Fantastic Features We Don't Have In The English Language

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  • Опубліковано 30 тра 2013
  • tomscott.com - @tomscott - There are lots of interesting features in other languages, some of which English would really benefit from having. I'm going to talk about four of them: time-independence, clusivity, absolute direction, and evidentiality.
    Also, I've learned from last week: no irritating piano music this time!
    UNESCO list of endangered languages: www.unesco.org/culture/languag...

КОМЕНТАРІ • 22 тис.

  • @LumaSloth
    @LumaSloth 4 роки тому +7410

    - Have you ever heard about that band?
    - Which band?
    - *Absolute Direction*

  • @nevadie133
    @nevadie133 4 роки тому +7452

    “I’m east-handed, when I’m facing north”

    • @dioganes
      @dioganes 4 роки тому +235

      How handy!

    • @ravenhart4387
      @ravenhart4387 4 роки тому +281

      "I'm west-handed, when I am facing south."

    • @PerryStevPT
      @PerryStevPT 4 роки тому +21

      OMG, I laughed so much!

    • @DragonMoth34
      @DragonMoth34 4 роки тому +98

      im south handed when facing north

    • @fBOMBB
      @fBOMBB 4 роки тому +38

      "I'm south-handed when I'm facing east"

  • @aurelia_the_jelly
    @aurelia_the_jelly Рік тому +2658

    I'm learning Swedish and I discovered that it has 2 words for yes. 'Ja' and 'jo'. 'Ja' is used as we use yes, but 'jo' is used when someone asks a negative question like "Aren't you coming?" and you'd say "Jo" or "nej" so there's no confusion whether you mean "Yes, I'm not coming" or "No, I'm not coming".

    • @allisonguthrie8257
      @allisonguthrie8257 Рік тому +155

      That’s brilliant

    • @fridamamen2081
      @fridamamen2081 Рік тому +51

      Norwegian too :)

    • @lourencovieira5424
      @lourencovieira5424 Рік тому +69

      in french too

    • @julienb.9526
      @julienb.9526 Рік тому +63

      This features in all Germanic languages (except English) and in French.

    • @dumsquirrel
      @dumsquirrel Рік тому +40

      That has always been one of the biggest sources of confusion in English for me. That's great. Although, I believe old English had that at one point.

  • @PeterArnold1969
    @PeterArnold1969 2 роки тому +212

    "Call me an ambulance!"
    "Ok, you're an ambulance"
    "Noooo, call an ambulance, and get them to come."

    • @potmki6601
      @potmki6601 2 роки тому +30

      - Hello, it's ambulance? What are you wearing rn?
      I'm SORRY

    • @wren_.
      @wren_. Рік тому +12

      “hi ambulance, im dad”

    • @alexharrison2743
      @alexharrison2743 4 місяці тому +2

      Call an ambulance!
      *draws gun*
      BUT NOT FOR ME!

    • @alexanderboulton2123
      @alexanderboulton2123 3 місяці тому

      Hi ambulance, I'm dad.

  • @IdliAmin_TheLastKingofSambar
    @IdliAmin_TheLastKingofSambar 3 роки тому +4846

    “No, dum-dum, your OTHER North!”

    • @itay1232
      @itay1232 3 роки тому +35

      Lmao

    • @thegreypenguin5097
      @thegreypenguin5097 3 роки тому +134

      "Make sure you keep west when driving"

    • @captainahab5522
      @captainahab5522 3 роки тому +47

      This would get confusing in space
      Maybe have orientation with the sun and the body that you are orbiting

    • @ragdollrose2687
      @ragdollrose2687 3 роки тому +40

      As an adult person who can't quickly distinguish left from right and tell time under pressure, I'm certain I would be told that anyway

    • @blackfordoblique1965
      @blackfordoblique1965 3 роки тому +8

      "No, dum-dum your OTHER North!"
      it's, 'No, dummy, your OTHER North"
      a dummy may exhibit temporal situational disorientation including xy and z & t or inappropriate or inordinate responses socially for myriad reasons.
      A dum dum...

  • @shibaarmy4385
    @shibaarmy4385 3 роки тому +6309

    "We're lost! what do we do?"
    Don't worry I'll use my special technique. *Absolute Direction*

    • @hhhhhhhhhhhhhnhhhhhhh
      @hhhhhhhhhhhhhnhhhhhhh 3 роки тому +224

      Wow that sounds like it came straight from an anime studio that heard the isekai is popular and just made another of the RPG type game based animes. How did you do that?

    • @qaweeorltuys
      @qaweeorltuys 3 роки тому +88

      Just figure out which one of your hands is your north hand, and you can know the way

    • @AJ-vs3yz
      @AJ-vs3yz 3 роки тому +16

      Seems like something out of highschool dxd

    • @allx1048
      @allx1048 3 роки тому +88

      That can't save you if I use the ability of my
      *Time Independence*
      You will find yourself in space but can you find yourself, *IN TIIIIIIIME*

    • @jamesdewane1642
      @jamesdewane1642 3 роки тому +34

      I was horribly easy to disorient as a kid and had to train myself in what to pay attention to later so as not to be always driving the wrong way. People from languages with absolute direction always freaking know their orientation. They don't get lost unless you drug them and fly them to a different continent.

  • @geoffreyhui830
    @geoffreyhui830 Рік тому +1710

    Being bilingual in English and Cantonese, it is much easier to chat with other bilinguals using a mixture. Actually, once you start, it is extremely difficult to revert back to one language or the other without contamination, unless a monolingual third person joins the conversation.

    • @pelipoika88
      @pelipoika88 Рік тому +102

      English-Finnish bilingual here and I agree. I mix the two languages a lot when talking with friends and find it harder to speak only English. Only Finnish is a bit easier for me, as it's my native language, but easiest is to mix both of them on the fly.

    • @Rage_Quiting
      @Rage_Quiting Рік тому +9

      English-thai bilingual here, me too

    • @neecogwheelsword3627
      @neecogwheelsword3627 Рік тому +39

      In my experience this ease is a consequence of lacking vocabulary in one of the two, might just be a language purist though idk

    • @geoffreyhui830
      @geoffreyhui830 Рік тому +9

      @@neecogwheelsword3627 Not in all cases.

    • @ZratP
      @ZratP Рік тому +74

      ​​@@neecogwheelsword3627 sometimes yes but sometimes it's just that one language has an amazing way of describing a situation that the other doesn't. Maybe it's shorter, maybe it's all condensed in a single word while it's a full sentence on the other, maybe it's just more accurate.
      I speak French-English-Japanese and with some other trilinguals we often end up with sentences that are full of words from the 2 other languages.

  • @wizengy
    @wizengy Рік тому +272

    Hawai'ian; Apart from only having 13 letters there are two words. Mauka for toward the mountains, inland (away from the ocean) and Makai for toward the ocean. On the islands these are important directions and commonly used by everyone. English also gives us the windward and leeward sides of the island.

    • @rogerrienstra1174
      @rogerrienstra1174 Рік тому +9

      To be proper, it should be either ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi or Hawaiian. The English word Hawaiian doesn't have an ʻokina in it.

    • @SonnyBubba
      @SonnyBubba 10 місяців тому +4

      Kind of like in downtown New Orleans. North south east and west don’t work because of the geography of the river’s curve.
      You get uptown (or upstream), downtown, towards the river and towards the lake.
      It’s even more hopeless using compass directions, as South Carrollton and South Claiborne are two streets that intersect, at 90 degrees no less.

  • @hahagostudy633
    @hahagostudy633 3 роки тому +10179

    "We've just won the lottery, but you haven't" has the same energy as "Call an ambulance! But not for me"

    • @olivep
      @olivep 3 роки тому +418

      i thought of "but mr krabs, we don't deliver!" "WE don't deliver, but YOU do"

    • @JannieKannie
      @JannieKannie 3 роки тому +14

      Ey kenma

    • @bananabird735
      @bananabird735 2 роки тому +61

      1:23 is when you've won the lottery but there's this one aunt/uncle that you have a restraining order against

    • @rolfeyM8
      @rolfeyM8 2 роки тому +5

      Thought the exact same thing

    • @CraftingTableMC
      @CraftingTableMC 2 роки тому +10

      This made me exhale from my nose

  • @snorf525
    @snorf525 3 роки тому +24533

    "As a language speaker" omg me too

    • @matteomagurno3068
      @matteomagurno3068 3 роки тому +1399

      i also speak languages, what a coincidence!

    • @Dr.Leymen
      @Dr.Leymen 3 роки тому +718

      @@matteomagurno3068 No way!
      I speak languages too

    • @Lemon-fp5zn
      @Lemon-fp5zn 3 роки тому +433

      Ok this is a miracle... I speak languages too

    • @varunsathya1912
      @varunsathya1912 3 роки тому +497

      I don't speak languages :'(

    • @Lemon-fp5zn
      @Lemon-fp5zn 3 роки тому +270

      @@varunsathya1912 well you see, I believe you are typing in something called ‘English’ which is classified as a language, so you do speak languages :D

  • @y0y4y0
    @y0y4y0 Рік тому +556

    I personally don't use it when typing, but in Spanish you have to start every interrogative question with ¿
    This helps out a lot when reading a text and having questions that are super long.

    • @joannas322
      @joannas322 Рік тому +86

      so true! same with exclamation marks ! I'm a big reader and sometimes a character will say something but you don't realise until after the sentance that they were meant to be shouting the whole time. Then I go back and read the sentence again to get the full effect.

    • @y0y4y0
      @y0y4y0 Рік тому +13

      @@joannas322 double reading!
      It's actually kind of a shame we don't have that in other languages (like Catalan or English)

    • @DistrarSubvoyikar
      @DistrarSubvoyikar Рік тому +10

      i sometimes use the ¿ in English too

    • @alahiri2002
      @alahiri2002 Рік тому +38

      My favorite thing about this is that it doesn’t necessarily draw attention to the complete sentence, rather focusing purely on the interrogative portion.
      The following sentence is a grammatically correct question in English:
      _Dad, what is that?_
      In Spanish, this is what you would write to express the same question:
      _Papá, ¿que es eso?_
      It may not look like much, but for long sentences with multiple commas and only one phrase that is actually doing the “questioning,” this makes reading Spanish exponentially easier.

    • @vignotum132
      @vignotum132 10 місяців тому +12

      @@alahiri2002I disagree with it being exponentially easier, as English uses reverse word order, which together with interrogative words like “what” or “how” and questions being separated by one of .,:; makes it quite clear what is a question and what is not.
      OP even admits to it being left out of a lot of typing, can you imagine how little people would use it in English, especially considering the amount of weird contractions English uses?

