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- "I do not know why you do not…
"I do not know why you do not like him."
Translation:Ich weiß nicht, wieso du ihn nicht magst.
34 Comments
I don't recall being taught "ich weiß" by the Duolingo curriculum thus far. I know it from other places, but honestly can't remember having seen it in my lessons so far. Anyone else have this happen to them?
"ich weiß" came to me just two sentences before this one in this very segment.
Yes, it should probably better be "du". One used to capitalize the informal you as well, as a from of respect, until there was a reform some years ago. I believe both forms are acceptable these days, so "Du" is not wrong.
Personally, I actually like the old-fashioned "Du" when writing a letter or personal message to someone, but it's not that common anymore.
Because in this case when you have a middle word 'handle' like why or while etc in the middle of the sentence I believe this indicates a new clause. This second clause is subordinate to the first clause "I don't know" - as 'why you don't like him' wouldn't make sense on its own without it.
When this occurs, the verb gets thrust to the end. This is why the 'magst' in du magst gets thrown to the end.
I believe this is right but I'm not 100% sure, seek clarification!
Ah thanks, I didn't think about that. I still think it's kind of confusing for Duolingo to be throwing in archaic spellings without warning. I suppose it's best for learners to be aware of the older spellings like "daß" for when we're reading pre-1996 texts but right now it feels confusing to be given contradictory information.
Both words, wissen and kennen, mean "to know" in English but are used differently in German. This will help you understand: http://duolingo.com/#/comment/18054
"Ich weiß nicht, warum ..." and "Ich weiß nicht, wieso ..." are both fine, I think.
Is the "wieso" working as conjunction here hence the verb coming last in the second part of the sentence (dependent one)!!! also can we write ihn before du/sie...
You cannot use weil instead of wieso - it means "because" and it wouldn't make sense here. [I do not know because you don't like him] ;-)
Hmm, I thought a comma in a sentence usually meant that the 'ihn' would move to the end? I need to go over conjunctions again >.<
wieso makes the clause subordinate. In subord. clauses, the conjugated verb goes to the end of the clause. ihn is a direct object so it falls in the middle of the clause
why do you need to put the "ihn" immediately after the "du"? I put it at the end of the sentence and that was wrong.
I put "Ich weiß nicht warum du magst ihn nicht" and was marked wrong. What is wrong with it?
It's a dependent clause, so the verb goes at the end;"warum" makes it a dependent clause. See thatjosh's answer above.
Would this also be the case as to why my answere was also wrong? 'Ich weiß nicht, wie magst du ihn nicht'?
Yes, I believe so. "Ich weiß nicht, wie du ihn nicht magst" would be the correct order of the words, but an incorrect translation--"wie" means how.
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Shouldn't the verb magst be right after wieso, in the second position of the subordinate phrase?
How come we have 'magst' at the end of the sentence and not 'mögen'?
