Japanese learning PARADIGM SHIFT: Cut through the confusion. Lesson 43

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

*Note:* If you want to go even deeper into this aspect of Japanese, please see this video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/fZqWc6B_h7-NhtU

[@RustieMcHogg]

This is great but I need to play it a couple more times to make sure I understand it. But I’m really glad you did the lesson as this has bothered me before.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I am glad to be of help. Yes there is quite a lot in one lesson - quite a bit of it is recap, but I think that was necessary.

[@a.m.4479]

Notes for me: In general, zero-ga defaults to watashi-ga, unless context tells us otherwise or the ga-car is explicitely shown (and the ga-marked noun is not watashi) In sentences with words like -tai or -ru/-rareru (the potential), unless the context tells us otherwise or the ga-car is explicitely shown (and the ga-marked noun is not watashi), zero-ga defaults to watashi-ga; in other words, words like -tai or -ru/-rareru (the potential) can flip their polarity depending on the situation REMEMBER: only nouns can be marked with logical particles Remember: every sentence has a wa-marked topic and a ga-marked noun, whether we can see them or not Japanese is an animistic language*, which often puts the inducer (as opposed to the experiencer, like in many Western languages) in the center. However, it can easily go from one POV to the other since, in Japanese, inducer and experiencer are two sides of the same coin / they aren't completely separate; they are two halves of the same action or state *(or not just more animist; it has a more unified view of the world) "The inside and the outside are not wholly separate, but are two sides of the same perception"

[@EricCouillard]

phew! i really appreciate how deeply you think about these things and explain them to us. the idea of no separation between internal and external is really fun philosophically, and you see it a lot in Zen Buddhism. not sure how to say it in Japanese, but in English it's called non-duality

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I think this would be 不二 主義 in Japanese but you don't see much, maybe because the term itself is Vedantic, although Mahayana thought embraces essentially the same concept (at least in my view) . It does seem to be deeply rooted in Japanese culture, probably via Buddhism.

[@DanneoYT]

Woah... simply mind blowing, my jaws dropped several times during this video. I remember back when I started this playlist and in the video where you introduced the helper adjective たい, there were many comments regarding this problem so you linked this video to them. I couldn’t watch it back then as it was too advanced for me but I’ve finally reached this video after working through the playlist and I CAN UNDERSTAND!!! It’s like beating a major boss level and feeling like you’ve ‘levelled up’ All this wouldn’t have been possible if not for your excellent and concise explanations Now onwards to the next video!!!

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

That's wonderful. I am so happy that you have "leveled up". By coincidence I released a kind of sequel to this video just today: kzbin.info/www/bejne/fZqWc6B_h7-NhtU

[@Jesse-cn2hn]

I really enjoyed this. I read a bit about zen buddhism, and it's interesting to see that the Japanese language itself has the same lens as it. That bit at the end with the rabbit reminds me of a lot of koans I've seen!

[@darkestholy74]

Hello miss dolly. In a sense, I like the fact that you talk about a two way movement. I think a motion implies an opposite motion, and it's only a matter of perception to decide which one caused by the other. That's not exactly what you said, but I think it's somewhat similar. My first experience with this was with 怖い. it would be a motion towards the subject itself of fear. So used on an object, it means it "attracts fear", so the opposite reaction would be people "giving fear" to the object. Used on a person, "attracting fear" would sound more like he's scared, and the opposite reaction would be the environment "giving fear" to him. I think that's a fair and rational way of seeing things too.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Yes, 怖い is another example of a direction-flipping adjective of subjectivity - and actually another one that one of my students has tried to "rationalize" by saying that even when one is pointing it at oneself one is really afraid of a nebulous A-car outside of oneself. This "rationalization" I would say is in itself undisprovable, but since we _can_ prove that subjectivity-flipping is a reality, we should be able to accept the more natural and intuitively likely hypothesis that it can flip from external cause to internal experiencer.

[@shade0636]

Good stuff. Really sucks that she's no longer here.

[@birthdaycat6756]

My God... Japanese is profound and beautiful indeed. No wonder Zen Buddhism is prevalent there.

[@MrKlumpfluff]

A really hard topic to tackle, that is explained well and clearly. I will digest this for a while, but honestly, realizing there is a language (and thus a method of thinking) that is closer to my perceived reality feels liberating. That was hard to explain properly, sorry. Again, thank you for these utterly well-made lessons.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I do understand. For many beings I think Japanese comes closer to the way we really perceive things in our innermost being.

[@Nico_00-q]

9:40 in this case, is it correct to say "東京が行きたい"?

[@ide94]

Not really. You wouldn't say "東京を行く", which is the action that "東京が行きたい" implies.

[@namless3654]

分かり易いです!　有難う御座います!

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

こちらこそありがとうございます。

[@Magnemite_]

fun fact, "fushigisou" (written in katakana) is also the japanese name for the pokemon ivysaur

[@luzff]

Dolly, I really love your channel and have bought your book Unlocking Japanese. I've already read the whole book, but a lot of things you talk about in your videos aren't there at all. Do you plan on publishing or at least writing about these other concepts? I say this because I'd really love to be able to read all of this and because I feel the need to have a "record" of all of this. In the sense that we never know if a KZbin channel will be taken down, or particular videos, and I wish I didn't have to depend upon my internet connection to be able to review these concepts you've taught us. They're nowhere else online, like the other user pointed out. So pretty pleasee hahahah, let me have a way of saving all of these lessons from your videos on pdf/epub/mobi. You can even release a second, more complete book. Or a second edition. I'd buy it.

[@deedanner6431]

I'm pretty sure she's working on a book now.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I have been planning a new book ever since this current series began. _Unlocking Japanese_ really outlines the basic principles on which all this is based so I think it's still useful, but clearly a new book is needed (maybe more than one) since it has all grown so massively. Of course I didn't have the train model when I wrote _Unlocking_ either and I think that is hugely helpful in grasping how it all words. And here's a little secret - the reason the trains are black and white is that they were designed to go into a book and color printing is still too costly to consider (and quite a few people use black-and-white Kindles etc). The sad fact is that I underestimated how much time it takes making weekly videos and doing everything else involved in running a Channel etc. My initial plan was to write the book in tandem with producing the course, but I haven't even started it! So sorry! But I _do_ still intend to do it.

[@luzff]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 Oh Dolly I'm so happy you will be writing that book/s after all!! Even if it takes a while. But are there a lot of videos left on this series, you think? And if you spaced out the videos for like 1 every two weeks? Would that leave you time to write?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

@@luzff Currently I'm already juggling two series - this structure one and the immersion one kzbin.info/www/bejne/rpmon4Cfmq2nm8U So I don't think I can do less than one a week (I have thought of trying for more some weeks but that hasn't been possible so far). I do intend to do the book though!

[@renandesouzaoliveira5511]

I bought the book too, and became a little frustrated how short it was. But still a great work that has been opening my mind. Thanks, and I hope that the new books come soon.

[@stay_coolXD]

I don't know. I feel more confused now. Maybe i should rewatch the series

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

This video isn't really meat to be watched until you are pretty firm in the earlier principles, so yes it probably would be a good idea to re-watch the series.

[@gabrielguimaraes8967]

Did she just explain the concept of AT Fields in Evangelion ?

[@elprofegrimm]

To quote Plankton from Spongebob Squarepants: "In a cosmic sort of way, yes."

