- Forum >
- Topic: Norwegian (Bokmål) >
- "Du leser uten å tenke!"
17 Comments
I understood this as "you are reading outside to think" as in you cannot think about what you're reading while you are indoors. How is "å tenke" translated to "thinking" and not to "to think"?
The gerund form is often used when describing other verbs in English, but since Norwegian doesn't really have any equivalent, it uses the infinitive form.
"You are reading outside to think" would translate "Du leser ute for å tenke" (You add the 'for' whenever you can say 'in order to' in the English sentence: "You are reading outside in order to think").
'uten' never translates to 'out/outside'. While it looks similar to 'ut/ute', they don't share the same meaning. 'uten' can only translate to 'without'.
yeah I realize that "uten=without" but "without to think" didn't make as much sense as accepting the fact that "uten" can mean "outside" to make the sentence meaningful :p I thought this was one of the many weird but beautiful details about Norwegian :) Again thanks for the help Fveldig!
As I was dinking an afternoon coffee yesterday, I was wondering how Norwegian does gerunds (I'm such a dork). Today, I get the answer. Thanks.
There is also another form as well:
"Thinking is hard" = "(Det) å tenke er vanskelig" or "Tenking er vanskelig", but in the latter form the verb has become a noun, which wouldn't work in the above sentence.
could s.o. explain the difference between tinker and tror ?? tusen takk
869
å tenke = to think
å tro = to believe (as in "to be of the opinion, that ...", but I think it can also be used as "believe in God")
Also “tro” is objective, it’s the fact (generally accepted) while “synes” is subjective, your opinion (it could be different for others)
- 275
I didn't see this in the lesson tips but I guess uten is a word that you follow up with the infinitive form. What other words act like this?
