an adjective, is "in conformity with some norm or standard", and that norm may be a moral norm, or it may not be.

Similarly, both "should" and "ought" have both moral and non-moral (i.e., prudential) senses. The use of the conditional to "soften" verbs is a tradition in some European languages; I don't know if it's something that makes sense elsewhere. Even "must" has a non-moral sense. "You must get enough vitamin C", etc.

Logically, the use of '-et' to weaken "devi" makes as much sense as the use of the conditional; it just doesn't happen to be what caught on. And that is no doubt because Z. was most familiar with European languages and generally didn't resist the inclination to copy their forms.

sudanglo (نمایش مشخصات) 29 دسامبر 2010،‏ 14:35:00

By all means, Todd, use deveti and devegi.

But the sense of these verbs is to diminish or to make more compelling the obligation.

Mi devetas ĉesi fumi doesn't mean I ought to stop smoking, but rather that I feel I am under some minor obligation to stop.

In other words, I don't believe that the case for stopping smoking is strong.

'I ought to' does not diminish the case for stopping. It externalises the case. It contrasts with 'I must' which expresses my own position/feelings as to the desirability.

The difference between 'devet' and 'deveg' is perhaps easier to understand in the noun forms - deveto and devego - where the temptation to equate them with well worn forms is English isn't so strong.

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