Japanese Language

Rilakkuma

2:19 AM

@3to5businessdays what do you think of men who call themselves あたし?

3 to 5 business days

3:35 AM

@Rilakkuma I think not

Ah, I have totally forgotten about Maggie Sensei

It's like seeing an old friend again

I used it quite a bit when I started out

Anonymous

Yay!

3 to 5 business days

the formatting is quite painful

Also, it took me a while to notice the audio clips

... which is nice, though at normal speaking speed, so to me it's a bit hard to follow

Anthony

3:51 AM

Hey!

3 to 5 business days

hey

Anthony

What's weird about the second sentence, as compared to the first?

2. a. ドアが壊してある。
b. #ドアがノックしてある。

I know the first construction, kind of. It's just "The door has been broken."

So why can't you say "The door has been knocked?".

3 to 5 business days

I don't know much about ある actually

Anthony

Is it because being knocked isn't state changing?

Oh.

3 to 5 business days

I mean てある

In fact, I'm reading this piece on てある right now

Anthony

3:59 AM

Ah.

@snailboat?

Anonymous

@Anthony Hello!

Anthony

Hola!

Anonymous

@Anthony ～てある is resultative

Anthony

Yeah.

3 to 5 business days

something something knocking semelfactive

Anthony

4:03 AM

Come again?

I still don't really follow why ドアがノックしてある is strange.

3 to 5 business days

Because "the door has been knocked" sounds strange?

Anonymous

How about "The door looked like it had been knocked upon."?

Anthony

I mean, that's fine to say right?

Anonymous

@3to5businessdays Well, that's just unidiomatic. No one knocks doors. People knock on doors.

Anonymous

You need a prepositional passive to go with it.

Anthony

4:05 AM

But I'm suppose to explain why it sounds weird, not why it could be okay.

Anonymous

Did someone come up with a reason why it could be okay?

Anthony

Oh, I thought what you just said was reason.

3 to 5 business days

Damn my bad England. I still think "the door has been knocked upon" sounds a bit odd

Anonymous

@3to5businessdays Well, it's certainly unusual.

Anonymous

@Anthony Does that mean you see nothing strange about "The door looked like it had been knocked upon"? :-)

Anthony

4:07 AM

No, but also translating and then noting something strange isn't really proof...

What the formal argument?

Anonymous

My sentence isn't a translation

Anonymous

But here is an observation:

Anthony

Alright. Regardless. As you said, てある is resultative. So how is this usage defying that?

Anonymous

Most doors aren't noticably knocked on. That is, you can't usually tell a door has been knocked on just by looking at it.

Anthony

That's true.

Anonymous

4:08 AM

Usually after someone's knocked on a door, the door is more or less in its original state.

Anonymous

Unless, you know, you're an angry Hagrid

Anthony

But it still seems resultative. I mean, it's not ungrammatical then, right?

3 to 5 business days

Is CSI. Is able to tell if a door has been tampered with.

Anthony

Is the construction possible?

Anonymous

# generally means infelicitous (semantically or pragmatically anomalous)

Anthony

4:09 AM

Alright.

Anonymous

@Anthony How does the resultative state differ from the initial state?

Anthony

It's been knocked :P

I see your point.

Anonymous

That's ungrammatical :-)

Anthony

NO

Why do I always do that!

Anonymous

You need a prepositional passive. "It's been knocked on."

Anthony

4:12 AM

Oh.

Is that all? I normally have problems with the present perfect.

Ugh I'm still a wreck with language.

3 to 5 business days

rekt

Anthony

What about these two, @snailboat.

1. a. 電車に乗るときは、白線の内側でお待ちください。
b. ＊電車に乗ったときは、白線の内側でお待ちください。

Anonymous

[I] knocked [on the door].　→　[The door] has been knocked [on ＿＿ ] ~~(by me)~~.

Anthony

The second it just weird because the past tense on the toki makes the two tenses disagree right?

“When you were riding the train, please stand behind the line”?

Oh and I know in that case. I just meant in general I normally goof. Like I'd say "I've drank water already."

Anonymous

Are you a native speaker? My dialect of English has non-standard forms for drink

Anonymous

4:15 AM

I think it's common to have some variation there

3 to 5 business days

purple drank

Anthony

lol Yeah I'm a native speaker. Only English. Just terrible.

Anonymous

I don't use that word

Anthony

Isn't it suppose to be I have drunk?

Anonymous

@Anthony Yeah, I have that problem. :-)

3 to 5 business days

4:15 AM

@snailboat Problem with drinks?