  • @later_babes
    @later_babes 2 роки тому +506

    i love languages and this was a super fascinating video, but it’s a crime no one is talking about tom using the one direction font for *_absolute direction_*

    • @lloniaceder
      @lloniaceder 2 роки тому +11

      right! I was wondering if anyone noticed this too 😂

    • @alexharrison2743
      @alexharrison2743 4 місяці тому +1

      I can't even picture what font that is, but that's very funny to hear. Am gonna go back through the video to learn what that font looks like!

  • @finlayhutchinson7370
    @finlayhutchinson7370 5 років тому +9568

    Teacher: those are west handed scissors, you can't use them!
    Me: *flips 180* sorry what was that

    • @DustInComp
      @DustInComp 5 років тому +765

      "Now they're east-handed scissors."

    • @kingcrimson4133
      @kingcrimson4133 5 років тому +420

      This is just speculation, but in those languages the hands might have special names, like "the strong hand" for right and "the smart hand" for left, or something like that. Or, they just do what the guy above said.

    • @nilaksh007
      @nilaksh007 5 років тому +118

      @Sir Thiccums I am south south west handed currently.

    • @SLokutaR
      @SLokutaR 5 років тому +99

      or they'd just be the 'dominant hand'

    • @jacobbruckelmeyer3466
      @jacobbruckelmeyer3466 5 років тому +16

      I'm west handed right now

  • @yahlibar6832
    @yahlibar6832 3 роки тому +39322

    I love how I can watch a tom scott video and never know if it’s from 10 years ago or 10 minutes ago

    • @banned2911
      @banned2911 3 роки тому +245

      Omg bruh what AAAH

    • @lucasthech
      @lucasthech 3 роки тому +735

      wow, just noticed that now, I thought the video was more recent

    • @skidaddleskidoodle
      @skidaddleskidoodle 3 роки тому +235

      @@lucasthech Same exacly, I just saw that one in recomended under the newest video, I thought it's like a week old or smth

    • @TheEnderRenderer
      @TheEnderRenderer 3 роки тому +37

      I kinda like this lighting more

    • @rottenapple2276
      @rottenapple2276 3 роки тому +17

      Wait what

  • @squaremail9758
    @squaremail9758 2 роки тому +334

    In indonesia, the word for the inclusive we is "kita", and the exclusive we is "kami". The funny thing is, some indonesians just use "kita", be it inclusive or exclusive.
    Example: "we broke up" in indonesia is "kita putus" for inclusive, and "kami putus" for exclusive. And sometimes, indonesians use "kita putus" when the listener is not the speaker's lover.

    • @clustervideos279
      @clustervideos279 2 роки тому +28

      In Cebuano (Philippines), we also use kami and kita but we never use kita for kami and vice versa in any circumstance. We also shorten them to "mi" and "ta" if it's not at the beginning of the sentence.

    • @rohan14040
      @rohan14040 Рік тому +8

      In marathi (India) ,inclusive we is 'Apla'
      and exclusive we is 'Amcha'

    • @ugljevikbo
      @ugljevikbo Рік тому +8

      In serbo-croatian language kita is word for penis

    • @allisonguthrie8257
      @allisonguthrie8257 Рік тому +2

      In Michif (Canadian indigenous language) kiyanaan is inclusive we and niyanaan is exclusive we. And then if you want to say a simple verb that ‘we’ did, you say ki-‘verb’-inaan or ni-‘verb’-inaan.

    • @Rickmonas90
      @Rickmonas90 Рік тому +2

      in the language of KrÂsïnrse, the inclusive "we" is "dasÿm" and the exclusive is "onësn"
      also, there's a "we" for when it's just two people - "tySt" (the capital S makes part of it)

  • @JustCurious.2
    @JustCurious.2 Рік тому +43

    Surgeon: "Quickly!! Stitch the lying patient's West foot!"
    Nurse: *having a panic attack trying to think which is the west foot of a person who is lying down*

    • @janegardener1662
      @janegardener1662 Рік тому +4

      This is why the people who prepare patients for surgery use special marking pens.

  • @arandomman.
    @arandomman. 3 роки тому +4804

    Imagine this happening;
    "Hey! We won the lottery But you haven't"
    Then suddenly miss your south kidney

    • @blueeye2281
      @blueeye2281 3 роки тому +76

      Southwest*

    • @vinayr395
      @vinayr395 3 роки тому +75

      You had me🤣🤣🤣🤣
      South kidney, seriously?
      Body part are supposed to be left and right, I wonder how the people who use cardinal directions are used to describe it.

    • @himura-miki
      @himura-miki 3 роки тому +113

      I'm slightly more concerned with how such people could communicate online or over the phone, or to those who are blind, where which direction you're facing isn't entirely obvious. Sure, you have a north foot and a south foot, but are you facing west or are you facing east? How does the listener know if they can't see you? You know your south kidney is missing, but if you tell your friend online who just recently stole an east kidney, would they know if they stole your kidney or someone else's?

    • @CruseCtrl
      @CruseCtrl 3 роки тому +23

      @@himura-miki Maybe they just ask each other which way they're facing?

    • @Berilia
      @Berilia 3 роки тому +18

      I'm slightly ashamed it took me a minute or so to remember what the hell you meant by south kidney

  • @ma-tanica
    @ma-tanica 3 роки тому +5006

    about inclusivity - there's soviet joke about some party official who during his speech makes an optimistic prediction: "In year 2000 we will live much better". One of his listeners, an ordinary worker, replies "I get it, what about us?"

    • @samo_di8420
      @samo_di8420 3 роки тому +249

      Why did I read this in a Russian accsent

    • @ma-tanica
      @ma-tanica 3 роки тому +798

      @@samo_di8420 because I typed it with a russian accent!

    • @Liggliluff
      @Liggliluff 3 роки тому +124

      Yes, there are 3 types of exclusivity for "we" and people usually only focus on two. It's me+you, me+them, me+you+them (where them is any number of people). - Your suggestion of an "everyone" pronoun isn't bad either. But -we- everyone already got "everyone".

    • @konstantinstepanov5461
      @konstantinstepanov5461 3 роки тому +28

      but isnt Russian "we" is the same as Eglish "we"? I mean it can mean (you/me) or (me/them) or (all of us)

    • @TGlooknohands
      @TGlooknohands 3 роки тому +15

      Who are you, Comrade Question? :P

  • @kackagalova2786
    @kackagalova2786 2 роки тому +1018

    I’d love it if more languages had "Oui", "Si", "Non" so it doesn’t get confusing when someone asks a negative question.
    - Don't you know them?
    - Si, I know them.
    I think this isn’t much of a problem in English but in Czech we get really weird situations because we have no idea what people mean when they plainly answer "yes" or "no" to negative questions.

    • @musiqualizator7699
      @musiqualizator7699 2 роки тому +73

      when someone replies negative to a negative question it logically means the answer given is positive, but that is not general, so sometimes answer that way implies otherwise.

    • @cam0227
      @cam0227 2 роки тому +63

      I've wondered that too. When someone asks me "Don't you hate it when ____" and I say yes, they don't know if i'm saying yes as in hate I hate it or yes as in I don't hate it

    • @davefoxxo
      @davefoxxo 2 роки тому +1

      cope

    • @musiqualizator7699
      @musiqualizator7699 2 роки тому +1

      seethe harder

    • @Janne_Mai
      @Janne_Mai 2 роки тому +52

      German has this feature too! ("Doch")

  • @montywoodside
    @montywoodside 2 роки тому +175

    I wish English had at least two ways of saying "love". In Spanish, querer and amar can both mean to love, but querer is used specially for friends and amar is used specially for a s/o.
    I rarely say "I love you" because I always thought of it as a romantic thing.

    • @DE3P_Beats
      @DE3P_Beats Рік тому +3

      Isn't querer "want"? I'm dumb so idk

    • @LilSulfite
      @LilSulfite Рік тому +2

      ​@@DE3P_BeatsIt can also be used that way

    • @anonymouswhite352
      @anonymouswhite352 Рік тому +3

      Love can be applicable to both platonic and romantic relationships.

    • @GeorgeDCowley
      @GeorgeDCowley Рік тому +1

      I guess "like" is a little different to both.

    • @personalexperience3637
      @personalexperience3637 Рік тому +4

      To varying degrees... adore, admire, love, like, even worship (...to ellivate that person to another heavenly realm)

  • @Hemlol
    @Hemlol 4 роки тому +1947

    "We've just won the lottery, but YOU haven't"
    I felt that

  • @cathe8282
    @cathe8282 3 роки тому +3754

    It drives me crazy that in English there is no determination with, say, "brother/sister-in-law". It could mean your spouse's sibling or the spouse of your own sibling.

    • @dariialysiuk8787
      @dariialysiuk8787 3 роки тому +330

      Ukrainian/Russian speaker here, and trust me, you're BLESSED to have this system. See, we have a separate name for almost every member of the family; there are so many complicated names that almost no one knows every one of them, and when someone does and mentions it everyone will be like 'wtf is that? Do you mean your spouse's sibling?' (and, of course, all the terms are separate for the two genders) There even are competitions at knowing all of these, if I'm not mistaken. I'm fascinated with how plain and simple it is in English.

    • @MohsinExperiments
      @MohsinExperiments 3 роки тому +27

      But in Urdu we do have different names for these relations.

    • @dariialysiuk8787
      @dariialysiuk8787 3 роки тому +8

      @@MohsinExperiments oh cool! And do you, like, actually know all of them??

    • @history2know422
      @history2know422 3 роки тому +5

      @@dariialysiuk8787 Yes

    • @Cepheus_01
      @Cepheus_01 3 роки тому +32

      @@magicpenguin9988 I was just about the say the same thing. Step sister and sister in law are bother the same word in French.

  • @jarancrane2462
    @jarancrane2462 Рік тому +105

    I really like the Japanese feature of a different 'there' if it's close to the listener or far away. Like これ 'kore' is here, close to speaker それ 'sore' is there, close to listener, あれ 'are' is over there, close to neither of them.

    • @covo5084
      @covo5084 Рік тому +11

      in italian it’s “questo”, “codesto”, “quello”

    • @ovoanaestheticovo3740
      @ovoanaestheticovo3740 Рік тому +9

      spanish has same feature too!