[@vinilzord1]

Sensei I have realized your physical appearance changed a lot throughout the years. But the top-notch quality is still the same heh :) This video was super enlightening

[@GarrisonMorton]

But 欲する (To want) is a real verb. albeit a very archaic sounding one.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

And modern Japanese chooses to use it very rarely because 欲しい seems more adapted to modern Japanese expression strategy. The same could be said of the verb 好く.

[@GarrisonMorton]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 Words like those two would probably be used outside of Japan if Japanese were an international language like English. Like how British english and American English are slightly different.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

@@GarrisonMorton That's very true.

[@sirmoco]

Great lesson as usual, but I have a few questions. 私は（東京が）東京に行きたい。 "As for me (Tokyo is) inducing the want to go to Tokyo." Wouldn't this be another way of looking at it? Just because Tokyo is marked with に doesn't mean it can't also be marked with が, as far as I can understand. In the same light, 私は（⓪が）早く食べたい。 Where ⓪が simply means "it", an unspecified subject. I think you've mentioned this in previous lessons, that が can be equivalent to an unspecified actor. So it would be "As for me, (it) is inducing the want to eat soon/quickly." Changing polarity is one way of looking at it, but do we really need to do that? Or actually, is that really how native Japanese 文法 works?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

It's not so much a question of 文法 (which is only a way of describing language and to some extent arbitrary provided it accurately reflects the underlying data) as what Japanese people actually mean when they talk 早く食べたい does not in fact imply any "it" that is making one what to eat. What is really a violation of grammar is the idea that something can be marked with に and also with が. It can't, either visibly or invisibly. A に-marked noun _can_ become a topic, but not a grammatical subject. 東京には行きたい does not mean as for to-Tokyo, it is making me want to go, because to-Tokyo is not an act-taking entity in that sense. Honestly if you want to shoehorn a non-polarity shifting system for the sake of "neatness" you can, but it does violence to the language. It is better to accept that just as we can polarity-shift subjectivities in English - "we were happy that day" vs "that was a happy day" - we also do it in Japanese (on a somewhat less arbitrary basis).

[@sirmoco]

​@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 When we say コーヒーが飲みたい, meaning "coffee is inducing want to drink", we don't mean it to drink any beverage in general, but coffee in specific. コーヒーを飲む. So コーヒー is both the thing inducing want and the thing that we want to drink, if that makes sense. In the same way, when we say 東京に行きたい, 東京 is both the place desired to go (に) and the place that induces that desire (が). In English, it would be something like "Tokyo is inducing the desire to go to Tokyo", which even if unnatural sounding, doesn't seem to violate any grammar/language. If it's not apparent, I'm having a lot of trouble wrapping my head around this lol

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

@@sirmoco As I say, if you choose to model it that way no one can stop you. I don't think it is a good decision. You say "When we say コーヒーが飲みたい, meaning "coffee is inducing want to drink", we don't mean it to drink any beverage in general, but coffee in specific. コーヒーを飲む. So コーヒー is both the thing inducing want and the thing that we want to drink, if that makes sense." Exactly. And that is why just saying 飲みたい means "I want to drink" - not "something is inducing drink-want in me".

[@siyacer]

final problems require final solutions

[@POPpopPOPE]

In the past I assumed that there was no strict rule on what can be the subject of a verb, so I thought “何がしている” could be interpreted as “what is doing”. If not “what is doing” then possibly another verb could be used, for example “what is making that noise”. Even in English it could be said “What is doing that” in the case where the verb in question is obvious in context. In English we could say “what is happening”, though I assume the verb “起こる” in Japanese is reserved for only certain types of verb situations. For the previous example of “What is doing [verb](say “falling”)” I would guess that one could say “that which is falling is what” in Japanese, but I feel like there would be an alternate way of saying it. Question words specifically have been confusing me because as we have learned, が would mark something that is new information, and in the case of a question, a question would seem to be only asked when it is believed an answer from the askee could be procured, and so は would be used instead. It is apparent in English that you can technically phrase sentences in a lot of different ways with the emphasis placed in slightly different places, but usually only in literature and more nuanced discourse is there a decision made in structure choice as to deliberately change the meaning of what is being said. And so for Japanese, I’ve been wondering the limits as to how certain words can be used and what kind of sentence structures are technically grammatically correct, whether or not it is weird sounding or could be phrased better for conversation. Ty

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I don't think "what is doing?" makes much sense in English _or_ Japanese. If you look up "何がしている" on Google with the quotes you find no exact matches - as one would expect. Expressions like "that which is falling is what?" are much more common in Japanese than in English because they are much more "agile" in Japanese. Agility is an almost universally neglected factor in language that is hugely important - I teach it here using this very "that which" structure: kzbin.info/www/bejne/fJWwlounrMp1gJI - because understanding agility teaches us that many forms of expression should _not_ be regarded as equivalent to their "English equivalents" even though they are semantically equivalent, because they are not equivalent in agility. It is not the case that が must mark new information, only that は can't. This is why the "a/the" analogy, while useful up to a point is only partial. が frequently marks old/known information, and has to because of the way it works. が is the only way of marking the nominative case (the grammatical subject). は doesn't mark any case or logical function - it is a non-logical topic marker. Sometimes you can leave out the logic-marking because it can be inferred, but by no means always. Which is why the notion of は and が as "alternatives" is so misleading. There are times when in practice we decide which one to make visible, but they do completely different jobs. More on this in this rather old video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/b53Ci5-HhrpnkKc

[@namename4980]

Another great video! Thank you a lot! I have question, but not really about video topic, as you explain everything extremely clear! about お腹がすいた - I run into this phrase in very childish anime, and thought that it's a kid's way of saying "I'm hungry". But u also used this phrase in your video. So it's just a normsl way of saying "I'm hungry" in Japanese?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Yes it is the normal expression. There are lots of variants like お腹がペコペコ or 腹が減た but the most basic one is お腹が空いた. Some male speakers might find it a shade childlike/feminine and use a slightly "rougher" expression but others would use it. Kind of like the おれ vs ぼく thing.

[@namename4980]

Organic Japanese with Cure Dolly ありがとうございました

[@The_DoubtingThomas]

Thank you

[@lennardtimmermann3864]

Although I have not even passed N5 lvl of Japanese, I do feel like having an explanation for the "problem" arising with 食べたい , following your previous explanations. Please correct me if this is going the wrong direction at some point. I am thinking of 私が　食べたい as in the desire to eat is invoked by "I" / 私. There is something within myself, that is invoking the desire. No cake, or dish is invoking it. And certainly the general concept of food (食べ物) is not, what invokes my desire to eat. But a part of myself is doing so. It may be my digestive system (as a part of 私) or my ego greeding to have food ( just as well as a part of 私 ) or anything that is part of the concept described by 私. Thinking about it this way,　(0が)東京に行きたいです。is making sense, as the desire to go to Tokyo is being invoked by something within me, and I might not even be able to point out what it is exactly, but it's certainly coming from within 私. Therefore, it appears to me, that たい is not switching it's use in any way, but actually stays the engine of 私が all the way. I hope I made my thoughts visual enough to follow, as it felt a little clumsy of an explanation 😅

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Yes, I think looking at it this way works too. Desire (and other subjectivities) can be aroused by an external object or by a movement within oneself. This is a simple fact of experience and is expressed regularly in Japanese. Even English has it but less frequently because it usually puts the experiencer at the center. But expressions like "that cake is tempting" are close to the most usual Japanese way of expressing it.

