吕明扬 Newbie United States Joined 5895 days ago 30 posts - 30 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin
| Message 9 of 59 18 December 2008 at 2:25pm | IP Logged |
Terry have you never heard the phrase "I have some doubts (about this)" ? its definitely the noun in that situation. With "this" being the object. saying "I doubt this" sounds a little strange. so its probaly a N/V word like Plan.
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TheElvenLord Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5919 days ago 915 posts - 927 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) 1 sounds Speaks: Cornish, English* Studies: Spanish, French, German Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin
| Message 10 of 59 18 December 2008 at 2:57pm | IP Logged |
Quote:
With "this" being the object. saying "I doubt this" sounds a little strang |
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In Britsh English, "I doubt this/that" sounds quite normal, at least to me.
TEL
Edited by TheElvenLord on 18 December 2008 at 2:58pm
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TerryW Senior Member United States Joined 6196 days ago 370 posts - 783 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English*
| Message 11 of 59 19 December 2008 at 3:10am | IP Logged |
吕明扬 wrote:
Terry have you never heard the phrase "I have some doubts (about this)" ? its definitely the noun in that situation. |
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Sure, but as Cainntear said, it means an uncertainty in this case. The particular "noun-al" use that I'm talking about seems to flat-out mean "a question to be asked."
From Wikipedia: "Doubt, a status between belief and disbelief, involves uncertainty or distrust or lack of sureness of an alleged fact, an action, a motive, or a decision..."
I searched USENET for "doubt" phrases. Here are some examples, not of disbelief, but a question:
"so here is my doubt... How can I change the process to run or not with OS X?"
"Please answer this Doubt i have."
And my favorite:
"I have a doubt. Why people use shut up for human being and shut down for computers. Purpose of both is same."
OK, Let's forget the noun thing I brought up, my point is that the word "doubt" is just not used that way by U.S. Americans (nor by Brits?).
And I even found a whole discussion on this topic:
http://www.physicsforums.com/archive/index.php/t-192539.html
I have a doubt about "doubt"
(Sorry to hi-jack the topic)
Edited by TerryW on 19 December 2008 at 3:29am
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gogglehead Triglot Senior Member Argentina Joined 5914 days ago 248 posts - 320 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Russian, Italian
| Message 12 of 59 19 December 2008 at 4:20am | IP Logged |
In response to TerryW's query, could the noun "a doubt" be the non-native English speakers result from the verb, which can have simmilar meanings in certain contexts.
e.g He questions my competence - He doubts my competence, both have very similar meanings in this sense. Maybe the confusion was created when taking the nouns (a question, a doubt) from these verbs?
G
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Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5850 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh
| Message 13 of 59 19 December 2008 at 10:51am | IP Logged |
I don't think we need to go too deep into theoretical "how they make this mistake" discussions -- basically "I have a doubt" is a literal translation from a very common phrase in the Romance languages. Nothing more complicated than that.
In French (as per Hollow):
" j'ai un doute sur ce point- la" (I have a doubt on this point there [ie that point])
In Spanish
"Tengo una duda" (I-have a doubt)
Edited by Cainntear on 19 December 2008 at 10:53am
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Hencke Tetraglot Moderator Spain Joined 6733 days ago 2340 posts - 2444 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: Swedish*, Finnish, EnglishC2, Spanish Studies: Mandarin Personal Language Map
| Message 14 of 59 19 December 2008 at 11:32am | IP Logged |
I was reminded of this earlier this year when I invited questions from an audience with the words "Any questions, or doubts?", and someone, though not a native speaker of English as it happens, pointed out that it was an unnatural wording in English and he was able to guess from that that I had been living in a romance-language-speaking country.
Apparently I have been contaminated slightly by Spanish in the case of this expression. Not that it has gone far enough that I would ever utter something like "I have a doubt for you." but still.
In any case, since then I am trying to catch myself with this and try to make it a point to use "Any questions, or anything you're wondering about?" instead.
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cheng Diglot Newbie Singapore Joined 5663 days ago 23 posts - 23 votes Speaks: Mandarin, English* Studies: Spanish, Swedish, Japanese
| Message 15 of 59 23 December 2008 at 10:27am | IP Logged |
I think the word question is used when you don't understand something and the word doubt is used when you suspect something is wrong. Question covers a broader range of situations.That is the difference, perhaps?
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jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6748 days ago 4250 posts - 5710 votes ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) ![](/images/pokal.2.jpg) Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map
| Message 16 of 59 23 December 2008 at 1:58pm | IP Logged |
It's funny how a question about the Teach Yourself series can evolve into a discussion about the word "doubt". :)
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