    • @qara_ch
      @qara_ch Рік тому +4

      My native Cebuano has it too!
      Kiri - This (closer to speaker than listener)
      Kari - This (equally near to speaker and listener)
      Karâ - That (closer to listener than speaker)
      Katu - That (far from both speaker and listener)

    • @luv5077
      @luv5077 Рік тому +3

      korean has that as well!

    • @ponytail336
      @ponytail336 Рік тому +1

      こそあど言葉 in general is really cool

  • @bluephoenix3392
    @bluephoenix3392 Рік тому +83

    Bengali speaker here. In our language we have 3 separate words for 'you' ( আপনি, তুমি, তুই - Aapni, Tumi, Tui), and you have to use either of them by judging multiple factors, such as age of the listener, age gap between you and the listener, his/her social position, your intimacy with him/her etc. We Bengali speakers know how to use them by default, but I guess others who come to know our language finds it a bit hard.

    • @just-a-hriday
      @just-a-hriday Рік тому +13

      Not just bengali - a lot of other north indian languages too, and maybe even some south indian ones. Hindi, for example, has "aap", "tum", and "tu".

    • @mewmimo8465
      @mewmimo8465 10 місяців тому +2

      Tbh i too find it hard to use as a native bengali. When i try to address someone younger than me but also a stranger i don't know if i should use "aapni"(used for strangers) or "tumi"(which can be used for people younger than you)

    • @eldreyte
      @eldreyte 7 місяців тому +2

      There's a similar thing in russian too. We have ты and вы. Ты is used when you're talking to singular person you're comfortable/familiar with. Вы is used either for plural you (talking to multiple people at once) or as a respectful way to refer to singular person who's higher in social hierarchy (and also respectful way to adress a stranger)

    • @paul22411
      @paul22411 7 місяців тому +1

      @@eldreyte so Вы is the same as 'vous' in French?

    • @-Alarion
      @-Alarion 5 місяців тому

      In german we also have two forms of you. You would say "you" to your friends, family, vlose ones, or younger persons, while you would use "Sie" for business partners, strangers or any kind of person who is at least at the same level in social hierarchy and you aren't very close to.

  • @joshporter5205
    @joshporter5205 3 роки тому +8545

    I'm studying Swedish at the moment and I am rather taken with the fact that the words for grandmother/grandfather, uncle, and aunt tell you which side of your family they belong to. Morbror, for example, is your mother's brother. Farfar is your father's father. Morfar? Your mother's father.

    • @massive.nerd.potential
      @massive.nerd.potential 3 роки тому +695

      I have today learned that that also applied to chinese.

    • @davididchi
      @davididchi 3 роки тому +281

      We have that in Bulgarian as well, but only for aunts and uncles, not for grandparents. (Vuicho and vuina are maternal uncle and aunt, chicho and lelia are paternal uncle and aunt respectively.)

    • @yiklongtay6029
      @yiklongtay6029 3 роки тому +267

      This is an interesting dilemma when designing languages. Do we go for precise vocabulary to convey information efficiently or do we go for generic and vague vocabulary to keep it easier to learn.

    • @FilippaSkog
      @FilippaSkog 3 роки тому +333

      As a native swede I’ve always found it a little weird that this isn’t the case in every language. “My grandmother on the maternal side”... or just mormor? Much easier. Good luck learning Swedish, Josh! I’ve heard it’s tricky. May I ask why you want to do it? It’s such a small language (though useful in three countries which is neat!).

    • @derdenni6780
      @derdenni6780 3 роки тому +10

      @@FilippaSkog no

  • @owenllewellyn5692
    @owenllewellyn5692 4 роки тому +3046

    Having no left or right might complicate surgery: "Mr. Jenkins, we have to remove your South kidney".

    • @jaypaans3471
      @jaypaans3471 4 роки тому +219

      @Aridalways the subject's left or right, obviously. :-\

    • @jaypaans3471
      @jaypaans3471 4 роки тому +41

      Good point, because the orientantion of your body matters at the moment of the statement.
      On the other hand: this is exactly why in most hospital i know writing something like "This leg off -->" on the leg in question, is already normal.

    • @nyangret
      @nyangret 4 роки тому +102

      Can i just say that in medical terminology they use the ventral/dorsal/posterior/anterior/etc. system for locating certain body parts and it is a definitive way that all doctors understand ... they don’t use right and left because your right wouldn’t be the patients right and that’s just confusing

    • @johnz5359
      @johnz5359 4 роки тому +41

      @@darknut1223 Right and left might not be used in other languages, but that has no bearing to parts of your body for doctors to care about. If you're talking about a patient's left kidney, it is the patient's left kidney. Not the "kidney on the left" either the doctors left or the patients left. If I said you left hand, you wouldn't ask "Do you mean my left, or your left?" We're talking about YOUR hand. Your left hand will always be your left hand, whether I'm talking about, or you're talking about it.

    • @satunbreeze
      @satunbreeze 3 роки тому +9

      @@nyangret I scrolled down to see if someone mentioned this cause Im taking Medical terminology right now 😄

  • @squeakydolphin9615
    @squeakydolphin9615 2 роки тому +47

    I like how Spanish (and probably other romance languages) has the difference between ser and estar. My classmates hate it, but I love it. I can finally say, "I'm tired," without having someone say, "Hi, tired. I'm ___."
    I'm still working through saber and conocer though.

    • @joavim
      @joavim 10 місяців тому +6

      Other romance languages do have both words, but none uses it as extensively as Spanish. "Stare" in Italian is used much less frequently than "essere", for instance.
      Re: "I'm tired", I've always found it interesting that in Spanish they differentiate between being tired due to physical exhaustion ("estoy cansado") and being tired as in being sleepy ("tengo sueño").

    • @youtubeviewerxx
      @youtubeviewerxx 10 місяців тому +1

      @@joavim You can do that in italian too, although not everybody does. You can say "Sono esausto/sfinito/distrutto" (physical exhaustion) or "Ho sonno" (being sleepy). "Sono stanco" can mean both things.

    • @joavim
      @joavim 10 місяців тому +1

      @@youtubeviewerxx has nothing to do with the usage of "stare" though

    • @marion.saturn
      @marion.saturn 5 місяців тому +2

      Same here with portuguese and I love it!
      I don't know if it's different in Spanish but in Portuguese "saber" means knowing something or having deep knowledge about a topic, wheras "conhecer" means being aquaintanced with a person/recognising them or recognising a word or a city for example. "conhecer" is not about knowledge/understanding, it's just about recognising something/someone. Again, could be different in Spanish!

    • @isabel-the-morel
      @isabel-the-morel 2 місяці тому +1

      @@marion.saturn its the same in spanish, but instead of conhecer its conocer

  • @minarchist1776
    @minarchist1776 Рік тому +889

    Well, I have been considering writing a science fiction novel. One of the characters comes from a civilization that has had faster than light travel capability for upwards of 40,000 years. Given that they have had to deal with problems caused by various different sorts of hyper-drive malfunctions they have come up with a "temporal Imperfect" tense. That describes an action which has either occurred in the past, is occurring now, or will occur in the future. But you don't know which. 🙂

    • @trappedcosmos
      @trappedcosmos Рік тому +8

      faster than light travel is completely impossible

    • @briangerra5236
      @briangerra5236 Рік тому +378

      @@trappedcosmos Recall that he says he is writing a book

    • @icantthinkofanything798
      @icantthinkofanything798 Рік тому +206

      @@trappedcosmos that's crazy I didn't know that I guess that's why it's a fiction book and it's not real

    • @Victorina32
      @Victorina32 Рік тому +77

      @@trappedcosmos I fear you missed the point

    • @trappedcosmos
      @trappedcosmos Рік тому +9

      *Science* fiction, its not fantasy, scientifically it's impossible

  • @themindstorm9947
    @themindstorm9947 5 років тому +53420

    Maybe these features will be added in the next update

    • @multistuff9831
      @multistuff9831 5 років тому +714

      I hope they also patch the political class

    • @ferna2294
      @ferna2294 5 років тому +259

      Actually, we are abandonware.

    • @tmyfatmufo
      @tmyfatmufo 5 років тому +371

      Buy the DLC for 29,99 for two different words you'll never ever use.

    • @Reixuria
      @Reixuria 5 років тому +57

      Im evil
      I changed your likes from 699 to 700 😈

    • @Reixuria
      @Reixuria 5 років тому +28

      Shronk Donk then why tf you making a big deal out of it then?

  • @joeghezzi37
    @joeghezzi37 4 роки тому +16255

    We need a word for “my left your right” and “my right your left”

    • @shanesalinas3645
      @shanesalinas3645 4 роки тому +3070

      That falls under the absolute directions. If you say "west" west is always the same direction.

    • @dwagincon4841
      @dwagincon4841 4 роки тому +371

      you can always tell someone to mirror you

    • @AnHebrewChild
      @AnHebrewChild 4 роки тому +598

      Shane Salinas not if the two people are facing the same direction and the object is between them.
      And so, the request for this word remains unanswered...

    • @mandc20022
      @mandc20022 4 роки тому +247

      we have that in the south is called Over Yonder

    • @nyx142
      @nyx142 4 роки тому +189

      What about just "my left/right"

  • @antonsopanen
    @antonsopanen Рік тому +24

    In Finnish language we have a word called "jaksa", it can mean "I prefer not (to do something)", "I'm too tired (to do something)" or "I dont have enough strentgh (to do something)", I use that word a lot; English language unfortunatly dosen't have a translation for that word.

  • @MK-fg8hi
    @MK-fg8hi 2 роки тому +202

    I speak Russian, English, and am familiar with Korean, what strikes me in them is the conventions for the order of words in sentences. In English, you have to go with Subject-Predicate, in Korean, you always put the Predicate at the very end (with lots of honorifics!). But Russian is very easy on that. In most cases, you can shuffle sentence parts without losing their meaning, you could lose parts of the sentence entirely ("Something." is a totally valid sentence of formal speech"). How to turn a sentence in the question? Just put a question mark at the end, no need for order change and all that stuff.
    Poor teachers of English language have a hard time restricting Russian kids to using particular order and putting all those grammatical words in sentences 😑

    • @NStripleseven
      @NStripleseven 2 роки тому +20

      So Russian is just “put whatever, wherever, and it’ll still make sense?”

    • @magitrop5336
      @magitrop5336 Рік тому +35

      ​@@NStripleseven that's true thanks to the case system
      so there is no need to put the words in a certain order

    • @evgeny-chugaev
      @evgeny-chugaev Рік тому +18

      Yes, it makes it easier, but sometimes we have to emphasize words in sentences instead of swap them, and to accentuate intonation.

