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na, you are missing the point here, in German "Wörterbuch" (literally wordsbook) is the standard term for a dictionary. No ambiguity because by default a book i

na, you are missing the point here, in German "Wörterbuch" (literally wordsbook) is the standard term for a dictionary. No ambiguity because by default a book is with words and then all composita describe some kind of deviation (Bilderbuch= picture book, Handbuch = handbook -> manual, Fahrtenbuch = drive book -> driver's log). English just draws vocabulary from many roots and attaches connotations to them which have to be made a bit more explicit in englisch. So english for example has from the Germanic root "hunger", and from the french root (compare french "faim" hungry -> french "famine") "famine". Now in German, famine is "Hungersnot" (hunger crisis) and "hunger" is "Hunger". Both languages are precise, yet I would say as a German native speaker, that French is more precise than English (also German is more precise but in this argument I am not impartial). Just to be clear I am no opponent of loan words, and overall I believe modern-day languages that have a written culture probably converge towards an optimal information transmission rate, which is why english will gain and lose words, so will French and German.

MrJohz 4y ago
You're cherry picking examples here though. How do you explain the "-zeug" words? If you think of "Zeug" more as tool then some of them kind of make more sense ("Feuerzeug", "Werkzeug", at a pinch "Spielzeug") but are you really thinking of a plane as a flying tool? And there are also cases where English has opted for a compound word and German has just invented its own: Ampel vs traffic light, for example. Personally, I feel like I can be much more precise in English than I can in German (although that's probably mostly impartiality again!) Yes there are lots of words that are ostensibly just synonyms of each other, but they're mostly not true synonyms, because they have different connotations and can be used in different ways. I miss that wealth of vocabulary in German, where it often feels like I say more to get across the exact idea that I want to. That said, a lot of that is probably familiarity and bias. I grew up in English, and learned German later in life, and I suspect you did the opposite, so obviously we're going have more intuition for our native languages.
- Someone 4y ago
  > and German has just invented its own: Ampel vs traffic light, for example That’s not an invention, but a loan word from Latin ampulla (small oil bottle), which got a meaning “hanging lamp” (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Ampel https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Ampel)
- biztos 4y ago
  I disagree about the Zeug, I think it’s great to have the flexibility — “Zeug” is also just “thing” sometimes — but I find Fahrzeug and Flugzeug just as intuitive as Werkzeug and Feuerzeug. Now relating them to the various meanings of “zeugen” might be tricky but I think I get that too. In many languages the airplane is a “flying machine” and that makes way more sense than “flat thing in the air” if you think about it. As a foreigner trying to learn the language (not in DE anymore) I have to remind myself just how weird English is, and not to place unreasonable expectations on people doing the reverse of my journey. Having had to have, so to speak.
  - logifail 4y ago
    > find Fahrzeug and Flugzeug just as intuitive There is a certain logic to German. How about: Wheel -> das Rad Wheels -> die Räder Bicycle -> das Fahrrad Bicycles -> die Fahrräder Cyclist -> der Radfahrer / die Radfahrerin Cyclists -> die Radfahrer / die Radfahrerinnen
    - hgomersall 4y ago
      Except for the genders, which are completely arbitrary and very annoying to a learner.
      - nine_k 4y ago