I thought you don't touch that stuff!

Anonymous

@Anthony For a while it was fashionable to say drank instead of drunk to avoid association with drunkenness

Anonymous

Have drank is still part of a number of dialects, though I think it's usually not a conscious choice to avoid saying drunk anymore

3 to 5 business days

not a conscious choice... drunk... へへ

Anonymous

Um.

Anthony

@snailboat I do the same thing with other words though.

Anonymous

4:19 AM

I don't want to actually answer your question about ～るときは～ versus ～たときは～

Anonymous

You could ask it on the site

3 to 5 business days

Pfff

Anthony

Eh, I'll ask something else. I have the chapter open on taxis. The only part that concerns me is I can't tell the difference between what is ungrammatical, and what is just weird. (Infelicitous)?

Anonymous

Ahh, our site's going to die! No one wants to ask questions on there, only in chat . . . :-)

Anthony

No! I'll ask questions.

3 to 5 business days

4:21 AM

my sleepy eyes read it as "infectious"

damn you ebola!

Anthony

Just I need to ask better ones.

All the questions I ask are terrible.

Question about ungrammatical things, I guess.

Is that just mandated by the language?

Anonymous

I don't understand your last question

Anthony

I mean it seems like it's ungrammatical to have two things that don't agree, tense-wise.

But I don't know why.

What is ungrammatical versus semantically or pragmatically incorrect?

I feel like I could declare anything grammatical in a language, but just say that only a small subset of constructions makes sense semantically.

Anonymous

Grammar is morphology (how words are formed and inflect) and syntax (how words fit together into larger constructions)

Anonymous

Semantics is the meaning the sentence itself has

Anonymous

4:24 AM

Pragmatics is the meaning a sentence is given in a particular context

Anonymous

> Q. Would you like some ice cream?
> A. #You are.

Anonymous

The answer doesn't really make any sense in context.

Anthony

Oh!

Okay.

Anonymous

It's infelicitous

Anthony

Then I guess I should ask that question on the site.

But I don't have tiiiiiiiime.

sigh

Anonymous

4:25 AM

> Q. Would you like some ice cream?
> A. *Cream ice some like would I, yes.

Anonymous

The answer is ungrammatical―the words are in the wrong order

Anthony

I see.

Because I think the * is claiming that ＊電車に乗ったときは、白線の内側でお待ちください。in ungrammatical. I'll ask on the main site. Just for you.

Anonymous

Yay!

Anonymous

I feel special!

Anthony

But I need to figure this out soon. Also I feel bad posting the sentence because it's a homework question.

:(

Anonymous

4:28 AM

It's not any different from posting it in chat

Anthony

Well.

Anonymous

This is all public, you know.

Anthony

Less public.

Anonymous

Archived for forever.

Anonymous

Available on the Google.

3 to 5 business days

4:28 AM

for^2ever

Anthony

A lot of things are available.

Doesn't mean most people would be able to access them if their life depended on it.

3 to 5 business days

infelicitous things, even

Anonymous

A * usually does mean "ungrammatical".

Anonymous

I like that big star, ＊

Anonymous

It's hard to miss :-)

3 to 5 business days

4:31 AM

^ big star

Anonymous

The site you linked to performs a Referer check

3 to 5 business days

?

What should I do?

Anonymous

So I see Image not found

Anonymous

> You don't have permission to access "http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMTk1MjM3NTU5M15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwMTMyMjAyM‌g@@._V1_SY317_CR14,0,214,317_AL_.jpg" on this server.

3 to 5 business days

Awwww

Anthony

4:35 AM

I asked a crappy question.

All for you.

Anonymous

Well done!

Anthony

Tried to spice it up by changing a noun, into something that is probably nonsensical.

Didn't even know the word right there. Subject? Object? I'm a wreck.

Rilakkuma

*Rilakkuma

Anonymous

@Rilakkuma Are you ungrammatical, or are you an unattested reconstruction?

Anthony

@Snailboat, if I say "I walked tomorrow" is that ungrammatical?

Crap sorry if I just triple pinged you.

Rilakkuma

4:46 AM

@snailboat the former one.

Anonymous

@Anthony Do you have a time machine? :-)

Anonymous

(Can you make it make sense if the answer is yes?)

Anthony

That seems like a lousy definition.

Rilakkuma

のるとき - while boarding
のったとき - (immediately) at the moment after boarding

*is wrong I?

Anthony

Isn't grammar just a set of rules?

So is there a rule in the English grammar that says some tense has to agree with another tense?

Anonymous

4:49 AM

English doesn't have grammatical tense agreement rules. Just semantic rules.