    • @ancliuin2459
      @ancliuin2459 Рік тому +7

      You need strict rules for word order in English because English does not have cases apart from the genitive. If you have cases, word order becomes less important, you almost always know what is the subject and what is the object, regardless of word order.

    • @yesiam7481
      @yesiam7481 Рік тому +17

      As a native english speaker, and someone still relatively new to learning russian, I've been told I speak "very english" russian.
      For example, it's perfectly reasonable in russian to say "это я знаю уже" or "This, I know already." But easier for me to assemble the meaning of phrases like this when its formatted in an English-grammatical way, such as "я уже знаю это" or "I already know this."
      I can imagine the rigid structure of english word order can be quite confusing for Russians learning english, but atleast for me, it applies both ways. The lack of word order confuses me.
      Edit: Sidenote, the occassional omission of personal pronouns such as I, you, or we and instead just relying on the verb conjugation can also make it more difficult for me to immediately understand who is doing what.

  • @MrTyty527
    @MrTyty527 3 роки тому +7535

    I am from Hong Kong and in Chinese, we have a word for every position in a family tree. For example, 姑姐 means "dad's younger sisters" and 姨丈 means "dad's younger sister's husband"
    In English, they are just simply uncles and aunts.

    • @onisuryaman408
      @onisuryaman408 3 роки тому +433

      Not to mention the cousins and nephews. I get lost on that.

    • @wngmv
      @wngmv 3 роки тому +369

      It's widely different in different part of china as well. I'm from northern china, dad's younger sister would be 姑妈/小姑子。 姨丈 would be 姑父. 姨 in our dialect means mom's relative. For example, 姨父 would be mom's brother or brother Iaw.

    • @kayjpjessie
      @kayjpjessie 3 роки тому +80

      does it take a lot longer to write or type chinese than english (assuming somebody was equally fluent in both), i’ve always thought the characters must take a while to draw

    • @MrTyty527
      @MrTyty527 3 роки тому +248

      Kayjp writing 100 Chinese characters definitely takes more time than writing 100 english words, but a 100-word passage in english can be translated into chinese with ~60 characters; in terms of typing there are many Chinese typing systems, eg. pinyin (type according to phonetics in english alphabets) and cangjie (breaking down each chinese characters into fragments represented by alphabets)

    • @kayjpjessie
      @kayjpjessie 3 роки тому +68

      @@MrTyty527 ah that makes sense, your language is so descriptive. Thanks for the response😊

  • @sallybradshaw4576
    @sallybradshaw4576 3 роки тому +2128

    I liked how the "Absolute Direction" font was the 1D font, nice touch.

    • @dillanbrownbp
      @dillanbrownbp 3 роки тому +17

      I noticed that too

    • @lucky_lol
      @lucky_lol 3 роки тому +5

      I don't get it. Anyone can Explain?

    • @tonin8499
      @tonin8499 3 роки тому +87

      @@lucky_lol I think it's the One Direction band's font. Actually is a idea, to my sense

    • @Umbrella2.2
      @Umbrella2.2 3 роки тому +13

      @@lucky_lol bc 1d is only 1 direction and it’s called direction

    • @DepFromDiscord
      @DepFromDiscord 3 роки тому +7

      That’s 2D

  • @Nippontradamus
    @Nippontradamus 2 роки тому +32

    A feature of my language I really appreciate is having a separate derivative word for every familial relative you could have. You can accurately figure how two people are connected by a single unique pair of words.
    Features in languages help gain insight into how the society functions and how language adapted to it.

  • @austinross4093
    @austinross4093 Рік тому +196

    Something every language should have: A lack of irregular verbs.

    • @stratonikisporcia8630
      @stratonikisporcia8630 Рік тому +13

      Well I mean, Japanese only has 5 so close enough

    • @austinross4093
      @austinross4093 Рік тому +6

      @@stratonikisporcia8630 How important are those verbs? Like, are they thinks like “to be” and “to do”, or are they other obscure verbs?

    • @stratonikisporcia8630
      @stratonikisporcia8630 Рік тому +18

      @@austinross4093 They're the most used ones. The most irregular is "da" = "to be", then you have the medium irregular ones: "suru" = "to do" and "kuru" = "to come", finally two are only slightly irregular: "iku" = "to go" (participial form "itt-" instead of expected ["iit-"]) and "aru" = "to be" (yes another one, it's kinda similar to the ser / estar situation in Spanish) that just doesn't have a connective form.
      Well, there are some other irregular verbs, such as "masu" or "irassharu" but these ones are either auxiliaries or expressions, so you won't have to conjugate them.

    • @Eren______
      @Eren______ Рік тому +2

      In Turkish we just put
      -tı -ti -dı -di
      or
      -mış -miş
      (Adds Uncertainty)
      At the end of the Verbs to make them past tense.

    • @stratonikisporcia8630
      @stratonikisporcia8630 Рік тому +3

      @@Eren______ Japanese:
      *-ta*

  • @backfisch_op6297
    @backfisch_op6297 3 роки тому +502

    the difference between "female friend" and "girlfriend".
    In german it's the same word and it's often confusing if I'm talking about a female friend.

    • @jliller
      @jliller 3 роки тому +39

      That's a problem in the US too.

    • @darklibertario5001
      @darklibertario5001 3 роки тому +55

      This always confused me in English, in Portuguese (and romance languages as a whole) dating someone and being friends with them are two completely different concepts expressed with different words.
      Female friend = Amiga
      Girlfriend = Namorada

    • @Lenoxuss
      @Lenoxuss 3 роки тому +55

      @@jliller And it's mostly generational. Anyone I can think of saying "girlfriend" for their platonic female friend is almost certainly over 45 years old at this point

    • @miguelpimentel5623
      @miguelpimentel5623 2 роки тому +22

      @@darklibertario5001 i realise your coment is 7 months old, but something cool is that in portuguese "amigo/a" used to mean girlfriend/boyfriend but also friend.
      Basicly it was like German or English with same word for both concepts causing mildly annoying confusion.
      One example of this was the medieval songs known as "cantigas de amigo" meaning "songs to boyfriend".
      In the 1300s people all over Portugal started using "amigo/a amado/a" or "amigo/a enamorada/o" to create diference to normal "amigos". Later the "e" was dropped turning the word into "namorado" which people started using as a noun instead of an adjective.
      There is a writting by some academic medieval dude complaining about the younger generation using this new widespread term. Supposedly it is one of the oldest clearly recorded instances of complaits about how young people are speaking wrong and using slang.

    • @darklibertario5001
      @darklibertario5001 2 роки тому +7

      @@miguelpimentel5623 That's some very interesting insight, I've studied about the troubadours and "cantigas de amigo" but never really connected the dots about the original use of the word, in a weird way I'm really glad that those two concepts were divided linguistically, I wish English had this.

  • @NetAndyCz
    @NetAndyCz 4 роки тому +991

    Well, the "we" in English may be confusing, but "you" can be even trickier.

    • @user-xb9yv2ci4c
      @user-xb9yv2ci4c 4 роки тому +64

      There was a time, where English had second person singular. The word was "thou". And it was conjugated separately: with the ending "st". Like "Thou writest a comment." Like in German, second person plural was used a polite form for storagers or people of high rank (The person counts like many persons.) The English were so polite, that they began using this form for everyone. In German, the polite form is today third person plural. So, "Can you help me?" would literally mean "Can They help me?"

    • @randomguy263
      @randomguy263 4 роки тому +3

      @Kanashimi Report THEM?

    • @mimull1378
      @mimull1378 4 роки тому

      YES

    • @hostgrady
      @hostgrady 4 роки тому +8

      My French friend cries because there isnt a super popular plural form of you

    • @jorgekunrath1016
      @jorgekunrath1016 4 роки тому +9

      @@hostgrady yeeeesss, as a brazilian I never know what "you" they are using. In portuguese we have "você" for singular and "vocês" for plural, and is SOOO more easy. I think that every latin language have this feature

  • @kurapikapika798
    @kurapikapika798 2 роки тому +6

    These features are only available in the premium version.

  • @majm4606
    @majm4606 Рік тому +9

    The leading ¿ in Spanish I realized is handy when reading text aloud (since you know right when you start a sentence what sort of tone you should give it). Sorta wish English had that too.

  • @Cheasle2
    @Cheasle2 6 років тому +2295

    A new language feature every language needs is a universal word for "sorry don't speak that"

    • @KoneSkirata
      @KoneSkirata 6 років тому +127

      Excellent idea. but probably hard to find a small word that is not already in use *somewhere* on earth xD

    • @CrazyLeopardStarYay
      @CrazyLeopardStarYay 5 років тому +54

      I don't think it would work 🤔 people are used to twisting their tongues in such unique ways that there can't be one word that is the same but also pronounced and interpreted the same. Just how it's difficult to understand what non natives are saying when they speak a foreign language. It's sometimes almost impossible because they cannot form certain words or sounds

    • @rightwingsafetysquad9872
      @rightwingsafetysquad9872 5 років тому +55

      Most have "English?". Best part is even if both parties only know a dozen English words, it's still the fastest way to communicate that you don't know what they're saying almost anywhere in the world.

    • @AaronTheGerman
      @AaronTheGerman 5 років тому +119

      I thought that's "huh?"

    • @garette8672
      @garette8672 5 років тому +1

      7LeopardStar ??? typical humans are capable of making the same sounds as everyone else. the word “help” can be pronounced by any typical person, regardless of their native language, it just wouldn’t be spelled help.

  • @benlevy5585
    @benlevy5585 3 роки тому +2369

    Fun fact: In Ethiopian grammar, they have a punctuation symbol used like a full stop, question mark or exclamation mark to indicate sarcasm.

    • @tompatterson1548
      @tompatterson1548 3 роки тому +289

      We have an optional one in english that I use a lot: "/s".

    • @MaliciousOnion
      @MaliciousOnion 3 роки тому +180

      technically we have one in english as well, although it's rarely used - the interobang (‽)

    • @novelle.27
      @novelle.27 3 роки тому +133

      @@MaliciousOnion I thought the interrobang was like “?!” but a single punctuation mark.

    • @gettingshotsomeonesgonnapa8635
      @gettingshotsomeonesgonnapa8635 3 роки тому +62

      In my language we use "(!)" if we're being sarcastic.

