17 Comments
You can say the following in English: "There is some risk of death". In that case, the singular "risk" encompasses the plural (I totally forget what these language constructs are called).
I would rather "There is some risk of dying", but that might just be personal preference. "There is some risk involved" is a common expression in English, particularly in relation to health matters.
1722
Except that "there is some risk involved" does not convey the degree of a risk. For example, "This might leave a scar." (or) "This could kill you". ;-)
Yeah, I don't know where I was going with that part of my post. The post is probably a year old, so I don't remember. Maybe I had a brain fart, or maybe the comment I replied to was edited and said something different.
- 1995
Where you were going is that Duolingo does not accept: "There is some risk of death" still as of 04/2014
What a strange idea to put up such a strange sentence out of context. Can you please explain the relevance for the students of this kind of sentences at this level of the course?
Maybe...We are studying medical terminology in this skill section, and the older you get and the more you travel, the higher the chances that someone might say this to you in a hospital in France somewhere. It happened to my neighbour when her husband had a brain aneurysm while holidaying in France.
Surely someone spoke english, you might ask? Eventually yes, but not intitially and not the medical jargon needed to discuss these types of things. Not that we would be likely to remember this sentence if our partner had just had a ruptured aneurysm....
Thanks for your comment Puppy. Well... the context you mention seems to be the exception on the rule. Not one method can include all the different expressions that could be useful at some stage of life, especially not at this level of mastery. There will always be an expression that you have never heard of. I would say that in the 20 years that I lived in France, I can't recall using it or having heard it: but I was younger, then, of course. Danger mortel or Danger de mort would be more commonly said than the above. In medical jargon this would translate as: Ses jours sont en danger as risques de mort sounds a bit too direct.
I agree completely about no method being able to cover everything and thanks for your insights into how this may possibly be phrased in real life. Perhaps the "risk" phrase would be used in medication info or even on ski hire disclosure forms?? It is often cited in french articles and forums about SIDS. Ies risques de mort subite de nourrison. I usually try to think of these exercises as giving us useful grammatical constructions that we would recognise if not use :)
Ses jours sont en danger - love it. That's almost poetry. Thanks, Alezie (allez-y?) :)
Reported "There are life-threatening risks", which is much better than the suggested "There are death risks"...
You're probably right there, but, as you know, translation always depends on context.
I had no 'of' in my word boxes, in fact the word choices were very limited. This is not everyday English. We would say 'there is a risk of death', unless we were specialising in insurance assessment, or something?! This plural has been translated too directly from French to English, resulting in a decidedly odd, grating phrase.
