Japanese Language

Flaw

6:14 AM

I saw a cat in school today, and was informed that her name was 消える

Which makes me think about naming things. Would it be instinctive to name things with verbs?

Anonymous

Are we limiting this to proper names?

Anonymous

A fly is called a fly. It flies

Flaw

If you limit it to proper names, does it feel weird if a verb was used?

Anonymous

Hmm.

Anonymous

I can't think of many examples.

Flaw

6:20 AM

Like if you wanted to name your pet cat.

Anonymous

I tend to name things with adjectives or noncewords

Flaw

Would you already have eliminated all verbs subconsciously?

Anonymous

Or occasionally nouns

Anonymous

Perhaps--I don't have ready access to what I'd eliminate subconsciously

Anonymous

But I can't think of any pets I've named with verbs

Anonymous

6:21 AM

So I think perhaps you're right

Flaw

If I look at something and try to name it. I would not think of using a verb and then proper-nounerizing it

But there are words that are verbs and it's a noun for itself

Anonymous

Like chase

Anonymous

which is a name, Chase

Flaw

I'm trying to think of a Japanese analog

かおり and かおる can both be names right?

Anonymous

And ひかり and ひかる

Anonymous

6:26 AM

かえる is the word for frog and it is also a verb

Anonymous

かわる is also frog

Anonymous

Err, かわず

Anonymous

I always wondered if かえる and かわず were from verbs

Flaw

Looks like my "verb limitation" theory is weaker in Japanese.

!

Maybe it has something to do with the SOV and SVO word orders

Anonymous

In English, it's really easy to zero-nominalize a verb and vice-versa

Anonymous

6:29 AM

Hmm. Maybe that's not relevant

Flaw

Japanese sentences feel "verb heavy" and English sentences feel "noun heavy" to me.

So that might explain the observation that "verb limitation" for names is weaker in Japanese than for English.

Anonymous

I'm not disagreeing, but I'm not sure if I understand what that means

Anonymous

Of course, I'm probably not good enough at Japanese to have a good feeling of what you mean

Flaw

I'm not really understanding myself either haha. I'm trying to get the right words for it but it looks like I'm not doing a good job

(I'm not particularly good at Japanese either, so all this is mostly theory-crafting)

Anonymous

Oh

Anonymous

6:32 AM

Well, it's fun talking about Japanese. I learn stuff talking about it :-)

Anonymous

I appreciate when you talk about it

Anonymous

Like the other day when you brought up 水面

Anonymous

I'm kind of curious about おもて

Anonymous

も　おも　おもて

Flaw

Maybe different regions used different words?

Anonymous

6:35 AM

My friend says his neighbor's dog is named Dash

Flaw

I like thinking about how things are thought about by different people.

Investigating phenomena that appear similar on the surface but arise from different thought processes.

I hope I don't come across as presumptuous whenever I theorycraft. Sometimes I feel like I need to walk around with a disclaimer on my forehead.

Anonymous

I'm not judging

Anonymous

I'm playing guitar :-)

Flaw

How many instruments do you play?

Anonymous

Hmm

Anonymous

6:45 AM

I played viola for ten years in school, and violin for some of that

Anonymous

Now I play violin and not viola, mostly because I have an electric violin and it's nicer than my viola

Anonymous

I play piano poorly

Anonymous

I play guitar and bass, also poorly

Anonymous

But I like playing them.

Flaw

That's quite impressive.

Anonymous

6:47 AM

I'm glad you're impressed by me playing lots of instruments badly.

Anonymous

:-D

Anonymous

I'm 31 and I started playing music when I was maybe 6 or 7, so music is pretty ingrained in me now

Flaw

As in, a wide variety of instruments, not the badly part. haha

Anonymous

I may not be the best musician, but I am a musician nonetheless :-)

Anonymous

I started guitar when I was 8

Flaw

6:48 AM

I only play the piano. I want to learn violin because it has that...

that different timbre. The sort of crying sound it can make

Anonymous

Well, it's expressive like a human voice.

Anonymous

You can sing through it

Flaw

Oh and the cello too.

Anonymous

I love cello!

Anonymous

That's one instrument I never picked up

Flaw

6:51 AM

If I could replace some of my bass clef notes with cello, it would be awesome

Anonymous

Even though I played the other three--double bass, violin, and viola

Anonymous

Cello reads three clefs

Flaw

Doesn't the skill requirement carry over?

