"Affen sind nicht dumm, sondern schlau."
Translation:Monkeys are not stupid, but smart.
16 Comments
And it was also the translation Duo proposed as correct in a previous instance of "schlau", in a sentence regarding a fox.
As if it wasn't bad enough having to use the Americanism 'smart', which to an English speaker means well dressed, the results condemned me for omitting a comma!
look up smart in the dictionary, it says synonym of intelligence as one of its meanings...
No, they're two different kinds of “but”. Specifically: “sondern” means “(but) rather”, it is used in exactly this kind of sentences, where the first element is negated; the second element is a natural consequence of the first. “Aber” and “doch” mean “however”, they represent the general “but”, where the second statement is just unexpected given the content of the first one (“he is rich, but/however he buys cheap clothes”).
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To buld on the above comment, aber indeed can replace sondern in cases such as "nicht zwei, aber drei". However, sondern, as Ly_Mar said, is limited to being used only to dismiss the former claim as imprecise and imply the latter claim as precise, which is the exact definition for "but (rather)" in English. Also, one is much more likely to hear sondern in these cases, especially when paired with a negating word (nicht or kein), so even though both are correct, "nicht...sondern" sounds more natural than "nicht...aber".
As for the doch statement, though both that and aber do imply something in contrary, to say that doch translates as "but" in English is to understate it. More accurately in meaning and function, doch translates as "yet", which we all know means something not just in contrary, but also ironic (though not necessarily paradoxical). I hope that all clarifies.
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Noch means yet or still (as in still occuring). Doch is a partikel and has a multitude of uses. I recently watched a 15 minute video on doch and all I know is that I am 'noch' unsure of its usage.
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Dumb, silly, stupid - all adjectives which should be accepted, but Duo insists on dumb, which principally means "unable to speak"
I'm not an English native speaker, but I understand that "dumb" is also an antonym of "sly" and of "smart".
I would like to know why my translation "Monkeys are not dumb, but sly" was not accepted.
It literally says in the lesson notes that "Affen" refers to all primates, but it my answer of "Primates are not stupid, but smart" was wrong. lol