Anonymous

You can put any tenses together that make sense.

Anonymous

There are rules about backshift that are somewhat complicated, though

Anthony

I don't know what backshift is.

But following on that, I still have no idea about the sentence I brought up earlier. Does Japanese have grammatical tense agreement rules?

Anonymous

> 1. The teacher told her students that the earth revolves around the sun.

Anonymous

> 2. The teacher told her students that the earth revolved around the sun.

Anthony

4:52 AM

What is the point of this example? Both are allowed, right?

Anonymous

@Anthony I'm not sure how to answer that question.

Anonymous

@Anthony Sentence 2 is the backshifted version of sentence 1.

Anonymous

As you correctly note, backshift is optional here

Anonymous

I am just illustrating what backshift is.

Anthony

I see.

Anonymous

4:53 AM

I don't have a complete understanding of ～る and ～た yet.

Anthony

So a backshift is just something?

:P

Anonymous

@Anthony Yes, verbs in subordinate clauses can be backshifted

Anthony

I see.

Anonymous

In this case, told lets you backshift revolves to revolved

Anonymous

Sometimes it's obligatory, like if you have reason to believe that what the verb expresses is no longer true

Anthony

4:54 AM

You mean semantically, though.

Anonymous

Yes

Anthony

I don't care about semantics.

To　地獄　with them.

Anonymous

Unfortunately, semantics and grammar are deeply intertwined

Anonymous

You can't study one without the other

Darius Jahandarie

@Anthony I can answer your question, but I have no idea what シルバー席シートおの周り means. Is that a typo?

Anthony

4:55 AM

haha

Anonymous

I say this as someone who likes syntax more than semantics :-)

Anthony

No it's me being dumb

Rilakkuma

why did you use 白線, not 黄色い線

Anonymous

Wait, that wasn't in the original question :-)

Rilakkuma

?

Anthony

4:56 AM

I restored it.

Anonymous

Ahh, there you go

Anthony

To it's glory.

Again, I'm a fool.

Darius Jahandarie

I kind of wonder how that happened... :-)

Anthony

I admitted already!

I tried to change it using my poor understanding of the language!

@snailboat Oh come on. There must be a way to study grammar by itself.

Anonymous

@Anthony Yep. Incompletely!

Anonymous

4:57 AM

:-)

Anthony

Certainly it wouldn't be useful but I mean, it just seems like a nice math of some sort.

@DariusJahandarie I feel I understand the difference, but it's claimed to be ungrammatical, and I can't say why succinctly. I know it makes no sense, but what is ungrammatical about that?

Rilakkuma

イ　てぃんk　てぃs　わy　と　wりて　cあん　べ　cあっぇd　macaronic script

listened to Carmina Burana by London Symphonic Orchestra and thought that macaronic is great idea

Darius Jahandarie

@Anthony It's a complicated answer, so I'm just going to answer it on the site.

Anonymous

Yay!

3 to 5 business days

homework

Rilakkuma

5:10 AM

taxis?

Darius Jahandarie

@Anthony Let me know if that answer helps or if you want more clarification somewhere.

Anonymous

"arrangement"

Anonymous

syn-tax(is) = arrange together, para-tax(is) = arrange side by side

Anthony

@DariusJahandarie I'm afraid I'm still uncomfortable with the matter.

3 to 5 business days

how about big-yell-ow-tax(is)?

Anthony

5:13 AM

Is tense agreement really a matter of grammar?

Anonymous

Depends on the language

3 to 5 business days

I did not know this "absolute/relative tense"

Anonymous

The theoretical status of ～る and ～た is a matter of some dispute :-(

3 to 5 business days

Does the relative tense apply to things like ～て、, 連用中止 etc.?

Anonymous

The 中止形 and ～て are non-finite forms

Anonymous

5:15 AM

So they don't have their own tense

Anonymous

They are generally understood with the same type of time reference as the matrix clause

Darius Jahandarie

@Anthony Well, I think that no longer becomes a question of Japanese, but of what "ungrammatical" means in any language. In English, I think "When you got on the train, please wait on the inside of the white lines." should be marked as ungrammatical. A command needs to be about a future event, and the tense is making that event occur in the past.

snailboat would be able to explain what "ungrammatical" means better than me, but to me it's when you can't assign any semantics to the sentence (in any context).

Anonymous

Ah, I use a slightly different definition myself

Darius Jahandarie

This definition becomes questionable when you consider how native speakers can still understand incorrect sentences, but I think that is via a different process.