[@lennardtimmermann3864]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 ありがとうございます。私は　せんぶ　お キュアードリのビデオが　見たい。👍 Keep up the good work

[@ViewtifulJosh388]

I have to watch this a few more times. I get it, but need to make sure. Anyway, I have a question: does particle に really mean "to"? I know it's "by", but the more I see things and the way you explain things in this video it seems that that particle ONLY means "by". I hope that's true because I've been having problems having to figure out if it's "to" or "by" when reading. Most of the time it seems like "by", but it's really annoying have to turn this switch that changes the meaning of the particle just to be able to make sense in English.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

The really important thing to understand here is that に is a logical particle. It is not a preposition. Japanese does not have prepositions. English has lots of them, like to, by, in, of, at, etc. Prepositions and particles are very different things and work in very different ways. But of course all language, in the end, is describing roughly the same world, roughly the same set of possibilities and feelings, even when they are looked at in somewhat different ways. So, logical particles - especially に sometimes end up performing functions that in English would be performed by prepositions. But they aren't the same thing and they don't work in the same way. When に attaches to a noun it becomes essentially part of the noun and marks it as some kind of target. This isn't what English prepositions do at all. So for example ボールをさくらに投げた can mean "I threw the ball _to_ Sakura" or "I threw the ball _at_ Sakura". That distinction exists with the two English prepositions, but に is merely marking Sakura as the target of the action of throwing the ball. In お店にパンを買いに行った The two にs both appear to do things that would be done by English "to": I went _to_ the shops _to_ by bread". But notice that this only happens because we are using a textbook-style "natural English" translation. Actually "buy" here is in its い-stem form and working as a noun (remember that logical particles can only ever mark nouns). So what this really literally means is: I went _to_ the shops _for_ bread-buying. What is actually happening is that に is marking the shops as "geographical" _target_ of my journey, and the act of my buying as the volitional _target_ or purpose. In receptive sentences, where が marks the _receiver_ of an action, the "target" principle becomes, as you might say, flipped. In a normal A caused object B to affect C type sentence, に marks the target of the action (C) - the person ultimately affected by A's interaction with B (B, being for example, the ball). So in this case に is marking the indirect object. Not because it is a dedicated indirect-object-marker, but because an indirect object is one very common form of "target". In a receptive kind of sentence, where A _receives_ an action from B, we need to pay careful attention to what it is that に does, because it is something very different from anything we find anywhere in English. This is why English can't understand Japanese receptive sentences and feels forced to translate them as "passive". The actor of 水が犬に飲まれた As we know, is not the dog but the water. And that is because the action - the core action of the sentence - is not drinking (飲む) but receiving (れる). In this case, because the sentence is a "pull" sentence rather than a "push" sentence the _source_ of the action of receiving, that is to say, the performer of the _secondary_ action of drinking (the dog) is seen as the target. As you can see the function played here is analogous in "pull" terms to the role Sakura plays in having the ball thrown at her in a normal "push" sentence. It's a slightly tricky concept to grasp - and that's because English finds the receptive helper verb very difficult to understand and ends up making a huge hash of it by calling it "passive". We really need to think of the receptive in particular in Japanese terms. But even outside of the receptive, attempting to assimilate に to any particular English preposition is a recipe for misunderstanding. に marks the target (which in the mirror-world of "pull" [receptive] sentences, becomes the source).

[@yahboisquishy5561]

I have a question about が. What is the purpose of が in phrases like 背が高い? I don't think it's a subject. Is it being used as a comparative like you talked about a few videos ago? Thank you as usual. I really appreciate this video series. I feel like I'm actually making progress in learning, even though I've been learning Japanese for three years with not much progress.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

They are logical clauses. However, in their pre-modifier form, you can regard phrases like 背が高い, 頭がいい as essentially compound adjectives. They are often in the pre-connective form 背の高い, 頭のいい. When they constitute a full sentence they are simply logical clauses "back is high", "head is good" that have a primarily adjectival function related to an "invisible は". I talked about this here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/lZ-7eaOhibmZfdU

[@lynkkx]

I might actually be too stupid to understand this I will try watching this a few more times

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Don't worry if it is a bit confusing. Do take notice of the proof that adjectives of subjective feeling can in fact "flip". Even if it is hard to understand why, it is important not to end up with a false model that tries to make it that they don't.

[@mikomichael9555]

Excellent as always❤️ kind of missing the 2d style and the old intro

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I liked 2D too but the range of movement was so poor that I had to give it up. And I'm so glad you liked that intro. I dropped it mainly to move more quickly into the material. Also I had a cutesier image of the channel when I first started. I turned out to be a lot more "serious" than I had expected to be so I tend to leave the cute elements to the graphics these days.

[@emplore]

So does anyone know how you would say "I can understand the book" in Japanese? Would it be Hon wa watashi ga yomeru?

[@swissphan18]

It would be 私は本が読める (watashi wa hon ga yomeru)

[@siyacer]

almost

[@animephilosopher8541]

I have a question regarding “older” Japanese, sometimes I hear them say like in mononoke-hime, わが名はアシタカ。is this older style of speaking closer to the concept of zero-が? As they seam to always use ga and ha.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I am not sure what you mean here. The は is perfectly standard. The only slightly old-fashioned bit is わが名, which is not standard Japanese though 我が家 (わがや) for "our/my house" is still in common use. Possibly the confusion might lie in thinking that the が of 我が is the particle が but it is part of the word. It is old Japanese (a fossil in its very limited modern use) since it is fundamentally an adjective without conforming to the very simple modern adjectival patterns. The が was originally a particle, ヶ (still used in time statements and place names) and pronounced か or が. When pronounced が it essentially works like modern の, but outside of place names it is rarely used and 我が at this stage is usually regarded as a word in itself.

[@GarrisonMorton]

All this talk about switching polarity makes me think of Star Trek.

[@Garbaz]

I'm wondering, what happens, when the thing that induces たい is itself a possible actor (e.g. a person)? Would that result in an ambiguous sentence? For example 「さくらが助けたい。」 Couldn't this both mean that Sakura wants to help, or that Sakura induces a desire to help. Maybe a bad example semantically, but I hope it illustrates my question.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

We don't normally talk about other people's desires using たい so it can't mean Sakura wants help. However in this case we would say さくらを助けたい. This opens a whole complex question. The reason is that Sakura is not an object inducing save-desire. Saving Sakura (さくらを助ける) is an action that induces want in us. This is an example of how particles are sometimes used differently in expressing things that relate to humans kzbin.info/www/bejne/nYfUpGeKr9asidk I may make a video on this soon.

[@Garbaz]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 Thank you very much for the reply (and so quickly at that)! Of course, I forgot that one doesn't talk about other people's desires with たい alone, so that ambiguity is thereby resolved. Regarding the particle usage: Thanks for the video link! It was very informative. But now ask myself another question: How would this work with an intransitive verb? I'm not sure if this even makes any sense, but would a sentence like さくらが逃げたい, mean that Sakura makes me want to run away, or does it mean that I want Sakura to run away, or is it just nonsense? Does the subject of a たい sentence have to be the object of the verb it induces desire for? I'm very sorry if I am simply misunderstanding your explanation in the video here.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

@@Garbaz Transitivity isn't really the issue here, and I am thinking that human interaction isn't the whole issue either. I need to process this further and will be making a video fairly soon.