    • @chrono0097
      @chrono0097 3 роки тому +28

      @Gray El entrenador Pokémon Never heard of (!), and i been speaking spanish for a while now, the more you know

  • @EVModules
    @EVModules 2 роки тому +13

    From a Star Wars perspective, I chuckle at the fact that I know a language that C3PO cannot use to communicate with, despite being "fluent in 6 million forms of communications" even if it was exposed to him. American Sign Language is quite an interesting language that has its' own structure, rules, punctuation, grammar, and sentence order. It's also a language which cannot be written down. To answer your question you posted at the end of the video, gestures are what every language should have. (waving)

  • @kismetkiss
    @kismetkiss Рік тому +58

    One thing I love about some languages (Japanese and Carrier are ones I've encountered) is that the verb is usually located at the end of the sentence so you have to listen to the speaker's whole sentence before responding, it makes exchanges feel more respectful and polite.

    • @Nichtdu-rt4ih
      @Nichtdu-rt4ih 4 місяці тому +2

      Gosh i hate that one. When translating you need to change the english start of a sentence depending on whether a japanese speaker adds a desu ka at the end of their sentence

  • @melonbals5512
    @melonbals5512 5 років тому +9076

    fantastic features that we dont have in the english language
    1. rules that are actually consistant

    • @Randy.Bobandy
      @Randy.Bobandy 4 роки тому +489

      *Consistent.

    • @joeschroedernz
      @joeschroedernz 4 роки тому +111

      Their ahh know rewlz ... roolz? Ruze?

    • @Iunanec
      @Iunanec 4 роки тому +121

      @@Randy.Bobandy If "consistent", therefore "resistent"? 🤔

    • @mikehu2451
      @mikehu2451 4 роки тому +89

      like pro *noun* ce but pro *nun* ciation

    • @oriorchids
      @oriorchids 4 роки тому +181

      I before e except after c unless sounding like A like neighbor or weigh or when the English language is being weird, such as either or height. Speaking of height, why do height and weight sound different? They're incredibly similar words when it comes to spelling, but they're both pronounced differently. Leisure and foreign are ei words that have also gone rogue from this spelling rule. And then there's science, glacier and species, which definitely is breaking the rules. Heirloom, atheist, forfeit, and seismic follow this trend as well. So in conclusion, English sucks.
      Edit: Wow, I didn’t know a lot of these English rules. Thanks for telling me.

  • @NoahW
    @NoahW 4 роки тому +2524

    In Swedish we have separate words for a “countering” yes (jo) and a “confirming” yes (ja). Let me show an example:
    - You’re wrong.
    - No!
    - Jo!*
    *’Jo’ is a countering ‘yes’ in this context; you say it as a counter to the recipient’s ‘no’.
    - Are you going to the mall?
    - Ja.*
    *’Ja’ is confirming the previous yes/no question.

    • @theunicorn1167
      @theunicorn1167 4 роки тому +305

      In german we have that too! But instead of Jo we say Doch. Ja is the same

    • @YnasMidgardNaule
      @YnasMidgardNaule 4 роки тому +80

      If you want to preserve the difference, English has you covered:
      A: You're wrong.
      B: No, I'm not.
      A: (You) are too.

    • @theunicorn1167
      @theunicorn1167 4 роки тому +116

      YnasMidgardNaule
      I‘ve never heard the answer „You are too“ to a „No“ answer. Tf

    • @Polyglot_English
      @Polyglot_English 4 роки тому +22

      In Russian we just use da 'yes' and nyet 'no' for that purpose, why do you need a separate word for that?

    • @menear
      @menear 4 роки тому +8

      arabic has this too

  • @yousefabutaleb5063
    @yousefabutaleb5063 2 роки тому +133

    Weird fact: In Arabic, the word can have more letters if the speaker wants to show strong emotions like saying "اصبر" which means you have to “wait” and "اصطبر" which means that you have to “wait a long time!”

    • @tourhet
      @tourhet Рік тому +2

      Not true in Egypt which is the only place i know to use that term
      أصبر و أصطبر هما نفس الكلمة مش عارف أنت جبت الكلام ده منين.

    • @markharnyk4475
      @markharnyk4475 Рік тому +15

      Is it like "waaaaait"?

    • @m7mdisenm866
      @m7mdisenm866 Рік тому +3

      @@tourhet It definitely exists in modern standard Arabic but it's not used that much in modern dialects

    • @tourhet
      @tourhet Рік тому

      @@m7mdisenm866 Some words in Standard Arabic have more than one pronunciation and writing, but they do not change the meaning or confirm it, and certainly not a rule for grammatical emphasis

    • @m7mdisenm866
      @m7mdisenm866 Рік тому +1

      @@tourhet Bro there is literally a whole thing called "صيغة المبالغة" in "نحو" Have you never heard of it?

  • @frogery
    @frogery Рік тому +13

    this reminds me of the movie Arrival (and the story it's based on), which is about how language changes perception. I wonder if people who speak languages with absolute direction and time-independence have an experience of the world slightly different from those who don't

  • @aronengel9192
    @aronengel9192 4 роки тому +3703

    Imagine having 16 forms of "the"
    **angry german noice**

    • @kanalkucker14
      @kanalkucker14 4 роки тому +201

      der die das dem den dessen....

    • @azyjmexcuseokstop924
      @azyjmexcuseokstop924 4 роки тому +103

      @@kanalkucker14 deren

    • @pengin6035
      @pengin6035 4 роки тому +292

      Der dir das, wieso weshalb warum, wer nicht fragt, bleibt dumm.
      In English: The the the, why why why...

    • @sophiat7459
      @sophiat7459 4 роки тому +229

      Imagine having 24 forms of "the"
      *angry Attic Greek noises*

    • @greenstarlover1
      @greenstarlover1 4 роки тому +63

      Imagine only having a single letter for the word "the". And for the word "and".

  • @gowzahr
    @gowzahr 4 роки тому +807

    Another neat feature of languages in the Philippines is that you can turn nearly any word into a verb by throwing on a conjugation.
    For example instead of
    -Should I get my shoes on?
    -No, you can go barefoot.
    Becomes
    -Should I shoe?
    -No, you can barefoot.

    • @alexbireta4668
      @alexbireta4668 4 роки тому +62

      English also does this quite often.

    • @user-gv9rt1nc1l
      @user-gv9rt1nc1l 4 роки тому +38

      English does that in some words but without applying any conjugation. The expression "to foot the bill" is an example of it.

    • @yutazenrenchin9701
      @yutazenrenchin9701 4 роки тому +15

      "Sapatos?" "Paa nalang."
      Edit: "[mag]paa [ka] nalang."

    • @julianaldama6631
      @julianaldama6631 4 роки тому +8

      Mag-shoe

    • @seefzi
      @seefzi 4 роки тому +6

      I only have experience with English and German but this happens frequently in both languages.

  • @theharmonizer2670
    @theharmonizer2670 Рік тому +20

    I once had an idea of a story which involved a fictional language. The language required a very precise pronunciation, making it difficult for most people to speak (who weren’t born doing so).
    Its written version is made up of symbols that act as a guide for the exact pitches and fluctuations needed to pronounce every word.

  • @Kimeikus
    @Kimeikus Рік тому +13

    That time independence concept explains why Native Chinese speakers who aren’t accustomed to English say: “He *watch* movie” or “They *sing* song” no matter what the tense they’re referring to is.

  • @NoEgg4u
    @NoEgg4u 4 роки тому +1391

    @3:42
    "Can you think of a new language feature?"
    I have a suggestion. But English lacks the means to explain it.

    • @artifex2.080
      @artifex2.080 4 роки тому +60

      Use a differrent language

    • @imthatgayguy
      @imthatgayguy 3 роки тому +88

      @@artifex2.080 r/woooosh

    • @davidgoldrock7264
      @davidgoldrock7264 3 роки тому +89

      A character for sarcasm
      I'd use a symbol that isn't in my keyboard- question mark but facing left

    • @Gihntemos
      @Gihntemos 3 роки тому +49

      @@davidgoldrock7264 I know portions of the internet use "/s" to mark it, though it's not universal enough. Sometimes I use caps to indicate emphasis on a word to make it more clear, but obviously that can just be confusing.

    • @davidgoldrock7264
      @davidgoldrock7264 3 роки тому +13

      @@Gihntemos you know that's nice, but I'm talking bout somthing universal: somthing that you can see in a book or a newspaper

  • @valonyaver600
    @valonyaver600 5 років тому +1332

    Different words for a mother's siblings and a father's siblings

    • @DirtyPoul
      @DirtyPoul 5 років тому +147

      We have that in Danish.
      Moster, faster, farbror, morbror.
      Mother's sister, father's sister, father's brother, mother's brother. The former are more used than the latter since the latter are not proper words. It's just father (far) or mother (mor) + brother (bror). A lot of people use uncle (onkel) instead because the others sound kind of dumb.

    • @nisa202
      @nisa202 5 років тому +78

      Hindi has that too

    • @cuamanhong2719
      @cuamanhong2719 4 роки тому +54

      Vietnamese has that too.
      The mother's older sister and brother are "bác"
      The mother's younger sister is "dì"
      The mother's younger brother is "cậu"
      The father's older brother and sister are the same as the mother's
      The father's younger sister is "cô"
      The father's younger brother is "chú".

    • @erischama1922
      @erischama1922 4 роки тому +93

      A lot of Asian languages have that

    • @jmartine
      @jmartine 4 роки тому +21

      @@cuamanhong2719 And what about the spouses of those people? In English, your mother's brother and your mother's sister's husband are both "uncle". Are the spouses of your parents' siblings another whole set of words in Vietnamese?

  • @elisapaulovich
    @elisapaulovich 2 роки тому +5

    1:52 i’m a simple person. i just FREAKED OUT when i saw the one direction reference. THANK YOU-

  • @finnianheart
    @finnianheart 2 роки тому +10

    3:17 this blew me away when i took japanese. like saying a whole ass sentence and then saying "to omoi masu" at the end changed the entire idea of what i was saying

    • @madladdie7069
      @madladdie7069 Рік тому +3

      I'm guessing that little bit would mean something like "that's what [subject] think(s)"?

    • @darkness74185
      @darkness74185 Рік тому +3

      @@madladdie7069 a direct comparison in English would be "but that's just an opinion of mine"

    • @madladdie7069
      @madladdie7069 Рік тому +2

      @@darkness74185 Oh. So it's less "that's what [SUB] thinks" and more "that's what I think"?