Anonymous

Sorta

Anonymous

Violin and viola are much more closely related

Flaw

6:51 AM

Applying the same skill on a bigger sized instrument

Anonymous

A viola is like a bigger violin, but with more of a bridge arch and a differently shaped bow

Anonymous

You play them largely the same way, so many violinists and violists can play the other instrument

Anonymous

You have to relearn the muscle memory for exactly where the notes are, is all

Anonymous

And learn to read C clef, for viola :-)

Anonymous

For cello, the instrument is turned around 180 degrees

Anonymous

6:53 AM

And generally you sit to play

Anonymous

And the hand positions are different

Anonymous

Both the left hand and the bow position

Anonymous

Upright bass has a couple different prominent schools, and one has a bow grip quite unlike cello

Flaw

(starts to imagine a giant playing a cello with his neck)

Anonymous

And the left-hand technique again is somewhat different

Anonymous

6:54 AM

Though at least it's not 180 degrees off, like cello relative to violin or viola...

Anonymous

So they're all a bit different.

Anonymous

I bet I could learn to play a cello, but I don't want to buy one right now and I've got enough instruments to get better at, for the time being

Anonymous

Cellos are expensive.

Anonymous

Plus I don't feel like taking lessons right now.

Flaw

I want to restart piano.

Anonymous

6:57 AM

(I don't think it's a great idea learning to play violin family instruments on your own. Just my opinion)

Anonymous

<3 Piano

Flaw

I still haven't gotten grade 8 yet

Anonymous

You mean like, formally restart?

Anonymous

You still play, don't you? Just not graded repertoire

Flaw

Yea, just not graded.

Anonymous

6:59 AM

I should do that too

Anonymous

I have books I'm working through on guitar right now

Anonymous

A snail ate part of my copy of Hanon.

Flaw

They eat books?

Anonymous

That was how I learned that paper contains calcium carbonate crystals, which snails need to eat to fill out the inner layers of their shells.

Flaw

Ah I see

Anonymous

7:01 AM

So when a snail finds paper or cardboard, they eat it!

Anonymous

Don't ask why a snail was on my copy of Hanon.

Flaw

Oh I remember that snail video you posted here

Their shells looked squishy

Anonymous

They grow the outer layer first

Anonymous

Then they have to find nutrition to fill out the middle and inner layers

Anonymous

So when they're born, they start out translucent.

Anonymous

7:02 AM

Well, when they hatch, anyway.

Anonymous

I like nature. It inspires me to play more music

Flaw

I'm now looking at maths questions with solutions and pretending that I know what's going on.

Maybe if I pretend hard enough, I'll know what's going on eventually.

Ah, I just figured out that it's okay to not know what's happening.

I'm given the equation without proof. And I'm not required to derive it!

This simplifies everything!

Anonymous

7:19 AM

Oh, I just remembered

Anonymous

Last night before I fell asleep, I played some of a video game.

Anonymous

And I wrote down some Japanese that I didn't understand

Anonymous

「おぼえておいて、そんはないわよ。」

Anonymous

そん I guess is 損

Anonymous

I just looked that up. When I was half-awake, I was wondering if it was a contraction for それ, but now I don't think that makes sense.

Flaw

7:24 AM

おぼえておいて = remember and keep in mind?

Anonymous

Yeah, I think so.

Anonymous

I'm kinda hazy on the whole 〜おく thing

Anonymous

But I was just looking that up and dictionaries seem to agree with you

Flaw

So the sentence reads "keeping in mind that there's no loss"

Anonymous

I think what they're saying to keep in mind was the previous sentence

Anonymous

7:26 AM

Which I didn't write down

Anonymous

And I've forgotten what it was.

Anonymous

Oh, hey, Weblio has an English gloss of a very similar phrase.

Anonymous

何でも覚えておいて損は無い　It is always good to know anything.

Anonymous

I was thinking maybe it means "It can't hurt to keep [that] in mind"

Anonymous

Where [that] = what was said in the previous sentence

Anonymous

7:30 AM

I see a lot of search results for phrases like 〜ておいて損はない

Anonymous

I guess 損はない is a common phrase

Anonymous

Weblio says やってみて損はない "No harm in trying."

Anonymous

ejje.weblio.jp/sentence/content/…

Flaw

oh I see

Anonymous

It might be common, but I've managed to go this long without noticing it :-)

Anonymous

7:35 AM

Okay! Yay, I understand 損はない now.

Anonymous

And おぼえておく

Anonymous

I need to get a better grasp of 〜おく in general

Anonymous

7:55 AM

豸 looks fiercer than 犭

Anonymous

「貓」「猫」

Anonymous

I'm more scared of the 貓

ssb

11:47 PM

Officially entering a period of doing literally nothing at work for the next 2 weeks

how should I pass this time?

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