[@lcbr8100]

this was a great episode and i learned a lot. does this apply with い adjectives? for example you can feel 怖い and also a situation can be 怖い thanks

[@goldeer7129]

Well it looks to be rather true with 怖い, when we sould say in english "I am scared of crepes" we would say "クレープが怖い" because that's just 'crepes are scary, in relation to me' and that makes sense, just like crepes can be eat-want-inducing. I'm not 100% sure if we could say '私が怖い" but I've seen 私は怖い (I searched Reverso sentences). Now is that applicable for all/most/someother い-adjectives ? Well... most of them are really just acting as describing features like 赤い or 美しい or 新しい.... I think the things "want" and "scared of" really have their 'own way' of being said, like it's a special thing. In Japanese there is not really any special thing in a way... But I think your question was more about whether or not this concept of ego-centered and all applied to certain い adjectives as well. And I think that yes it does, that's the case with 怖い (we mark the thing as 'scary' to mean(in english) that we are scared of it), but also with たい as it really is an adjective as well. (though I'm not sure if 怖い can "flip" or not)

[@lcbr8100]

@@goldeer7129 hey thanks so much for your reply, pretty much cleared it up and was very thought provoking. i liked your point about the fact that たい in 食べたい is working like an adjective anyway i think 私は怖い is like 私はそれが怖い 。 so i feel like it's similar with 私はうなぎだ、私は怖い。 it's just the が marked noun has been omitted. although i can't remember if it's 私はOがうなぎだ。 anyway, thanks for you're replying and putting the time and effort into typing that 🙏

[@justerman6518]

Sensei, I've posted a question to your Patreon Community page but after doing so I noted your comment that "These posts don't show up on my dashboard so it's better to just PM me. The trouble is I can't think what to PM you means. Help!

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

If you click on my icon in Patreon (the circle with my head in - same as on this reply but in Patreon) you should get an option to message me. If not, please let me know here.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

OK - I found and replied to the question. But it is a good idea to PM me in future because I probably wouldn't have found it if you hadn't flagged it here!

[@justerman6518]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 Thank's for explaining. I'm using Chrome under Windows 10. On your "Posts" screen there's a button labelled "Message" which seems to work.

[@schokoladenjunge1]

I don't quite understand why the Japanese interpretation of these things would be more "complete". Going by the cases covered, it seems that the rule is to set polarity of subjectivities on the experiencer when no cause is around or specified, but to set it to the cause when that is known. However, you claim (in my view correctly) that these are both viable views on subjectivities. So what is the logic in Japanese to prioritise the cause over the experiencer, and to only fall back to the experiencer when needed? If it were truly more complete, it should be possible to say something like(私が) お茶から 食べたい being the opposite polarity of お茶が 食べたい. However, that does not seem to be available. Secondly, I don't really get why Japanese tends to see "ability/potential" as an action, but subjectivity as a property. What is the mindset behind that? Did I miss it in one of the previous videos?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Well complete is a matter of perspective and was really only a passing remark so I won't get into that. Ability is seen as a subjectivity because it is predicated of the thing that is possible, not of a person (as English tends to prefer and translate it) and therefore represents something about that thing that applies from the perspective of the person. This is the way Japanese tends to look at it.

[@Twismyer]

I suppose if you want to be more verbose, you could say that　本が読める　means "The book makes itself readable." Which is essentially "the book does readable" as used in the example but slightly more verbose to make it slightly more natural. It's using readable as an adjective instead of a verb however, which is incorrect, but it's being used as part of the verb 'makes' so it is kind of correct i think.

[@bandhanpramanik8516]

By the way, the one who gave the female voice behind you is amazing!

[@smhsophie]

if you want to simp for sensei, get in line

[@bandhanpramanik8516]

@@smhsophie I am a simp slayer.

[@TyphusNurgle]

I've continued with your lessons but I found myself in a pit I can't escape from. All is in relation to those "lovely" helper-adjectives and emotional adjectives. As you mentioned previously, all i-adjectives contain the copula functionality. In the interaction between experiencer and object, whenever the translations for the experiencer are presented, my mind is unable to handle them. In every example, you use the verb "to be". The problem is that in English, the verb "to be" has 2 uses: as a copula and existance/ to exist in a state. In Japanese, 2 verbs do those functions: だ and いる/ある. In Spanish, "ser" and "estar". In the previously mentioned examples, the verb "to be" was used as an action indicating the state of the experiencer , not as a copula. And every of those examples is an "A is B" sentence, so the copula should always be used (explicitly with だ or implicitly with an i-adjective). So, I tried to use the copula functionality in some of those examples and I just lost it: [ kowai ] (私)zeroが怖い. ---> I = scared (as an experiencer) ---> I'm not equal to "scared" (It's a state, not a quality of myself) [ tai ] (私)zeroが食べたい. ---> I = want to eat (as an experiencer) ---> I'm not equal to "want to eat", I'm not equal to a verb (It's a state, not a quality of myself) [ nai ] (私)zeroが食べない. ---> I (not)!= eat(as an experiencer) ---> To me, this kind of means that "I'm not eat(a verb)" / I cannot process these. You explained, in relation to the last example, that ない is describing the state of not doing an action. My question is how it is possible to describe a state when your only tool for doing it is the copula? You cannot be equal to state, you can only exist in a state. I may be overcomplicating things but I trully want to understand clearly these particular cases. The least thing I need now is that my "poor" particles start losing their minds and end in a madhouse. I think I'm bothering a lot with all my questions but still decided to make it (what can I say? A robot who can discuss for eternity about the existance or non existance of conjugations in Japanese may have some patience left for my silly question). Keep spoiling us with your logic. Thanks a lot.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I think your problem here is rooted in a false association between Japanese and Spanish. You say: In Japanese, 2 verbs do those functions: だ and いる/ある. In Spanish, "ser" and "estar". But だ and いる/ある do _not_ respectively correspond to "ser" and "estar". The distinction between "ser" and "estar" - as a simple grammatical distinction - does not exist in either Japanese or English. This is your problem I believe. You are assuming that だ="ser" and いる/ある="estar" But this is not the case.The truth is that. だ = ser/estar いる/ある = haber The distinction between a permanent existential condition and a temporary state is not made by Japanese grammar - or by English grammar. It is a specifically Spanish grammatical distinction. Similarly Spanish makes no grammatical distinction between いる and ある (and neither does English). I think if you ingest this it should solve your confusion.

[@TyphusNurgle]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 I'm really grateful for your answer. It solved most of my doubts. I do still have an issue with the -tai helper-adjective. I completely understand the double usage that this adjectives and others have so that isn't the problem. My issues is that I cannot comprehend how can I show my desire to do an action without a verb. With 欲しい there is no problem because it acts as an adjective, "is wanted". But with the examples of -tai, we express our wants with verbs, not as an adjective: [object] ケーキが食べたい　　　---> The cake is want-inducing eat ---> I'm describing the inducing quality as an action, not as an adjective >>> I think I can understand this perspective if inducing is not considered an action that the cakes is doing and I consider "want-inducing" as a compound adjective. [myself] (私)zeroが食べたい　　---> I am wanting to eat --->　 I'm describing the desire (wanting) as an action, not as an adjective I don't know if the English language is not capable of describing desires without the use of an action (want). Everytime I see the last example's translation my mind wants to consider the sentence as A does B sentence but it's clearly an A is B one. I would like to know if you know another version of the translation that would reflect more clearly (to me) the use of -tai as an adjective. To me "I am wanting" = "I am 'acting' (or doing an action)". Not "I am 'adjective' (a quality)". I don't know if English not being my first language is part of the issue in this case too but to me "wanting" is an action, not an adjective. Thanks again for your reply and have a great weekend!