    • @FordTruckFan
      @FordTruckFan Рік тому

      Weeb congregation

    • @oz_jones
      @oz_jones Рік тому

      Did you fart it out because you were saying an ass sentence?

  • @jamesstewart556
    @jamesstewart556 4 роки тому +1678

    "Only one more step to defuse the bomb, lieutenant. Carefully cut the east wire."

    • @natnuss98
      @natnuss98 4 роки тому +17

      So the right one if you're facing north

    • @nukesrus2663
      @nukesrus2663 4 роки тому +48

      what if the bomb is along a north - south axis and every wire is on the east side

    • @Deksudo
      @Deksudo 4 роки тому +80

      Your east, or mine?

    • @alexandreduarte6533
      @alexandreduarte6533 4 роки тому +4

      @@natnuss98 If not you're dead

    • @Yazan_Majdalawi
      @Yazan_Majdalawi 4 роки тому +6

      @@natnuss98 that would be easy IF you knew where you were facing.
      And suppose after your efforts, you found out that you're facing the South West :)

  • @unrelatedK
    @unrelatedK 4 роки тому +9212

    Simple.
    We (inclusive): still We.
    We (exclusive): *me and the boys*

    • @itacom2199
      @itacom2199 4 роки тому +63

      Exatly

    • @canadian__ninja
      @canadian__ninja 4 роки тому +118

      That's not literally one word though. It works, but misses the point.

    • @d0943
      @d0943 4 роки тому +114

      that would be "the boys and me" or "the boys and I"

    • @enzo1468
      @enzo1468 4 роки тому +10

      This needs atleast 1k likes

    • @Timothee_Chalamet_CMBYN
      @Timothee_Chalamet_CMBYN 4 роки тому +49

      This isn’t correct at all, English lacks that. For example if an African tribe language lacked the word for the month June and referred to it as “the 6th month” instead of having a word “June”, it’s primitive ish. English lacks the we inclusive/exclusive and needs to add more words to convey meaning that most languages have a word for

  • @Hiya8partyz
    @Hiya8partyz 2 роки тому +5

    Been learning Spanish. A nice feature it has is that you don’t need to constantly add in the subject. What I mean by that is words like ‘you’, ‘we’, ‘I’, etc. For example, in English:
    “You go to the supermarket so you can buy milk for your mother.”
    In there, the listener is referred to 3 times, though you can simplify the sentence so it becomes 2 times.
    Meanwhile, in Spanish, you can just do this:
    “Vas al supermercado para poder comprar leche tú madre.”
    In this, the word ‘you’ is only used once. However, the listener knows we are addressing them because of the ‘vas’ at the beginning, since ‘vas’ is the you(familiar) conjugation of ‘ir’, which means ‘to go’.
    Also, this means we don’t have the conjugate the ‘comprar’ (to buy) to ‘compras’ since we’ve already used ‘vas’.
    While the whole conjugation in Spanish can be confusing, it does make the specific-ness of English very minimal.
    Of course, I’m only learning Spanish, so this could be complete BS, but oh well.

  • @bendovbloch7630
    @bendovbloch7630 11 місяців тому

    I love that you published the referenced books. I'll go look it up :)

  • @bernardososa3126
    @bernardososa3126 3 роки тому +616

    "We've just won the lottery!"
    :D
    "But not you!"
    D:

  • @tslanews24
    @tslanews24 7 років тому +3165

    Fantastic Features & Where to Learn Them

    • @Julian0505z
      @Julian0505z 6 років тому +9

      What are you doing here?!

    • @JesseWetherell
      @JesseWetherell 6 років тому +7

      Linguistics, and you may learn where ever you want to, good luck

    • @EssieP
      @EssieP 6 років тому +1

      illiteration? Erm, we have that.

    • @ursuslegolas1215
      @ursuslegolas1215 6 років тому +1

      Do you know Clint Eastfoot?

    • @lilylou2615
      @lilylou2615 6 років тому +8

      WwwWario is this a Harry Potter reference ❤️

  • @benrockstar574
    @benrockstar574 2 місяці тому

    I love it and I hope that it helps so that more people can get your knowledge

  • @norbertfranqui
    @norbertfranqui Рік тому +64

    In English it might be weird just saying "I love you" because it is considered a big deal and mostly used for relationship love. You can say like "love ya" to friends to be more casual but it's still to the closer friends. I'm used to having words for different versions of love like to a friend, to family, etc. I'm convinced the lack of these words is part of the reason why English-speaking only places are more awkward to show affection and communicate

    • @matroqueta6825
      @matroqueta6825 Рік тому +8

      In my experience, in languages where you have varying degrees of "love", telling a partner a lesser form of "i love you" is interpreted as saying "I _don't_ love you", which pressures you into always using the highest form of the verb even if you don't actually mean it.

    • @paulkosmala2730
      @paulkosmala2730 Рік тому

      @@matroqueta6825 apple love vs orange love...

    • @njits789
      @njits789 11 місяців тому +2

      Interesting. To me, this clarifies why characters finally saying 'I love you' is a huge moment in TV shows many times.

    • @user-jg3yx8yu4l
      @user-jg3yx8yu4l 9 місяців тому +1

      @@matroqueta6825​​⁠interestingly, this is the not the case in Japanese, where there are many varying ways to express your care and affection of another, the highest form of “I love you,” (愛してる) is sometimes said at the culmination of a fictional piece of work, and is saved for the special occasion precisely because of it’s strength and rarity. It’s rarely said in real life, as well as never being used for love confessions. The lowest and most common form actually is, (好きです) and the surrounding tensity, privacy, and tone indicate that someone is revealing their harbored romantic feelings. The slightly higher one 大好き is used when you want to express that you really like something! But when used to express feelings to another person is actually more shallow and welcomed among friends, and thus never perceived as a deep romantic confession.
      Love confessions, in order to kickstart a relationship, is standard practice in Japan. What couples say to each once their mutual feelings are confirmed is probably personal and varies. Another note, replying “Me too.” in Japanese when told “I love you.” is not considered non-romantic or someone too afraid to say I love you back. It’s simply a pure confirmation that their love is the same 😁

  • @cmb9173
    @cmb9173 3 роки тому +7476

    here's a vital feature: a singular short word that has about the meaning "look, i'm sorry but i really want to end this conversation right now" which is generally accepted and respected

    • @gettingshotsomeonesgonnapa8635
      @gettingshotsomeonesgonnapa8635 3 роки тому +1752

      Just say "goodbye."
      "Hey dan remember the match last weekend-"
      " *Goodbye* "
      *Walks away without making eye contact or saying a word*

    • @lucasrobin2788
      @lucasrobin2788 3 роки тому +1081

      the entire english language politeness system works around saying a lot of words and being vague, so good luck trying to undo centuries of that.
      Polish is an example of a language that goes the other way. In Polish it's polite to be short, direct, and with as few a words as possible.

    • @byron4545
      @byron4545 2 роки тому +109

      @@danahanley888 As a response to "tja" you usually get a "Und sonst so?"

    • @DougAdams
      @DougAdams 2 роки тому +491

      In the midwest US we say "Welp" and the other person says "Yep" and that's it.

    • @tandemdwarf745
      @tandemdwarf745 2 роки тому +67

      @@DougAdamsSame in the Pacific Northwest, so maybe just an America in general thing.

  • @TheRWS96
    @TheRWS96 8 років тому +1932

    yes (you agree)
    no (you disagree)
    mu (the quwestion is wrong)
    we need MU

    • @Alexaflohr
      @Alexaflohr 8 років тому +121

      +TheRWS96
      We really do. I have used mu many times, but I often have to explain the word. Mu is surprisingly useful.

    • @LLorfa
      @LLorfa 8 років тому +12

      +TheRWS96 I agree, and I've also used it.

    • @FlameInsignia
      @FlameInsignia 8 років тому +23

      +TheRWS96 Mu is a Greek letter. It is indicative of the prefix micro. For example, micrometers or micrograms. Our blood should always have less than five micrograms of lead per deciliter in it. This quantity would be written like this: μg/dl.

    • @TheRWS96
      @TheRWS96 8 років тому +18

      not really random as the word MU already existed in other languages so that is why MU instead of something else
      Click this link for more information:
      c2.com/cgi/wiki?MuAnswer

    • @LLorfa
      @LLorfa 8 років тому +11

      +TheRWS96 He was talking to 'Mark Streminsky', hence the "+Mark Streminsky' part, who was mentioning that the greek letter mu is used for micro, which is kind of random for this discussion. If it were to be added to say the English language, it would be written out 'mu', using the greek letter for it would be like, l33t speak.

  • @Exderius
    @Exderius 2 роки тому

    Keep up the great work

  • @tomboshoven6545
    @tomboshoven6545 2 роки тому +9

    Speaking with people from different cultural backgrounds, what I always find fascinating is the words for feelings. They seem to be very subtly different even in very similar languages (Dutch and German for example). And then there are words that just don't exist in certain languages.
    An often-quoted one from Dutch is "gezellig", which doesn't really exist in English. It's a form of coziness or closeness, but without any intimacy. The word "gezel" means companion. In English, I would use the super-generic word "nice" instead. For example, a "gezellig feestje" would just be a "nice party". The English version doesn't convey at all that the reason why I'm enjoying the party is the company.
    If you want to have fun with the subtle differences in meaning, look up a feeling in a thesaurus. You'll find many very similar, but subtly different, versions of that feeling. Now imagine a different language that doesn't have words for some of them, but has a set of completely different ones.

    • @paper2222
      @paper2222 2 роки тому +3

      that's one of the reasons why languages are amazing. you learn a word that you can't convey well in english.

  • @trashpanda5947
    @trashpanda5947 7 років тому +1638

    In Swedish we differentiate between grandparents on the mothers side and on the fathers side. The Swedish word for grandfather on the fathers side is "farfar" which roughly means father's father. Somewhat confusing sometimes when people talk about their grandfather in English and I'm like: "Which one?".

    • @xd-lt2ul
      @xd-lt2ul 7 років тому +71

      Simon Ulander yeah, we do that in Denmark aswell, but that makes sense since our languages are quite similar

    • @trashpanda5947
      @trashpanda5947 7 років тому +148

      Panda Danish is just Swedish with a speech impediment. ;)

    • @tylerv.g.6268
      @tylerv.g.6268 7 років тому +7

      Very interesting!

    • @zeezy6691
      @zeezy6691 7 років тому +33

      Same in Turkish 👍🏽

    • @jammydoughnuts
      @jammydoughnuts 7 років тому +43

      If you're talking to a friend whose grandparents are unknown to you, does it really matter which ones they're talking about? Or do you just feel as if it should be differentiated because it's what you're used to in Swedish?