Anthony

@DariusJahandarie I feel like 'unable to assign definition' is a very indefinite description.

But I suppose I can take it.

@DariusJahandarie But what if time travel back in time were suddenly possible. (Despite the fact that it won't ever be.) Then would this be grammatical? Or would you use 直す in your command? sigh

Darius Jahandarie

5:28 AM

No, I still wouldn't accept the English sentence or Japanese sentence as valid.

Past/future in verbs for me is about the person's own perception of time.

"When you go back to the past and get on the train, please wait on the inside of the white lines."

Going back to the past and getting on the train are things that the person doing the actions would perceive as something they are doing after now in their own stream of time.

And that's what matters, to me anyways.

Anthony

Yeah.

In some sense local perception of time, or something like that.

I really need to move on, but I'm going to reread what you say. I dig your answers.

Darius Jahandarie

Thanks. :)

Ah, thank god for tethering. Silly Comcast, randomly dropping my internet connection.

What would I do if I were cut off from the internet for more than a minute?!

Anonymous

I miss my unlimited phone as modem plan.

Anonymous

Eventually they decided that unlimited meant 5GB/month. :-(

Anthony

@DariusJahandarie But actually, when I lose internet I can't do anything.

Darius Jahandarie

5:36 AM

I think I'm still technically on the grandfathered unlimited plan with AT&T. I wasn't allowed to use the personal hotspot on my iPhone until the latest iOS because of that.

Anthony

All my homework is inaccessible, can't touch the school servers if I need to test a project....

Darius Jahandarie

I have no idea why the latest iOS lets me do it. Maybe they renegotiated something with AT&T. Or maybe I was taken off the unlimited plan without any notice.

Anthony

Can I ask you two another question? I actually didn't a chance to read the chapter on measurement, and I've had no experience with this.

What about these?

a. この湖は深さが20メートルある。
b. #この湖は深さ20メートルある。

Darius Jahandarie

Not sure about that. The first seems much better, but I don't know the exact status of the second one.

Anonymous

What does your book say?

Darius Jahandarie

5:41 AM

What are you asking about?

Anthony

I'm asking why the second is silly.

@snailboat I'm reading through the chapter right now, can't find something that looks liek this.

(If you're curious, we're using Hasegawa's book she's about to publish)

And by about I mean in the future.

Darius Jahandarie

I can't think of a good explanation. It just seems really jarring to not have a particle there, while I think 深さある is fine, though I'd personally almost always opt for putting in the が.

Anthony

I mean, I could/would say that too.

Darius Jahandarie

I'd ask a native speaker though, I don't fully trust my judgments here.

Anthony

But not only does that not help me at all with understanding Japanese, it also does not answer my homework.

sigh

I appreciate your help, @DariusJahandarie and @snailboat.

Darius Jahandarie

5:48 AM

Does your school policy actually allow for asking other people for help completing homework by the way? I think most places don't.

Anthony

lol

It's funny actually.

I don't think it's normally allowed, and in the CS department it's been a big deal.

But in this class the teacher encouraged us to.

I don't understand the ideology.

Darius Jahandarie

Neat. I actually mostly approve of that.

Anthony

I mean.

Darius Jahandarie

I think people learn better when they discuss things with other people.

Anthony

Well, also I don't just copy answers.

Darius Jahandarie

5:51 AM

Just ask good questions and copying answers becomes impossible.

Anthony

Well that too.

But she's been asking mostly translation problems which makes no sense.

Darius Jahandarie

I'd say the rule is mostly there for the teachers' benefit as opposed to the students'.

Anthony

Because the native speakers don't even need to try.

And then I have no idea without consulting outside sources.

Darius Jahandarie

You have native speakers in your class?

Anthony

Like three or four?

Darius Jahandarie

5:52 AM

Why don't you just become friends with one of them?

Anthony

And most people are in third year Japanese, but only second year is a requirement.

Lol

I dun wanna.

Darius Jahandarie

自業自得かな。

Anthony

Also I don't mind too much, I think most the people don't really know what's going on/ don't care. People don't seem to like analyzing Japanese that much... idk...

self industry self arrive?

Rilakkuma

@Anthony completely agree

Darius Jahandarie

There are bad students in every bunch.

Anthony

5:54 AM

I'm mostly just being cynical.

Darius Jahandarie

I'm mostly just agreeing.

Rilakkuma

it is not about being a bad student. It is more about the way of learning. There are different learners - "rememberers", "understanders", "atom dividers" and so on.