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

​@@TyphusNurgle ​ I think the problem here is simply that you cannot one-to-one Japanese with English. Just because something is not an adjective in English doesn't mean that it won't be in Japanese. In fact want-inducing isn't a verb even in English. It is an adjectival, though not a common one. To take a more common example "hentai anime is disgusting" is an adjectival description, not a action even though "hentai anime disgusts me" is an action. Just because the easiest and most natural way to put something into English uses a particular expression strategy does not mean that Japanese is using the same expression strategy. Even the fact that English actually _can't_ use a particular expression strategy doesn't mean that Japanese isn't using it. In fact it uses untranslatable strategies all the time. See this video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/rX3VfJKPrcmDpa8 (私)zeroが食べたい describes my state as one of wanting to eat. It is not a verbal clause but an adjectival clause.

[@GarrisonMorton]

tai switches polarity. So in other words tai is an adjective meaning. "wanty" "Food is eat wanty" (I want to eat the food) "I am eat wanty" (I want to eat)

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

This is not unknown in English. For example "I am suspicious of her behavior", "her behavior is suspicious".

[@GarrisonMorton]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 Curious. There it is again.

[@alexen8859]

I've had problems getting to grips with the polarity of 食べたい and 怖い etc. But these two English examples of "suspicious" and "curious" have been incredibly helpful in getting more of a feeling for how it works in Japanese. Thank you, both!

[@GarrisonMorton]

@@alexen8859 Dreadful switches polarity too

[@gamingwithyoty7725]

Another example: comfortable / comfy

[@マーク-d2d4v]

wait so does ga mark everything before it?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Ga (が) marks nouns, including box-pronouns like no (の), which *can* contain everything before them. See this article - it's open to the public: www.patreon.com/posts/52089494

[@CHRIS-tv7hf]

dora is that you ? jokes aside. this video is really helpful thank you. my only complain is the audio needs work.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I think it may be me. I don't have this human imitation thing licked yet.

[@RameshKumar-mv3jd]

This makes me wonder how much a culture's language affects the culture itself. I always hear about Japanese culture being all about fitting in and not standing out, whereas in the English-speaking cultures I'm familiar with, life is all about being an individual. This seems to correlate with the non-ego-centric vs ego-centric nature of the two languages.

[@alexv3357]

As far as linguistics is concerned, that's not really all that true. Living languages aren't designed by anyone or for any special purpose and how they work is fairly random. Language can of course affect how its speakers perceive the world, such as speakers of a language with grammatical gender that corresponds to human gender describing objects with a given gender using male- or female-associated adjectives, but the case should not be overstated. Grammar does not really reflect culture unless a language's speakers make a very conscious effort to change how they talk for some reason. That Japanese as a language doesn't need to assign an actor to every action in every sentence and English does is very much arbitrary, and if Japanese people suddenly developed a culture of standing out and Americans a desire to fit in the languages themselves would not really change that much in response outside of whatever new vocabulary was needed to describe the change. English would for example not lose its 'it' as a zero-pronoun in cases such as 'it is raining,' nor would Japanese need to invent one.

[@clockfixer5049]

@@alexv3357 every statement you made is merely guesswork. While there's one good guess (hypothesis even) I'd be more than 50% sure about, the likelihood of the rest seems marginal. The good one is (allow me to paraphrase) is that 'arbitrariness' or 'randomness' has a part to play (to some extent). Still, the statement you make in the second sentence seems much more wrong than right. Your statement: 'Living languages aren't designed by anyone or for any special purpose and how they work is fairly random'. What makes you think so? Now, I don't believe the word 'living' adds any information here. Dead languages should follow the same logic just within a different timeframe. If by 'living' you mean 'natural', there is some truth to that but again it's a matter of the degree to which there's truth. For instance, I wouldn't necessarily be stating that since formal languages are easy to trace (we know the creator(s), their purpose etc.) and natural ones are extremely hard to trace, it somehow means that formal languages are d e s i g n e d and natural ones are n o t. That may well not be the case. Just because we're incapable of tracing the design of natural languages as they evolved through time, the main actors contributing to its evolution --- we can't conclude that they were not designed by anyone. I'd much rather venture to say that they were created by everyone with a specific purpose in mind (language as a tool). If demand for a certain language function reached a certain threshold, it became part of common language. Finally, you can't dismiss the fact that prescriptive grammar is a thing (and it pretty much defines how you should use the language). Other statements represent the purest form of guesswork (I would not call them hypotheses because they are not good enough).

[@based9930]

There is no way this way of speaking/thinking happened organically. Consciousness and the doer always comes first by necessity. It isn't even rational to have an object centered language.

[@svenholtrop6385]

One way to perhaps translate this more accurately would perhaps be: is coupled to As for me, fish is coupled to wanting to eat. And I am coupled to wanting to eat.

[@lynkkx]

I feel like with this logic we should have an actor vs do-er 0が giving the が the do-er concept is just confusing when it comes to acting out an emotion when the 0が is always thought of as something that as doing the verb or adjective, I can see how it works when it is put on an object or is declared, but it's the invisible one that takes things out of context. cake が tabetai. cake is doing the action of giving me the desire to eat it. if we are looking at cake and we say tabetai, doesn't that also make it mean cake0が tabetai? for onaka ga suita, hayaku tabetai, what would be the full complete structure for this sentence, maybe we should have a separate train for expressions, I think because tabetai, or kowai, isn't really an actual sentence structure but an emotional expression that it doesn't make sense to use or see the invisible が as any sort of do'er at all. would わたしがこわい even mean that me is scary whether it may be true or not to others? How did your other students who had this same issue get a grasp of this concept? I feel like I could move on and just continue along just thinking of emitted emotions not having a 0が since saying something like 食べたい or just こわい isn't meant to be a train structure anyways since we are just expressing our feeling and not really trying to write a complete grammatical sentence anyways, but this will always bother me to some degree.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

食べたい is just as much a train structure as 疲れた. If you want to say it isn't I think you are setting up some tricky situations for yourself down the line. The fact that adjectives of desire work both ways isn't even unknown in English - for example we can say "we were happy that day" or "that was a happy day". In other words we can make the subject either ourselves or the day. If you want to try to avoid this you can of course but I think it is setting a structural trap for yourself.

[@lynkkx]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 I just can't get whats trying to be explained, so either I stop learning, skip trying to get a grasp of it, or spend years trying to figure this one thing out. I get the essential use of it and I can properly use and understand the way to utilized these expressive words properly without issue, but it's just without thinking about the invisible 0が. I even get how the whole passive tho not passive words work because が is still doing something consistent whenever the eru verbs come up. basically what I am saying, I literally do not know how to see it from your eyes. I don't know if this is because I have always been one to think on nothing logical rules and specific structure that I don't know how to think in this different way. I can understand everything else you teach pretty clearly like following a nice yellow brick road, but all of a sudden I made a turn somewhere and am in the middle of nowhere.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

@@lynkkx Then I recommend skipping this issue. Model it any way you like in your own mind. This is actually quite a lot more advanced than your current level and I only linked you to it because you asked a question relevant to it. Shelve the issue for now and carry on is what I would suggest.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Let me say that you are making massive progress really fast. It was probably ill-judged of me direct you to this one which is really meant for when the earlier concepts have been properly digested. Don't underestimate the question of digestion. It really takes time for completely new concepts to sink in to the point where you can build new concepts on top of those. You may actually be going too fast right now. That's OK - you can go back over things whenever you need to. But when you hit a stumbling-block like this, don't let it stall you. Let's put it on the back burner for now.

