"Ich bin praktisch perfekt."
Translation:I am basically perfect.
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"badly short" isn't two adjectives. Badly is an adverb. So stacking those two adjectives, for example "Ich habe schlechte kurze Hose an" would mean just that you have trousers that are bad and short. So the answer to your question: Yes, you can absolutely stack adjectives in German. But not in the exact way I think you mean.
If you would like to indicate that your "Hose" are short to the point of disadvantage you would just emphasize it with something like "sehr kurz".
I've got the same question, and I'm still confused. :( It's translated as "practically/basically perfect", where "praktisch" is translated as an adverb here, since we can't stack adjectives in English. While in German it's an adjective. How about the rules in German? Does German have adverb? Thanks.
In German, adjectives share the same word as their partner adverb. Langsam = slow AND slowly. Einfach = simple AND simply.
The reason it's "translated" as an adverb, is because it was used as one in the first place.
You can't really "stack" adjectives in that kind of sentence, you would need an 'und' in the middle: 'Ich bin praktisch UND perfekt'. THAT would mean 'I'm practical and perfect', which still wouldn't make much sense :)
In a sentence like this, use your English-speaking instincts. "I am practical perfect" makes absolutely no sense in English, and neither does it in German. Therefore, 'praktisch' can only translate to 'practically' here.
The German word 'praktisch' is an adverb in this phrase, the difference from English is that there is no difference between the spelling of the adjective and the adverb in German. So while in English we would have 'practical'/'practically' or 'basic'/'basically', German has only 'praktisch' which takes different functions depending on the context.
No, the German word 'praktisch' is an adverb in this phrase, the difference from English is that there is no difference between the spelling of the adjective and the adverb in German. So while we in English would have 'practical'/'practically' or 'basic'/'basically', German has only 'praktisch' which takes different functions depending on the context.
The way I see it, when an English person says "I'm practically perfect" (think Mary Poppins!), it just seems like a slang usage. The way I feel it should be used is as follows:
Practical = handy, good thinking, not hasty. Practically = in a methodical and thought out way.
All too often we use Practically = Essentially/Basically = pretty much/almost completely. It just doesn't feel right to me. It feels even worse seeing it written in German. I know we English carve up and mess with our words to make them fit, and mean something new-ish in the process, but it just seems wrong.
Has anyone actually heard a native German speaker use this phrase or the word praktish in this context?
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Just want to point out for non-English speakers that using practical and practically to mean "near enough to be considered so" isn't slang and is an accepted dictionary definition. It isn't messy if you consider that practical's meaning isn't "methodical" or "well thought out" but rather "having to do with real world applications". If at some point one comes so close to perfection that it is not worth the time and effort to make a distinction, then one can be considered perfect for all practical purposes. In that case, one is practically perfect.
At least for me, that isn't a grammatical sentence in English. What are you trying to say?
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I suppose because the "praktisch" is first it is the adverb.
"Ich bin perfekt praktisch" would mean "I'm perfectly practical, the reverse?