  • @corner559
    @corner559 7 років тому +2183

    Another feature English lacks is a spelling system that actually makes sense.

    • @saltyman7888
      @saltyman7888 7 років тому +53

      i ink we should revamp certain words:
      cake, make, bake, take, lake, sake, fake are now kaek, maek, baek, taek, laek, saek, and faek.
      latin/greek/french roots are calqued, if not regularised in english.
      Photosynthesis is Lightmaking. Internationalisation is now Betweencountrymaking.
      loanwords are always calqued.

    • @Maki-00
      @Maki-00 7 років тому +111

      At least English should have accent marks for spellings with multiple pronunciations. Rough, through, cough, etc. "ough" is pronounced in a completely different way. If I weren't a native English speaker, this would be maddening. I worked in a cafe near the UN in New York and it was amusing listening to all the foreigners try to pronounce "whole wheat" when asking for a bagel!

    • @syockit
      @syockit 7 років тому +19

      It sounds like something out of 1984

    • @saltyman7888
      @saltyman7888 7 років тому +2

      syockit
      Not really.

    • @marcussmith7409
      @marcussmith7409 7 років тому +32

      /watch?v=GiVs05yq9-o It actually does make sense if you learn how the roots of words are made. You can even roughly figure out what a word means and is spelled you've never heard before just by identifying the roots in it as well as knowing what language the roots came from.

  • @madison_crvt
    @madison_crvt 2 роки тому

    the one direction font made me giggle (that aside, another excellent video! languages are amazing)

  • @EnglishwithAlan
    @EnglishwithAlan Рік тому

    I like your final point about preserving languages.

  • @sakurafan771
    @sakurafan771 5 років тому +3609

    Having a conversation with just two letters.
    For example in Filipino...let me demonstrate by a conversation at an elevator.
    Fil 1: Bababa ba?
    Fil 2: Bababa
    Which means in english...
    Eng 1: Is this going to go down?
    Eng 2: Yes, it's going to go down.
    Yes, we are minions.

    • @dudcats
      @dudcats 5 років тому +118

      sakurafan771 lmaoo

    • @joshuamason2227
      @joshuamason2227 5 років тому +371

      "Going to go down?"
      "Going to go down."
      same thing with english

    • @allainediapana619
      @allainediapana619 5 років тому +60

      Banana warriors

    • @nzbg1132
      @nzbg1132 5 років тому +66

      Wu Chenglin no one talks like that

    • @swiftdrifter01
      @swiftdrifter01 5 років тому +100

      Isn’t that kind of like:
      Q: This is going to go down?
      A: This _is_ going to.

  • @marlene2723
    @marlene2723 4 роки тому +775

    Also those dying languages have good insights: Scientists learned about this one turtle that hibernates because a native word for that type of turtle is "turtle-that-goes-down-in-the-winter"

    • @RosimInc7
      @RosimInc7 4 роки тому +40

      @Random playground That's how I'd name a parrot that doesn't repeat after me.

    • @archwaldo
      @archwaldo 4 роки тому +59

      @@RosimInc7 or you could rename yourself into "poor parrot trainer"

    • @reanetsemoleleki8219
      @reanetsemoleleki8219 4 роки тому +17

      @Random playground your butt can't what?

    • @sliceofbread2611
      @sliceofbread2611 4 роки тому +10

      @@reanetsemoleleki8219 this is why people should not change their name on youtube..
      or in general..
      oh i miss the days where one would pick a nickname and just stick with it forever..

    • @tenacious3911
      @tenacious3911 4 роки тому +1

      "Passifik Oshan"

  • @JackieBaisa
    @JackieBaisa Рік тому

    Watching this 9 years later and enjoying it as if it was a new post. Love it.

  • @ValpasKankaristo
    @ValpasKankaristo 2 роки тому +2

    Been thinking about clusivity a lot. Glad to know there's a word for it, and it's used somewhere in the world!

    • @mattlivingston2192
      @mattlivingston2192 Рік тому

      There are English words for language features that don't exist in English - that's kinda hilarious!

  • @korbinmdavis
    @korbinmdavis 3 роки тому +6898

    There were a lot of African students at my old university that used absolute direction, so they painted every North wall in every building orange.

    • @alexeysaranchev6118
      @alexeysaranchev6118 3 роки тому +347

      Or the confused students could have just carried compasses with them.

    • @zaharacreative
      @zaharacreative 3 роки тому +652

      They... Meaning the students or the university administration?

    • @pierbertone2957
      @pierbertone2957 3 роки тому +288

      Source: trust me dude

    • @jerrygreenest
      @jerrygreenest 3 роки тому +79

      Oh no... There’s a whole separate story of confusion about directions. Some compasses use red/orange arrow to direct North, but some other use red arrow to direct South. Which kinda makes sense: North should be blue, since it associates with cold, and South should be red, since it associates with warm.

    • @1985230ce
      @1985230ce 3 роки тому +512

      @@jerrygreenest I suppose that depends on which hemisphere you are in.

  • @leonard4733
    @leonard4733 4 роки тому +1102

    When I was learning English, I was so puzzled as to why I have to use subject in virtually every sentence even when it is so obvious from the context, because In Korean and Japanese we usually omit them! But I’ve seen how it is also puzzling the other way around :)

    • @usbee
      @usbee 3 роки тому +78

      Can confirm. As a Hungarian who learns English, it is really strange to me too.

    • @alialmans
      @alialmans 3 роки тому +42

      Same here in Poland

    • @MrRedstoner
      @MrRedstoner 3 роки тому +37

      Add Slovak and Czech to the list.

    • @djungbo4462
      @djungbo4462 3 роки тому +20

      And romania too

    • @alialmans
      @alialmans 3 роки тому +50

      @@StackOfPancakes2216 In Poland we use a phrase equivalent to "raining" when we want to point out that it is raining, none of us need to scream and point out the window, as we all just assume the subject without needing to point it out either verbally or nonverbally.

  • @Abiesbracteata
    @Abiesbracteata 2 роки тому +43

    I would love a written way of indicating that something written is to explicitly NOT be taken literally. An indicator such that when someone writes something figuratively, rhetorically, or ironically this imagined written feature notifies people that what is written is NOT literally meant. So many misunderstandings and flame wars would be avoided.

    • @avalonplemel8933
      @avalonplemel8933 2 роки тому +3

      The closest we have is a bit silly, BuT tYpinG LikE tHiS oFteN DoEs tHE tRIcK

    • @Stormy_Slime
      @Stormy_Slime 2 роки тому +6

      i hate that idea/j
      slash j works well

  • @RomyAndMichelle
    @RomyAndMichelle Рік тому +7

    I’m still looking for a word or phrase in English to succinctly describe the difference between bimonthly (twice a month, each month) and bimonthly (every two months).
    Similarly, I would like to clearly be able to describe the difference between “next Thursday” (the Thursday coming up this week in 2 days) and “next Thursday” (not this Thursday but Thursday next week).

    • @GeorgeDCowley
      @GeorgeDCowley 11 місяців тому +1

      I used to insist that "the Thursday coming up this week in 2 days" was the only correct one.

  • @randomchannel8436
    @randomchannel8436 5 років тому +3573

    There is also another thing, like in Chinese, there are shapes and structures in the word. So for example, 门 is door, and heart is 心.When you put them together, 闷 means stressed, sad or depressed. If you look at the shapes you can see that the heart is behind a door, meaning that there's things going on in your heart(mind) that is not spoken out, the thoughts are confined, therefore stress and sadness.
    This is quite useful because in some Chinese songs/poems they use it to show some hidden meanings, which is rather cool in my opinion.

    • @jay-ki6ie
      @jay-ki6ie 5 років тому +209

      That's cool

    • @alinah1403
      @alinah1403 5 років тому +216

      Yep. That's called "pian pang bu shou" or radicals. If a word has 心, then it's related to feelings (not the muscle that pumps blood). 想 means think, and 感 means feel.

    • @hadwinying6664
      @hadwinying6664 5 років тому +168

      we should learn traditional Chinese. in simplified Chinese, love is 爱 but in traditional Chinese, love is 愛 which has the character 心in it which means heart. You cant love anyone without a heart!

    • @Smileyreal
      @Smileyreal 5 років тому +39

      @@hadwinying6664 Emotion comes from the brain, all the heart does is pump your blood.

    • @yukhimli1807
      @yukhimli1807 5 років тому +11

      no it means bored not stressed nor sad nor depressed

  • @kubaborowiecki5401
    @kubaborowiecki5401 6 років тому +2040

    The English language doesn't have a single word for one and a half, but it, obviously, has a word for throwing someone out of a window (Defenestration)

    • @paradoxmo
      @paradoxmo 6 років тому +309

      Don't blame us, we got it from the Romans. (:

    • @diebosenzipfelmanner7268
      @diebosenzipfelmanner7268 6 років тому +501

      You gotta have priorities mate

    • @talknight2
      @talknight2 6 років тому +97

      And what a fine word that is!

    • @SergiuszOlszewski
      @SergiuszOlszewski 6 років тому +95

      Just write threehalves without a space. Solved.

    • @andresmartinezramos7513
      @andresmartinezramos7513 6 років тому +72

      Kuba Borowiecki But it makes sense one and a half is simple, 1 & 1/2. Defenestration is also simple
      De- (most often without, in this case off)
      -Fenestra- (latin for window, proper word in latin would be fenestram)
      Tion- it means its a verb
      So its sort of throwing (if you strech the doing something part) off a window.

  • @parmesanzero7678
    @parmesanzero7678 Рік тому +4

    I can’t imagine keeping track of absolute direction. I wonder how that concept impacted explorers who spoke that language and whether it was advantageous vs those who did not have that standard in their language.

  • @kryptoid2568
    @kryptoid2568 Рік тому +1

    That's why I love ithkuil. It has all those features:
    Aspect, referentials, absolute and relative directions as well as a special 3d system of directions, and validation, and much much more!