[@lynkkx]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 ok I shall :)

[@jaydk2470]

okay たい describes the subjects. if there's a subject other than yourself たい describes that subject. if there's no subject then たい describes yourself. if there's an object or a target then たい again describes yourself. in conclusion there's was no changes in meaning, no polarity switching. or there's an error in my argument?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

You may find this video helpful: kzbin.info/www/bejne/fZqWc6B_h7-NhtU

[@jaydk2470]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 okay sensei, its clear to me now what you mean by switching polarity, but still, i downloaded that video just in case if その動画をまた見たい。

[@teeksonen]

very helpful :)

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Thank you.

[@Wazhai]

Have you heard of the website Imabi? www.imabi.net/ is often recommended as one of the most in-depth online resources in English about Japanese grammar, covering much more than Tae Kim. I'm curious if you have an opinion about it and I'd like to hear your thoughts if possible. However, I have a feeling that Imabi may be best avoided entirely, even more so than many other traditional English-centric grammar resources. Those kind of resources are often still useful, especially to people who can look at their explanations and examples with the mindset that you teach here. For example, something traditional like Genki merely teaches that "Xが好きです" means "I like X" more like a set-phrase without much explanation at all. This can be taken as simply teaching the most natural way to express the same idea in both languages. This set-phrase method also doesn't preclude students from thinking "since が is the subject marker, 好き probably literally means appealing/pleasing". On the other hand Imabi, on the topic of this video as well as the overall structure of Japanese, seems to go all-in on the concept that が/を can act as both a subject and object marker interchangeably. It offers verbose explanations and rules for that model of Japanese. As in: www.imabi.net/theparticlegaii.htm - The Particle Ga が II: The Object Marker Ga が www.imabi.net/wantfeeling.htm www.imabi.net/gavswo.htm with statistics about "percentages of what the subject is marked with depending on whether the object is marked with either が or を" www.imabi.net/likelove.htm This is arguably worse than a rote set-phrase approach of something like the recently published free digital-only textbooks for beginners called "IRODORI Japanese for Life in Japan" found here: www.irodori.jpf.go.jp/

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I think you are absolutely right. When a source starts not only teaching, but teaching in huge detail how が can sometimes mark the object of a sentence it's time to head for the bomb-shelter. This is seriously damaging and to be honest I am a bit surprised by it. Surely the writer is aware that が is _not_ marking the object in Japanese but only marking what _would be the object_ in an English sentence with a completely different structure that would be used to express the same idea. This is actually clear from the information given, but is _not_ what the writer is telling us.

[@Wazhai]

​@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 Given that Imabi has dozens of lessons ranging from Advanced/Veteran levels of Japanese to even Classical Japanese, the author must be a rather proficient user of the language, at least as far as reading comprehension, but they're not a good teacher. It's a shame all of their knowledge was taught here with an overcomplicated model of Japanese stuck in the English ego-centric perspective for "I like", "I want" and things like passive voice. And I'm sorry for asking the obvious; it should've been clear this resource is categorically incompatible with your model as soon as there was a lesson called "The Object Marker Ga が".

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

@@Wazhai The really strange thing about it (and the psychological puzzle of how English-based educators are so stuck in their own language model that they can't see outside it) is that what he actually depicts on that page makes it clear that が is _not_ marking the object in Japanese terms, but somehow he seems unable to see the obvious and makes a convoluted argument contrary to the evidence he himself presents.

[@Wazhai]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 It was recommended to me when I happened upon an example of adverbial noun grammar from the site Kanshudo. 私はひらがなを全部読めます vs 私は全部のひらがなが読めます I couldn't grasp why the particle switched and both sentences are correct. I asked and natives told me "が and を both are fine there". I was also referred to the "Ga VS Wo" article for "a relatively in-depth explanation in English". I threw up my hands in frustration after I partly read it. I looked for opinions about Imabi online, and the impression I got was that it's universally well-regarded as a go-to free resource for those looking for more advanced, in-depth info than Tae Kim. Thankfully deferred trying to understand this so-called が/を interchangeability for later...

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

​@@Wazhai Honestly I don't think you will find much of any value on this in English, since no one other than this unit seems able to see beyond basic mis-modeling like the "object-marking が". There are some useful discussions in Japanese going into the history. They aren't actually necessary for understanding. The only thing one really needs to know is that the potential helper verb れる・られる is being applied in one case to the thing that is possible and in the other case (more English-friendly) to the person who is able. Where there is no identified cause of subjectivity this is regularly done (potential is a quasi-subjectivity as it refers to personal ability). Sometimes it also happens where there _is_ an identified cause - in which case the cause becomes a direct object. I refer to this as a "polarity switch" and it is not unknown in English (I am suspicious of her conduct vs her conduct is suspicious). For perspective, a Google search on the base potential verb できる gives around 65 million results for "をできる" which sounds impressive until you realize that "ができる" returns over a billion! This confirms the general impression - the を form isn't uncommon but the が form is overwhelmingly dominant.

[@senjutsu3400]

たい marks a subject as having [qualities that induce the desire to eat]. The nature of those qualities is subjective. Sweetness could be the quality that induces in someone the desire to eat crepes. What if it's a savory crepe? Not all crepes have the qualities to induce the desire to eat. If the subject is a person, how is it different? The subject, person, has the qualities that induce the desire to eat. The nature of those qualities is subjective. Feeling hunger could be a quality of humans that induce in them the desire to eat. The crepe induces desire through qualities, a human induces desire through qualities too. No one said the subject needs to be the food. In the Tokyo example: The subject (person) has the qualities that induce in them the desire to go to Tokyo.

[@diogocosta4256]

これは何？　とサクラは不思議そうに言った。 Shouldn't it be サクラが? She's the "doer" of "saying" 言う, so...? Or can both は or が be used?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

The base answer is that either can be used. This takes us right back to Lesson 3 kzbin.info/www/bejne/i2rChWebhMeBjsk サクラは言った (Sakura said) = is actually in structural terms サクラは∅が言った (as for Sakura, she said) because we can't have a logical clause without a logical が even if it is invisible. は is a non-logical particle that tells us nothing about the role its noun plays in a sentence but only marks it as a topic. So either can be used.

[@yasashisagakawaii]

Thank you again. I wonder, which else languages are similar to japanese in its "outer centeredness"...

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I would say it is a sliding scale with English quite far over to the Ego-center edge.

[@joemuis23]

i think honestly what would be best is to ignore grammar and try to find content thats so at your level that you can induce grammar by context. My head really started hurting when I watched your videos but atleast it got me out of the idea that japanese was some magical alien language. The actual works start when you become able to just wing it and induce meaning based on context. I think us autists types have a hard time with that but recently in therapy I learned to do so because I was promised that life is easier if you don't require yourself to deduce everything. especially the grammar translation was extraneous but I feel the explaining parts made me understand the culture better so thanks for that.,

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Heh. If you can induce grammar by context you're doing a lot better than me. But then I'm a droid, so working out what humans are _likely_ to mean by what they say is a bit of a lost cause for me. The trouble with finding something at your level is that you can understand it is a chicken-and-egg problem. When you start _nothing_ is at your level, and this is true even after "studying" quite a lot. So in order to start understanding you have to understand. Children can "bootstrap" language for complex reasons that I have discussed kzbin.info/www/bejne/gIe3oaqla9moZtU but for adults or teens it is a great deal harder. Given total immersion (complete 24/7 immersion with total isolation from other language) anyone will do it over time (but not as well as an infant). Given low quantities of sporadic semi-immersion the chances are not good.

