"Bäume braucht man doch!"

[Link_Xue]

Why can't I say "people" but have to use "we"?

[tsilis]

"one needs trees" is not taken correctly

[arymac]

They must have updated it, because I just submitted "but one needs trees!" and it worked. Perhps it was wrong for you because you did not translate "doch".

[allsey87]

not only is 'one needs trees' not accepted, one of the correct answers is just wrong: "Man needs trees"

For a man, i.e. a human male to be a correct English translation, the German would be capitalised as it would be a noun, that is 'Mann' or 'Man'. However, 'man' lowercase in German is a pronoun which has two correct English translations: one or you (in the generic sense)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_(pronoun)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generic_you

[DannyDeutsch-]

you missed the 'doch' / 'but' that's why it's incorrect

[backtoschool]

Lets do the following: I translate the German sentence with its full meaning as best as I can, and an English native speaker may give us some nice translation, and then we see how this would match with Duolingo.
OK: "Bäume braucht man doch!" means, -this sentence makes only sense in German if someone has said the opposite before like: "(forget about all trees, we should cut them all down, for example.)"

Trees are needed, yes for sure!,
One needs trees, for sure!
Nevertheless, trees are needed.
Everyone is welcome to make up a better English translation. :-)

[carolina_passos]

Well, thanks, you make sense. :)
But Duolingo doesn't :p

[philster043]

"For sure" is certainly a good example of how emphasis can be lost in translation sometimes. Thanks!

[carolina_passos]

Duolingo suggested "But we need trees!" and "does need trees!" (no capital letter to start the sentence) as translations. I had answered "One needs trees!" and it was not accepted, although people here in the post say it should be a crrect answer. What is going on?

[ligersharks]

A mistake on Duolingo's part, I suspect. I made the same thing, and technically "One needs trees!" should be more of what they're looking for based on word choice...

[blargblargblarg]

i think with a better speaking module, the stress points on the words would reflect the meaning more appropriately

[kentel]

Is there a way to tell if Baume and/or man are in the accusative here? Also why isn't "man" capitalized? I couldn't tell which was subject and which was object, so I went with word order - "Trees need you all the same!" was my translation, not accepted..

[feikoi]

Bäume is plural, so if it were the subject, the verb would be conjugated as brauchen.

[LB_StorM]

I don't understand. Shouldn't this be 'trees need us' and 'man braucht Bäume' be 'we need trees'?

[Menschenkind]

Bäume braucht man doch = Trees are needed; One needs trees.

Trees need us = Bäume brauchen uns.

We need trees = Wir brauchen Bäume.

[backtoschool]

I fully agree with Menschenkind IMHO it is all correct hence the answer is: One needs trees, maybe: Anyway (regardless, one needs trees. :-)

[whbailey87]

One needs but trees?

[Zerbo]

There are many more ways to interpret this sentence since "doch" can be used in a variety of responses. It depends on the situation and the conversation leading up to this sentence. Some other possibilities:
- People do too/indeed need trees.
- People really do need trees.
- So people need trees after all.
- Actually, people do need trees.

"people" can also be switched out with "a person", "one" and in some cases even "you"

[backtoschool]

Well said Zerbo, if you start the sentence with: actually, however, after all, yet and use one, we, you or may be people in general and finish off with need trees, than you have a nice sentence which could be a reply to someone denying that trees are needed, or someone saying trees are obsolete or the like... 's that simple, the only adj. I personally wouldn't use is "but" in this case there are more suitable adverbs!! :-)

[xohellister]

If the sentence is "We need trees" shouldn't it be 'brauchen' as opposed to 'braucht'?

[Blomeley]

It's 'braucht' because 'man' is 3rd person singular

[mdelolmo]

Does anybody else find the sound of "Bäume" strange?

[odi_et_amo]

Same here. The entire clip sounded a bit off to me. It wasn't as bad in slow mode.