  • @Mr123awesomecoolio
    @Mr123awesomecoolio 6 років тому +3445

    We just need to fix “do you mind if I....” because if you say yes, a lot of people get confused if you mean yes I mind (don’t do it) or yes that’s fine (since the asker is usually asking if they can do something they want to)

    • @tim-4368
      @tim-4368 6 років тому +147

      I usually answer with sure go for it or ide rather u not

    • @SkillMinecrsft
      @SkillMinecrsft 6 років тому +97

      Valve, please fix

    • @18lucky17
      @18lucky17 6 років тому +1

      NobodyMiner whats bad with that

    • @kokuyosekihaiwado8561
      @kokuyosekihaiwado8561 6 років тому +31

      Jack Rhodes this is me on the daily I have no clue whether to say no or yes to answer those kinda questions because as you wrote could mean two things

    • @tropinnka
      @tropinnka 6 років тому +27

      That’s what yea and nay were meant to do, as being absolute yes or no. Do you mind if I do this? -Yea means go ahead, Do you mind if I do this? -Yes means I do mind

  • @Back-Space.
    @Back-Space. 7 років тому +4948

    The fact that there's no word for 'the day after tommorow" or 'the day before yesterday'! It's so annoying.

    • @limsshouse
      @limsshouse 7 років тому +540

      BackSpace In chinese "the day after tmr" is 后天(hou tian) and "the day before ytd" is 前天(qian tian). Pretty sure there might be some other languages that can describe those too!

    • @astrastellari5986
      @astrastellari5986 7 років тому +595

      Russian and other Slavic languages have words for these too. ^_^

    • @giudittanatalini5369
      @giudittanatalini5369 7 років тому +277

      in italian we say "the other yesterday"

    • @Kenexxa
      @Kenexxa 7 років тому +525

      In Germany the day before yesterday is "Vorgestern" (It's basically the words "vor" (Before) and "gestern"(yesterday)stuck together... ) and the day after tommorrow is "Übermorgen"(Über = Above; Morgen = tomorrow)

    • @Ceruleanst
      @Ceruleanst 7 років тому +1173

      The English word "overmorrow" has been forgotten, but it's plain enough that you could probably bring it back and start using it without having to explain what it means.

  • @felics6
    @felics6 2 роки тому +4

    In Arabic, you have "lam of emphasis" (and many other ways of stressing) which helps a reader know some emotions of the writer (frustrated, angry, etc)
    For sentences that use multiple stressors an english equivalent would be like saying, "I really really really mean it!!" *slams hand on table*

  • @Mote.
    @Mote. 2 роки тому +1

    I do love the paper and the sound it makes

  • @kenninast
    @kenninast 8 років тому +223

    I very much like the Spanish inverted question and exclamation marks in the beginning of a sentence, so you know right away what kind of sentence it will be.

    • @UltimateHammerBro
      @UltimateHammerBro 8 років тому +31

      Questions are pretty clear in speech since the intonation shows it's a question. It's in writing they may be ambiguous: that's precisely why inverted marks exist.

    • @kenninast
      @kenninast 8 років тому +30

      Obviously I meant writing. A bit weird that I have specify the obvious thing that a punctuation symbol is only written and not spoken.

    • @UltimateHammerBro
      @UltimateHammerBro 8 років тому +2

      ***** I meant they're clear in Spanish.

    • @ukras01
      @ukras01 8 років тому +3

      In Portuguese, we don't have the initial question mark. So We kinda have the problem. Reading aloud, a long sentence that happens to be a question, may make the reader look retarded. However we can mitigate this by postponing the changing of intonation to a point where it becomes clear it will be a question. Kinda "I've already seen the question mark with my peripheral vision"... Or by reading aloud with sufficient pause, to allow a quick sentence inspection. Or by using the grammar constructions in ways that clearly hint about the existence of a question.
      But, today's people write fast, without much care for proper phrase construction, so I see the point of adding and inverted question mark.

    • @Grissol69
      @Grissol69 8 років тому

      It's not like the words "How, who, when, where, what, why" indicate that the sentence is a question

  • @stijnvinkenburg8878
    @stijnvinkenburg8878 3 роки тому +2655

    In other languages there is a difference between the word “you” when you’re talking to one person and “you” when you talk about more people. As someone who learns to speak english it is very confusing what other people are talking about. So in my opinion the english language needs a new word for “you” when you talk to multiple people.

    • @abelnemeth4346
      @abelnemeth4346 3 роки тому +431

      It already had one: "thou" and "thee" (same way as I and me), but like in french, to be polite to someone, they used plural. Now English people at some point decided to be polite to everyone.
      So when you say: "You idiot!" It is already the polite and civilised way of saying "Thou idiot!"
      Nowadays you only see it in the Bible: strictly when addressing God.

    • @ericredbear425
      @ericredbear425 3 роки тому +575

      You've never used "y'all"?
      Then again, in some parts of the South "y'all" singular and "all y'all" is plural.

    • @TheGreatBackUpVIDEOS
      @TheGreatBackUpVIDEOS 3 роки тому +98

      As Ábel said, thou and thee would have been singular and you would have been plural but then you became all three.
      It even had a huge amount of resistance with new-age you'ers being regarded as stupid just like what people who use singular "they" are facing...which is weird since singular you happened WAY later on in history.

    • @LuizAlexPhoenix
      @LuizAlexPhoenix 3 роки тому +69

      @@ericredbear425 That... Sounds needlesly complicated.

    • @Anon-uv9mj
      @Anon-uv9mj 3 роки тому +37

      Just say yall when its more😂😂😂😂😂😂

  • @hypothesised4453
    @hypothesised4453 2 роки тому

    Thanks for the great video! Noticed you used the One Direction font for absolute direction - bonus points.

  • @WantSomeWhiskey818
    @WantSomeWhiskey818 2 роки тому +95

    Im learning Japanese and this language, while a mouthful sometimes, is so efficient its crazy. You dont need to worry about pronouns, gendered conjugations, or even saying "I" or "You." You can get across a large amount of information in a comparatively shorter time in Japanese.

    • @EliseLucy92
      @EliseLucy92 2 роки тому +46

      On the other hand, if you have to use "I" or "you", you end up with 8421 pronouns to choose from and if you pick the wrong ones, you're likely to sound offensive :D

    • @spaghettiisyummy.3623
      @spaghettiisyummy.3623 Рік тому +8

      Japan is a VERY tidy and Efficient place.
      Everything has to be on perfect and on time!

    • @felicitygee381
      @felicitygee381 Рік тому +2

      Yep, I love it, easiest is just not to use I or You, most ppl don't 😂

    • @zahra9890
      @zahra9890 Рік тому +8

      that's actually not true, japanese has a much slower information rate compared to a lot of european languages.

    • @darkness74185
      @darkness74185 Рік тому +8

      @@zahra9890 it's an extremely efficient language in terms of day to day use (and even more in places like the internet), but the formal use of the language can get extremely tedious and long

  • @matrixphijr
    @matrixphijr 3 роки тому +4210

    "I'm not saying Chinese doesn't have a tense system..."
    *1 billion stressed Asians have entered the chat*

    • @HerrVonWelt
      @HerrVonWelt 3 роки тому +321

      *will have had been going to entered

    • @Arthur_Hastings
      @Arthur_Hastings 3 роки тому +131

      “All your base are belong to us.”

    • @christong888
      @christong888 3 роки тому +204

      Wow, that sounds tense.

    • @papasscooperiaworker3649
      @papasscooperiaworker3649 3 роки тому +24

      i don't get this someone explain

    • @Tea57
      @Tea57 3 роки тому +70

      Since when are all Asians Chinese?
      No means to insult btw

  • @theartificer1981
    @theartificer1981 4 роки тому +2152

    This is a bit unrelated but I hate how "bomb" isn't pronounced like "womb" or "tomb" because if it would be pronounced as "boom"

    • @F100cTomas
      @F100cTomas 4 роки тому +78

      It's more related than you think

    • @godofthecripples1237
      @godofthecripples1237 4 роки тому +111

      This is genius and I'm now also frustrated it doesn't work like that

    • @ItsNotRocketScienceGD
      @ItsNotRocketScienceGD 4 роки тому +78

      Don’t forget about the word comb.

    • @jeffcatgreeb7262
      @jeffcatgreeb7262 4 роки тому +28

      It’s Not Rocket Science comb would be pronounced the same as cwm

    • @BuzzKirill3D
      @BuzzKirill3D 3 роки тому +75

      @@ItsNotRocketScienceGD Oh god I'm combing

  • @rogsiel
    @rogsiel 2 роки тому

    Third and forth one are just next level, awesome

  • @abbe1255
    @abbe1255 Рік тому +8

    In Swedish there is a difference between your grandpas, grandmas, uncles and aunts depending on which side of the family they come from. The word grandpa is either “morfar” which is your mom’s father (literall translation is mother-father) or “farfar” for your dad’s father (father-father)

  • @nessmercieca9966
    @nessmercieca9966 4 роки тому +827

    Most other language also have a separate plural version of the word ‘you’. English could really do with that!

    • @gwishart
      @gwishart 4 роки тому +181

      Several English dialects do:
      "y'all"
      "youse"
      "thas"
      etc.

    • @kv297
      @kv297 4 роки тому +38

      How about ye?

    • @dbfangirl8484
      @dbfangirl8484 4 роки тому +45

      The South US uses y'all. But don't say you people bc that can be an ethnically discriminatory

    • @adriancombe
      @adriancombe 4 роки тому +86

      We used to have it. It is seen, e.g. in the King James Bible. You, ye, your etc. are plural. Thee, Thou, Thy etc. are singular. Allows it to match the source language intent. I want to say Shakespeare used them that wasy as well.

    • @spinnis
      @spinnis 4 роки тому +12

      yall

  • @teabeeeee
    @teabeeeee 4 роки тому +2089

    I love how the font for "Absolute Direction" is the One Direction font 😂

    • @jesseo8212
      @jesseo8212 4 роки тому +18

      theresa I just noticed that too!

    • @leejaerim8972
      @leejaerim8972 4 роки тому +62

      OMG, I'm exhausted 😩 I've been scrolling the comments for 2 minutes straight until I finally found someone who actually noticed that. FINALLY 😌

    • @kedabro1957
      @kedabro1957 4 роки тому +43

      @@leejaerim8972
      Wish we could let the graphic designer know his cleverness was appreciated.

    • @dattokkaji
      @dattokkaji 4 роки тому +5

      IM SO DEAD AHAHAHHA

    • @JamieAubrey
      @JamieAubrey 4 роки тому +6

      I hate myself for even knowing that

  • @itsannaluh5362
    @itsannaluh5362 2 роки тому

    in “absolute direction” the font was the one from 1d and I just loved it

  • @peterawesomeness1
    @peterawesomeness1 8 місяців тому

    “That’s dance man.” Got you Tom.