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- "De ligger och sover."
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The two "correct" solutions are listed as "They are lying and sleeping" and "They are sleeping." The second sounds natural in English, but you'd never say the first. You'd say "They lie sleeping."
You might perhaps already know this, but I’m adding a link to this thread as an additional explanation to this construction.
If I was going to use both lie and sleep, I'd say "They are lying sleeping". For a previous sentence, I'd say "They are sitting eating". (Neither were accepted.) I'm not going to report this for now, but does anyone agree with me or is this a very regional construction to leave out the "and"?
I completely agree. I actually tried "they are lying asleep" just to see if it would be accepted (it wasn't).
These lessons are about continuous tense so "Jag står och lager mat" is "I am cooking" so why is "De ligger och sover" not "They are sleeping"? It is insisting that it is "They are lying and sleeping" which is very odd English.
The problem is basically that whatever is chosen in the admin interface as a default translation is what you're shown when asked to translate in reverse - from English to Swedish. What this means is that if the way more logical "They are sleeping" is chosen as a default, there's no good way of teaching the translation of the continuous into Swedish, since De sover is much closer to that in isolation. So it's an unfortunate byproduct of a system which does a lot of things really well - but not this one at all.
The hint gives "lie down" as a translation for "ligger", so why not say "They lie down and sleep."?
The problem with this sentence in particular is that "lying" by itself is about perpetrating falsehoods, not position. Apparently they're spreading malicious rumours in their sleep or something...
(It should be "lying down", or just "they lie sleeping" as previously suggested)
We do get that complaint occasionally, and it's equally problematic regardless of solution. The issue is that usage varies a lot among natives here. To some, like you, just using "lying" is plain incorrect. To others, it is perfectly fine. It doesn't appear to be a one-side-of-the-Atlantic thing either - for instance, Cambridge and Merriam-Webster both accept "lying" on its own like this.
I completely understand that this is frustrating, but it's better from a user perspective to allow both, since that means people will at least not be marked wrong regardless of which they prefer.
I try to put this in my live: Telefonen ringer, jag svarar i telefon. "Hej, detta är Boddason." "Hej, detta är Carl. Kan jag få prata med din fru?" "Nej, hon ligger och sover." Har jag greppat det rätt?
Yes :-) Very good!
Maybe should a conversation between friends be a bit less formal.
Möjligen skulle en konversation mellan vänner vara lite mindre formell.
"I try to put this in my live: Telefonen ringer, jag svarar i telefon[en].
-Correct, but In this example it should be be "telefonen". THE phone. your phone.
Or just skip redundant info, like this:
THE telephone rings and I answer.
"TelefonEN ringer och jag svarar."
"-Hej, detta är Boddason." "Hej, detta är Carl. Kan jag få prata med din fru?" "Nej, hon ligger och sover." Har jag greppat det rätt? "
Ja :-) Jättebra!
Or someting like this:
"Telefonen ringer och jag svarar, -Hallå det är Boddason, -Hejsan det här är Carl Carlsson, skulle jag kunna få prata en stund med din fru? Nej tyvärr, hon ligger och sover just nu, skall jag hälsa henne att du har ringt? (No im sorry, shes sleeping right now , should I tell her that you did call ?)
Why can't I translate this to 'they are lying down and sleeping' , they are lying and sleeping feels like an odd translation here.