Anonymous

@Anthony You should self industry self arrive yourself at a dictionary :-)

Darius Jahandarie

I didn't go to a super prestigious university, but at least at mine, I think the majority of my classmates really did not care about anything.

Anthony

lol I did it into yahoo answers

@DariusJahandarie That's sad.

I'm losing hair competing with these math/cs/physics students.

They're all too damn smart.

:P

Darius Jahandarie

5:56 AM

I forget what you're actually studying. Was it Physics?

Anthony

I'm going for the triple.

:P

Jack of all trades, master of none.

Darius Jahandarie

Oh. Well, maybe that's what's making you lose hair. :)

Anthony

Except it's more like Jack of no trades, master of none as well.

@DariusJahandarie I mean it's also in my genes. But yeah.

Anyway I'm boned for this Japanese homework... I should go read the chapter.

Darius Jahandarie

Working hard and planning well, two very critical skills to accomplishing anything.

I find that if I'm ever stressing out about anything, it's because I neglected to properly do one or both of those things at some earlier point.

As obvious as that may sound. :)

Anthony

lol

Everything is obvious

Anonymous

5:59 AM

@Anthony a. この湖は深さが20メートルある。　／　b. この湖は深さ20メートルだ。 ?

Anthony

but for some reason I don't know it

@snailboat woops did I cut off the end? It was ある

Anonymous

No, I was thinking without が it might be better with だ

Anthony

Oh.

I mean, I suppose. But why?

Moreover she used that damn octothorpe.

Darius Jahandarie

I certainly agree with that. 深さ20メートルだ。 is totally fine.

Rilakkuma

*この池は２０メートル深いです。

Anthony

6:02 AM

水海

Darius Jahandarie

湖

Rilakkuma

沼

水溜

Darius Jahandarie

熊

Anthony

身図卯実

楽

楽熊

Rilakkuma

ゴロ熊

Darius Jahandarie

6:04 AM

身図卯実　＜中二病みたいな書き方ｗ

Anthony

What did you say?

Darius Jahandarie

Hmm... there isn't really a good way to translate 中二病.

Rilakkuma

中二病（ちゅうにびょう）とは、「（日本の教育制度における）中学2年生頃の思春期に見られる、背伸びしがちな言動」を自虐する語。転じて、思春期にありがちな自己愛に満‌ちた空想や嗜好などを揶揄したネットスラング。「病」という表現を含むが、実際に治療の必要とされる医学的な意味での病気、または精神疾患とは無関係である。

Darius Jahandarie

I think Anthony might have trouble reading that.

Anthony

I do not know Japanese well enough to even start reading that.

lol

bangin.wordpress.com/2008/12/21/…

Rilakkuma

6:08 AM

I think apple's recent Yosemite made all Japanese look awful on macintosh

it looks somewhat like うずら font @snailboat uses so it may be nice for someone

Anonymous

I don't think Apple's font rendering was ever very good unless you were on a very high resolution display

Darius Jahandarie

I think the うずら font is cute, though I'm not sure I'd be able to deal with it all the time.

Anthony

@snailboat You were right, of course.

Darius Jahandarie

@snailboat There are some who would disagree vehemently.

Anthony

I found where she talked about measurement patterns.

Anonymous

6:10 AM

@Anthony Oh? Lucky me! :-)

Anonymous

@DariusJahandarie I say this as a long time mac user.

Anthony

Although she fails to offer any explanation.

Anonymous

I think the font rendering is designed for looking nice rather than readability

Rilakkuma

@snailboat apple's font rendering is religious topic

Anonymous

@Anthony Oh, good! Me too.

Anthony

6:11 AM

:P

Anonymous

I mean―drat!

Rilakkuma

@snailboat there's a legent Apple renders fonts so that they look as close as possible to the printed version which makes sense in very high resolutions otherwise some parts will be lost, unlike Windows rendering which changes small details so that they appear more clearly on low resolution displays.

Darius Jahandarie

Mmm, em dashes.

Gotta run, night all.

Anonymous

Have a good evening!

Anonymous

@Rilakkuma OS X font rendering has a configurable threshold for AA, though, so if you find non-AA'ed fonts to be easier to read at low resolutions, you can certainly have them

Rilakkuma

6:17 AM

yeah but they are ugly :p

Anonymous

I have my own personal opinions about readability and prettiness. I don't generally try to force them on other people

Anonymous

I think sometimes AA'ed font rendering is prettier but not as readable

Anonymous

I'm not aware of really conclusive studies about font readability

Rilakkuma

when it comes to 好み I prefer my own opinions to any studies, although studies may make me re-check own opinion. :]

Anonymous