        This is because English has lost most of its Indo-European heritage (except lexical), and looks much more similar to Chinese that to an IE language like German, Spanish, Russian, Greek, Hindi / Urdu, or even Farsi (though Farsi has also lost grammatical gender). * English has no inflections; nouns and adjectives stay the same no matter what role in a sentence do they have. * English has no noun-adjective agreement, and a very rudimentary verb-noun agreement (only third person singular). * English words have unpredictable pronunciation: like in Chinese, there are some hints and rules, but they are full of exceptions. Try to find a pattern: "busy" / "Suzy" / "circusy", "corps" / "thorps", etc. No way to predict the sound without knowing both the etymology and tradition. * English has no grammatical gender. * Though unlike Chinese, English has a sharp distinction between singular and plural. No wonder even German looks somehow distant from English :)
- nine_k 4y ago
  I'd translate "Zeug" as "device": a tool or other contraption made to facilitate some activity. Flugzeug definitely helps flying, like Werkzeug helps working.
  - wirrbel 4y ago
    Sportzeug, Nähzeug, Strickzeug, &c.
- wirrbel 4y ago
  > And there are also cases where English has opted for a compound word and German has just invented its own: Ampel vs traffic light, for example. Ampel is a loanword from latin, "ampulla", it was used for oil lamps hanging from churches and thus kind of made its way into the "Ampel". The legal texts use "Lichtzeichen" instead of Ampel IIRC.
- wirrbel 4y ago
  > Personally, I feel like I can be much more precise in English than I can in German (although that's probably mostly impartiality again!) Yes there are lots of words that are ostensibly just synonyms of each other, but they're mostly not true synonyms, because they have different connotations and can be used in different ways. I miss that wealth of vocabulary in German, where it often feels like I say more to get across the exact idea that I want to. Don't know if you are still reading this but nevertheless I wanted to give a reply to this paragraph. Overall I think I really understand your point here, but these various connotations are to me not precision, but a symptom of a high-risk of imprecision if that makes sense. In German (there I am partial), or in french (there I would be impartial) I think that language is more precise because if in doubt, you just add a relative clause or another sentence. You know, learning English and French in Germany, after 4 years of french classes (like 4h per week) my 4th year of french classes was with the same teacher who also taught English. She made a comparison, when learning english you basically are able to speak fairly easily already in your first or second year on a basic level. To become proficient it takes however a decade of learning and mastery. With french, most students are struggling for 4 years until the grammar is learned, but then they actually have all tools under their belt to speak and write proper french. the rest is filling a few wholes in your vocabulary-knowledge here and there and memorizing a few more irregular verb forms.
wolverine876 4y ago
> optimal information transmission rate Written like a programmer. Information transmission is only one narrow purpose of language. We are not computers; language isn't a data structure. It's an Orwellian concept. > No ambiguity > Both languages are precise, yet I would say as a German native speaker, that French is more precise than English (also German is more precise but in this argument I am not impartial). Measuring precision of a word requires a defined, precise or accurate (complete, correct, consistent) concept. I.e., to say Wörterbuch is precise, you need to have a precise concept of what it describes. But reality isn't precise; you never have complete, correct, or consistent knowledge of it. There is always another variation, invention, exception, etc. The only exception is circular definition - if you define the object according to the bounds of the word. 'This object is a Wörterbuch, and an object that doesn't meet the definition is not one.'