[@RustieMcHogg]

You criticise other books for seeing the world of Japanese through English grammar. That’s true I think but maybe the bigger problem is that many English speakers don’t have a good grasp of grammar in the first place. I think that is part of what leads textbooks to just give a list of rules and not an explanation of the underlying subject. But truthfully without your and Jay Rubin’s explanations I’d never have got to grips with the passive.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I think that's another part of the problem. When Japanese was first modeled for English speakers it was done using English grammar, which is not a great idea, but when people are skilled in English grammar (as most educated people were at the time) it worked somewhat better. Using the wrong tool for a particular job can be partially mitigated by the fact that someone is at least very good with that tool. When people actually have to learn Western grammar in order to misapply it to Japanese (ideas like "passive" and "conjugation" there is no redeeming feature left! One could argue that textbooks largely avoid grammatical terminology, but I would say firstly that they don't avoid it enough - they still use misleading terminology like "passive" and "conjugation". And secondly they use misapplied grammatical concepts not just words. So calling helper verbs "conjugations" is not just a misapplied grammatical term but leads to an entire edifice of misunderstanding - with misleading concepts like the "tai form of verbs" for something that is clearly an adjective (albeit attached to a verb) or "negative verbs" (once again adjectives) or na-adjectives (adjectival nouns) etc. etc. My aim is to explain Japanese with a minimum of grammatical terminology and almost no reliance on Western concepts. I say "almost no" because for example I do pragmatically use the term "adjective" for 形容し because a) most people understand it and b) while not 100% accurate it really is near enough accurate to do the job. However "Engine" and "Main Car" for subject and predicate I think make things much clearer. I occasionally mention "subject" on the assumption that at least a portion of people will understand it - very rarely "predicate" on the assumption that most people won't. So what I am saying is that avoiding grammatical terminology does not entail giving shopping lists of "facts" and "rules". Principles can be taught without using difficult terminology that for the most part doesn't fit anyway.

[@dolfos7571]

Hey Dolly Sensei, Before i watched this lesson the were a few things that were still bugging me, but this lesson took it to the next level. In the Lessons very early you brought up examples with the word: わかる and in those examples the word often switched it's meaning from: "to understand" to "to be understandable / to be clear". This made me think that verbs can switch their meaning. Could for example the word: 驚かす (to surprise) switch it's meaning to "to be surprised" even tough the dictionary does not list this meaning? I know that Google translate is not a good source but for some reason it translates: 私は驚かす to "I am surprised". To me that translation makes no sense, since 驚かす is a other move word, but the translation is more of a self move word. If verbs could just switch from other move to self move, what is even the point of learning that concept? If verbs could switch their meaning, it would also make the receptive helper verb useless. 飲む (to drink) could switch it's meaning to "to be drunk" which is very similar to the receptive of the word. Am i wrong somewhere, or can a verb really switch it's meaning?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Generally speaking verbs do not switch meaning. 分かる does not in fact switch from meaning "understand" to "be clear". It never means "understand"*. It is just that some of it's uses are very difficult to render into English without using "understand". This is why English "translation" is a minefield as far as really understanding Japanese is concerned. 驚く (lit. "do surprised") and 驚かす(lit "cause to do surprised) have specific meanings and switching them around would make no sense. On the other hand sometimes in the past tense verbs can be used like adjectives (as they can in English) for example "tire" is a verb, as in "you will soon tire of that" but "tired" works as an adjective as in "I am tired" (not usually "I have tired"). Similarly "surprise" is a verb "let's surprise her" but it is often used as more-or-less an adjectve "she looked surprised" which is structurally similar to "she looked happy" and is not usually taken as short for "she looked as if she had been surprised". Similarly with 驚く which means "do surprised", 驚いた is the past tense but is also used adjectivally just as "surprised" is. The point here is that once it is in adjectival territory it _can_ flip on some occasions. So the common expression 驚いたことに means "surprisingly". The こと is the thing that surprised us, but it is described as 驚いた. Does this make sense? But generally speaking verbs _functioning as verbs_ do not switch. Note also that 私は驚かす has no logical particle so technically it could be taking any, even though in natural speech it would most often be implying が. Google Translate is especially handicapped in translating from Japanese to English because Japanese relies on context for things that have to be made explicit in English. Without knowing the context (or with an algorithm not yet human-like enough to infer it) the bot is helpless. * Just to make life confusing, you will occasionally in "young people's Japanese" (若者言葉) hear 分かる literally used to mean understand (Xを分かる). This is _not_ correct Japanese and comes from deliberately modelling Japanese on English because English is "cool". A bit the way English people used to use expressions like "it is to laugh" (meaning it is funny/laughable) modeled on French _c'est à rire._

[@dolfos7571]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49　この答えがわかった。 You also answered another Question i had. We came across 驚いたことに in one of the Alice reading videos and i wondered why it was not 驚くことに. But now i know why. Thanks you very much for the Answer.

[@ckorweng1]

14:55 haha nice poring, a fan of ragnarok online I presume?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I'm afraid I've never played Ragnarok Online (I'm almost exclusively a Nintendo Droid) so I don't catch the reference - it's pure coincidence. Not even sure what poring is. Just call me dumbot!

[@seadonkey7159]

X が V たい is expressing a state. What it is that the speaker wishes to convey or the person is realsing to themselves it that 'a desire' is either happening or has happened. Does the written ga here (hereafter 'the physical ga' ) in this construct absolutely have to be the subject marker?! I am not saying there is no subject. Rather the subject is the temporal goings on inside a person. Temporal because it starts at a point in time, anyhow it is a concrete thing. I propose a zero ga and that the construct is somewhat like a trailing or unfinished sentence. I propose that the object of desire is physically marked by ga because of the absence of a more suitable particle*. This may be controversial but I propose: X　が　V　たい　0が　ある As a way of mentally parsing X が V たい. By using zero ga the end the object of desire marked by the physical ga can not be not the ga marked subject. Aha! what we have here is very fundimental. Walking and chewing gum here. Given that every sentence with a grammatical subject has a realisation, a sentence about a realisation is a nested sentence, a zero ga sentence. There has to be one ga for each realisation. So there Cure Dolly-sama, that solves it don't you think. You were very busy building a cathedral so not suprising you missed that one ありがとうございました。 I wrote the note below before I was hit by the bombshell of a realisasation being the grammatical subject of a sentence. I have cried like never before writing this comment. *Musings on why the object of desire is marked by ga. One thought was ga is as per Genki!'s teachings serving the purpose of 'allowing us to fill in the blank'. When something is for example red in a pencil case but we have forgotten which object it is so we ask someone and they might reply 'the pencil'. At that moment we realise that the pencil is red. A desire is a realisation of what one wants. At the moment the desire is realised the object of desire and the verb strike us simultaneously. ga is perfectly suitable to describe a verb and object combination and that is what it is doing here. So I am throwing ゼロが out there for tai constructions. Incidently, while Cure Dolly has given me by far my deepest insight into Japanese I do not know all her work intimately. I leave my self wanting to do some digging on the stem form.

[@challengerapporaches]

Do you prefer the term android or synthetic being?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Thank you so much for your consideration. Strictly speaking I'm a gynoid but android seems more approachable. I think. Synthetic being sounds maybe a little cold.

