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... and this is the point of that phrase you quoted you completely skimmed and missed MASTER. English is easy to understand, hard to master. Here's an example

... and this is the point of that phrase you quoted you completely skimmed and missed MASTER. English is easy to understand, hard to master. Here's an example especially with American Stress. Imagine that each capitalized word is stressed, this changes the meaning of the sentence. I did not say he stole the money. i DID not say he stole the money. i did NOT say he stole the money. i did not SAY he stole the money. i did not say HE stole the money. i did not say he STOLE the money. i did not say he stole THE money. i did not say he stole the MONEY. These mean different things. Outside of the stress, there are different words for things which depends on the context. poop, fecal matter, feces, shit, stool, poo, manure, dung, droppings, excrement, etc. Chinese and Arabic are different. They are different because of the written form. Folks feel the same about Japanese, till they see it written out with roman letters. Chinese is tough for English speakers because of the tones, but not for those coming from a tonal language. English is hard for those coming from a tonal language, but not those coming from a stressed and intonation based singing language.

LudwigNagasena 7y ago
>English is easy to understand, hard to master. So, like, any other langauge with a literary tradition? >I did not say he stole the money. i DID not say he stole the money. i did NOT say he stole the money. i did not SAY he stole the money. i did not say HE stole the money. i did not say he STOLE the money. i did not say he stole THE money. i did not say he stole the MONEY. No person who knows a SAE language would be confused by this, they would probably understand the meaning naturally without it even being explained to them as a rule. >Chinese and Arabic are different. They are different because of the written form. Folks feel the same about Japanese Learning a writing system takes like 2 weeks at most, it is a drop in the bucket considering that you would need ~88 weeks to be professionally proficient in Japanese compared to, say, ~24 weeks for Spanish. >Folks feel the same about Japanese, till they see it written out with roman letters. While lots of sentences that sound natural in Spanish may sound almost as natural in English, one-to-one Japanese translation would sound completely off and vice versa.
yongjik 7y ago
> I did not say he stole the money. i DID not say he stole the money. i did NOT say he stole the money. i did not SAY he stole the money. i did not say HE stole the money. i did not say he STOLE the money. i did not say he stole THE money. i did not say he stole the MONEY. While this is an interesting example, it doesn't really say much about relative difficulty of English. E.g., in Korean, the most basic way to say the sentence would be: > (money)-(object marker) (steal)-(past tense)-(quote) (no) (say)-(past tense) The beauty of it is that it doesn't say who said what or who stole the money - it's all inferred from the context! (You can even get rid of "money" if it's obvious.) But you have to get the politeness level right, of which there are at least four, or six if you are old-fashioned. Plus a bunch of optional verb endings to denote surprise, annoyance, confidence, etc. Difficulty is in the eyes of the beholder.

LudwigNagasena 7y ago

>English is easy to understand, hard to master. So, like, any other langauge with a literary tradition? >I did not say he stole the money. i DID not say he stole the money. i did NOT say he stole the money. i did not SAY he stole the money. i did not say HE stole the money. i did not say he STOLE the money. i did not say he stole THE money. i did not say he stole the MONEY. No person who knows a SAE language would be confused by this, they would probably understand the meaning naturally without it even being explained to them as a rule. >Chinese and Arabic are different. They are different because of the written form. Folks feel the same about Japanese Learning a writing system takes like 2 weeks at most, it is a drop in the bucket considering that you would need ~88 weeks to be professionally proficient in Japanese compared to, say, ~24 weeks for Spanish. >Folks feel the same about Japanese, till they see it written out with roman letters. While lots of sentences that sound natural in Spanish may sound almost as natural in English, one-to-one Japanese translation would sound completely off and vice versa.

yongjik 7y ago

> I did not say he stole the money. i DID not say he stole the money. i did NOT say he stole the money. i did not SAY he stole the money. i did not say HE stole the money. i did not say he STOLE the money. i did not say he stole THE money. i did not say he stole the MONEY. While this is an interesting example, it doesn't really say much about relative difficulty of English. E.g., in Korean, the most basic way to say the sentence would be: > (money)-(object marker) (steal)-(past tense)-(quote) (no) (say)-(past tense) The beauty of it is that it doesn't say who said what or who stole the money - it's all inferred from the context! (You can even get rid of "money" if it's obvious.) But you have to get the politeness level right, of which there are at least four, or six if you are old-fashioned. Plus a bunch of optional verb endings to denote surprise, annoyance, confidence, etc. Difficulty is in the eyes of the beholder.