MrJohz 4y ago

You're cherry picking examples here though. How do you explain the "-zeug" words? If you think of "Zeug" more as tool then some of them kind of make more sense ("Feuerzeug", "Werkzeug", at a pinch "Spielzeug") but are you really thinking of a plane as a flying tool? And there are also cases where English has opted for a compound word and German has just invented its own: Ampel vs traffic light, for example. Personally, I feel like I can be much more precise in English than I can in German (although that's probably mostly impartiality again!) Yes there are lots of words that are ostensibly just synonyms of each other, but they're mostly not true synonyms, because they have different connotations and can be used in different ways. I miss that wealth of vocabulary in German, where it often feels like I say more to get across the exact idea that I want to. That said, a lot of that is probably familiarity and bias. I grew up in English, and learned German later in life, and I suspect you did the opposite, so obviously we're going have more intuition for our native languages.

Someone 4y ago
> and German has just invented its own: Ampel vs traffic light, for example That’s not an invention, but a loan word from Latin ampulla (small oil bottle), which got a meaning “hanging lamp” (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Ampel https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Ampel)
biztos 4y ago
I disagree about the Zeug, I think it’s great to have the flexibility — “Zeug” is also just “thing” sometimes — but I find Fahrzeug and Flugzeug just as intuitive as Werkzeug and Feuerzeug. Now relating them to the various meanings of “zeugen” might be tricky but I think I get that too. In many languages the airplane is a “flying machine” and that makes way more sense than “flat thing in the air” if you think about it. As a foreigner trying to learn the language (not in DE anymore) I have to remind myself just how weird English is, and not to place unreasonable expectations on people doing the reverse of my journey. Having had to have, so to speak.
- logifail 4y ago
  > find Fahrzeug and Flugzeug just as intuitive There is a certain logic to German. How about: Wheel -> das Rad Wheels -> die Räder Bicycle -> das Fahrrad Bicycles -> die Fahrräder Cyclist -> der Radfahrer / die Radfahrerin Cyclists -> die Radfahrer / die Radfahrerinnen
  - hgomersall 4y ago
    Except for the genders, which are completely arbitrary and very annoying to a learner.
    - nine_k 4y ago
      This is because English has lost most of its Indo-European heritage (except lexical), and looks much more similar to Chinese that to an IE language like German, Spanish, Russian, Greek, Hindi / Urdu, or even Farsi (though Farsi has also lost grammatical gender). * English has no inflections; nouns and adjectives stay the same no matter what role in a sentence do they have. * English has no noun-adjective agreement, and a very rudimentary verb-noun agreement (only third person singular). * English words have unpredictable pronunciation: like in Chinese, there are some hints and rules, but they are full of exceptions. Try to find a pattern: "busy" / "Suzy" / "circusy", "corps" / "thorps", etc. No way to predict the sound without knowing both the etymology and tradition. * English has no grammatical gender. * Though unlike Chinese, English has a sharp distinction between singular and plural. No wonder even German looks somehow distant from English :)
nine_k 4y ago
I'd translate "Zeug" as "device": a tool or other contraption made to facilitate some activity. Flugzeug definitely helps flying, like Werkzeug helps working.
- wirrbel 4y ago
  Sportzeug, Nähzeug, Strickzeug, &c.
wirrbel 4y ago
> And there are also cases where English has opted for a compound word and German has just invented its own: Ampel vs traffic light, for example. Ampel is a loanword from latin, "ampulla", it was used for oil lamps hanging from churches and thus kind of made its way into the "Ampel". The legal texts use "Lichtzeichen" instead of Ampel IIRC.
wirrbel 4y ago
> Personally, I feel like I can be much more precise in English than I can in German (although that's probably mostly impartiality again!) Yes there are lots of words that are ostensibly just synonyms of each other, but they're mostly not true synonyms, because they have different connotations and can be used in different ways. I miss that wealth of vocabulary in German, where it often feels like I say more to get across the exact idea that I want to. Don't know if you are still reading this but nevertheless I wanted to give a reply to this paragraph. Overall I think I really understand your point here, but these various connotations are to me not precision, but a symptom of a high-risk of imprecision if that makes sense. In German (there I am partial), or in french (there I would be impartial) I think that language is more precise because if in doubt, you just add a relative clause or another sentence. You know, learning English and French in Germany, after 4 years of french classes (like 4h per week) my 4th year of french classes was with the same teacher who also taught English. She made a comparison, when learning english you basically are able to speak fairly easily already in your first or second year on a basic level. To become proficient it takes however a decade of learning and mastery. With french, most students are struggling for 4 years until the grammar is learned, but then they actually have all tools under their belt to speak and write proper french. the rest is filling a few wholes in your vocabulary-knowledge here and there and memorizing a few more irregular verb forms.

wolverine876 4y ago

> optimal information transmission rate Written like a programmer. Information transmission is only one narrow purpose of language. We are not computers; language isn't a data structure. It's an Orwellian concept. > No ambiguity > Both languages are precise, yet I would say as a German native speaker, that French is more precise than English (also German is more precise but in this argument I am not impartial). Measuring precision of a word requires a defined, precise or accurate (complete, correct, consistent) concept. I.e., to say Wörterbuch is precise, you need to have a precise concept of what it describes. But reality isn't precise; you never have complete, correct, or consistent knowledge of it. There is always another variation, invention, exception, etc. The only exception is circular definition - if you define the object according to the bounds of the word. 'This object is a Wörterbuch, and an object that doesn't meet the definition is not one.'