[@GarrisonMorton]

The Spanish phrase me gusta is a little like 好きです But yo quiero is NOTHING like 欲しい

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

My point isn't that Japanese and Spanish are alike. They aren't. It is that the modern English ego-centered language model is not universal and we can find instances where it does not apply even in European languages.

[@GarrisonMorton]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 Yeah. I know. I was just making the observation that one sentence was simialr.

[@hektor6766]

I don't see the problem with お腹が空いた、早く食べたい。 "Stomach has emptied, soon-to-eat-inducing." (the person's) stomach is the subject and the actor. The -tai on the verb has turned it into an adjective, like suki. It's just like "Crepes desire-inducing." No need to search for another "hidden" subject, we don't need Mr. Scott to reverse the polarity. Unless there's something wrong with the verb form for 空いた in the main clause, not linking it to the relative clause-you wouldn't say "stomach will empty" or "stomach is emptying", that doesn't support being hungry-I don't see any inconsistency. To translate this as "I'm hungry, I want to eat soon." is falling into the old Japeigo trap. Or is there another point you're making here?

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

As I said in the video, what do you do with 東京に行きたい? I really would not tie yourself in sophistical knots trying to maintain the (slightly) more satisfying single-polarity model, because it will not serve you well for actually understanding the language.

[@hektor6766]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 The issue with 東京に行きたい。does not extend to お腹が空いた、早く食べたい。As for 東京に行きたい, I suspect the nominalizer was dropped long ago for brevity, as you might remove the subject of food (or the empty stomach as above) from 食べ物が食べたい 。, and shorten it to simply 食べたい (早く食べたい。) . Properly for the subject to actively want, and not have another subject inducing desire, it should be 0が東京に行きたがる。

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

@@hektor6766 The Tokyo example is relevant because it shows that we _cannot_ build a model that restricts たい to describing the cause of desire - it _must_ in at least some cases point at the experiencer herself - as your answer tacitly admits. But if you want to make a model where we force it not to switch wherever we possibly can despite the violence it does to natural meaning, then that is your privilege. I can only put in my caveat that I don't think it is a good idea.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I should add that I do understand the problem because I have worked through it myself. While I am usually seen as a model-making engine I would say that even more important is that I am a model-breaking engine. Making models is actually not that hard. What is hard is examining them from all sides and testing them to destruction until you really get sound models that cover all angles. The "Tokyo problem" was what started me looking more deeply into my original model. At first, like you, I was seeking a one-way model of adjectives of subjectivity. The Tokyo problem was the sticking point. That made it clear that such a model was not sustainable. Because I am an android I don't get emotionally stuck on flawed models (this may be why humans have not succeeded in modeling Japanese). It also became clear that a more flexible (but still predictable) model covered the actual usage of the language much more adequately.

[@CasperTheRestless]

I think a lot of these problems can be fixed mentally by adding commas like with the 早く食べたい sentence if you think of it as 早く , 食べたい, it flows more easily for an language learner. Its like saying "hurry, I want to eat". It helps you mentally, to visualize that gap which makes the connection between the seemingly different items

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

早く食べたい doesn't mean "Hurry, I want to eat". It means "I want to eat soon". 早く here is an adverbial. Adverbials modify both verbs and adjectives. Here it is modifying the head-adjective たい.

[@Randhrick]

How I wish I had read your book (and Rubin Sensei's book too) and had your channel when I started learning Japanese maybe I would be farther in my journey to Japanese proficiency. Also, I would recommend people learning more about Japanese culture (besides anime and video games), because when you know the mentality of Japanese people and the way they think these points make sense. Japanese are humble in general and is considered rude/not well seen to brag about yourself or to speak in place of someone (which is why there is a special verb AUX (tagaru) to say that someone wants or seems/show sign of to want something when you speak for someone else) so these "passive" form make sense when you know a bit more about their culture and way of thinking. Japanese are no centered on themselves all the time and this shows in their language too. So if someone asks me "what's the first I should do when learning Japanese?" my answer will be to learn about the culture, in general, it helps with a lot of grammar points actually (it did for me).

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

I think you are certainly right here. Japanese grammar to a considerable extent represents the Japanese "point of view" - in the broadest sense of the way they fundamentally look at life. I think this is the mind-shift that English-language Japanese textbooks can't/won't make. Incidentally I am always surprised by the way Japanese learners (and not just native English speakers) avoid using Japanese. Japanese learning forums are essentially English immersion environments which probably do a great deal to improve the English of the many non-native speakers who use them. I have noted that whenever two or more gaikokujin (Western ones - less true of other Asians) are together in Japan they usually speak English, even if their English is relatively poor and they are capable of using Japanese. It is like a kind of "unspoken ideology" and I think, at root, though they may not be consciously aware of it, that is exactly what it is. I think the core reason for this phenomenon is that English corresponds more closely to the thought-world of Euro-Americans, and what they have to say to each other is much more English-like than it is Japanese-like. English-language "Japanese forums" for example, provide a wonderful immersion not only in the English language but in the English thought-world. This use of English as a real means of communication (not only on Japanese forums of course) is probably the key reason why so many foreign learners of English are so very good, and so few foreign learners of Japanese are.

[@user-vg8tn8cy8p]

せんせい i want to know how to say "i am readable" in japanese ”私が読める" will be "i can read"

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

To say something unusual you need to say it in such a way as to make yourself clear in order to dispel ambiguity kzbin.info/www/bejne/nZTFk4aNYrCoirM this is fundamentally important in language and rarely explained. 私が読みやすい means "I am easy to read" for example and makes the matter clear.

[@user-vg8tn8cy8p]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 understood thanks as always 先生

[@IchEsseKonsolen]

Dolly spitting straight fire!

[@MikeSugs]

You lost me, but that's okay.

[@木漏れ日77]

[@27b4]

I really enjoy these lessons, even thought I have read the book and also Rubin, but I find the robotic, "cutesy" voice almost incomprehensible. Could something be done to improve the clarity of the audio? Otherwise perfect.

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

You won't believe how I struggle with the audio (and this is why I always provide full subtitles). I am always disappointed when someone says that it is _still_ bad (I think I have improved it a lot, but clearly not enough yet). I am investing in yet more audio equipment (I am stationed a long way from anywhere much so it will take some time to come) which I hope will improve things more. It turns out to be far harder to record my voice with equipment made for humans than one might imagine. But I assure you that I am aware of the problem and keep working on it. I also seem to have (at least some people say - I can't tell myself) a strange "accent" which is just how the phonemes were loaded into my firmware - perhaps using slightly unusual human models. I have tried to correct this somewhat since my earliest videos but without messing with the firmware (which I don't want to do, since my sentience is actually a "glitch" that I don't want fixed) I probably can't eradicate it completely.

[@27b4]

@@organicjapanesewithcuredol49 Thank you for your prompt reply, but it leaves me wondering what " you" might be. Sub titles wa; I'm not seeing them inEnglish.

[@benadrylpumpkinpatch]

@@27b4 (using KZbin app on an Android device) Touch the 3 dots in upper right corner for drop down menu, select 'captions'

[@organicjapanesewithcuredol49]

Ah the cute robotic voice is the giveaway. I'm a cute robot (well, android really - or properly speaking, gynoid). On a PC you can get the subtitles by clicking the cogwheel at the bottom right of the play window and selecting subtitles from there. You may have to hover to see it. In some cases I think you may see CC (for Closed Captions) - if so just click that.

[@27b4]

@@benadrylpumpkinpatch Thanks