Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2021 June 29

= June 29 =

Please confirm Mandarin is correct
I used Google Translate and looked up some Chinese images for this sign. Seems like they use "Germ Warfare". So, is the Mandarin in this image reasonably correct? I worry about Brand_blunder.Thank you. Charles Juvon (talk) 01:32, 29 June 2021 (UTC)


 * Google translate translates 沒有細菌戰 as "No germ warfare", which, translated back, yields 没有细菌战. The final character 战 in the latter is a simplified version of the character 戰 in the former. Google translate translates "No bioweapons" as 没有生物武器, which, translated back, yields "No biological weapons". There is a substantive difference between "weapon" and "warfare". The article on the Chinese Wikipedia on biological weapons has the title 生物武器, so the Google translation seems more on the nose than the slogan in the poster. But the first two characters, 没有, mean "no" in the sense of "absent", as in "we found no bioweapons there". For "no" in the sense of a prohibition, the usual term is 禁止; for example, "no smoking" is 禁止吸煙. If you mean to say "Ban Bioweapons", you should use 禁止生物武器. The Biological Weapons Convention is known in Chinese as 禁止生物武器公約, literally "Prohibition of Biological Weapons Convention". (Disclaimer: zh-0.) --Lambiam 07:00, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

"would" for past tense
Is there a name for the usage of, for example, "Albania would face three opponents in 1992" as opposed to "Albania faced three opponents in 1992"? --jpgordon&#x1d122;&#x1d106;&#x1D110;&#x1d107; 14:05, 29 June 2021 (UTC)


 * It's kind of a future in the past.... AnonMoos (talk) 14:45, 29 June 2021 (UTC)


 * It's hard to tell without some more context, but this seems to best fit the meaning 1.4 at wiktionary:would. The most recent example there is also(?) from a sport context, which may be a coincidence. I wouldn't trust to much the given name "anterior future", not only because of the red link, but also because the similarly sounding futur antérieur redirects to and means future perfect, which is a completely different thing (preceding event in the future, not following event in the past). Personuser (talk) 14:52, 29 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Sorry for messing up the timeline with possible autoreferential implications, anyway User:AnonMoos found the correct term. Personuser (talk) 15:09, 29 June 2021 (UTC)
 * The context is Sports in Albania, changes in the last couple of weeks. --jpgordon&#x1d122;&#x1d106;&#x1D110;&#x1d107; 16:47, 29 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Be aware that the construct may be considered pretentious unless it really brings clarity about the order of events. See WP:INTOTHEWOULDS for EEng's take on the matter (and the rest of the page is certainly amusing as well). No such user (talk) 11:37, 30 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Oh excellent. --jpgordon&#x1d122;&#x1d106;&#x1D110;&#x1d107; 13:39, 30 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Replace "would" with "went on to."  Jim Percy (talk) 20:11, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

Questions about modal verbs
Dr Salvus 14:15, 29 June 2021 (UTC)
 * 1) Is it possible use "can" instead of "may" in sentences who indicate a possibity? (example: You may can be involved)
 * 2) Is it possible use "may" instead of "can" for indicating an ability? (example: I can may speak Italian)
 * 3) Is "will" used only for future tense?
 * 4) Do "should" and "shall" have same functions?
 * 5) How is it possible ask a question about an ability in the past if "could" is used for formal questions?


 * There's variation between "may" and "can" in different English dialects. As for point 5, the all-purpose solution for the limitations of "can" is "to be able to" -- "Were you able to lift the weight 5 years ago?" AnonMoos (talk) 14:49, 29 June 2021 (UTC)


 * 4) No. "Should" implies a suggestion or recommendation, whereas "shall" implies a requirement.  For example:  "you should do this for better results" vs. "you shall comply with the new regulations". 2603:6081:1C00:1187:4E1:F20B:8F45:88B8 (talk) 18:34, 29 June 2021 (UTC)


 * I can only offer advice from the perspective of my dialect of English, which is Southern British English. Firstly, "can" versus "may": They overlap, but have different flavours. "Can" emphasises whether something is possible (hence the example: can you lift the weight?) but the possibility might be limited by law, by what's allowed, in which case it overlaps with "may". For example, "Can I park outside your house?" might be answered by, "You can, but you'll probably get a parking ticket!" (emphasising that you can, physically, but you are not permitted; the person replying is making a pedantic joke: "you should have asked 'may I park...'"). "Can I sit down?" is asking not whether I'm physically able to, but whether the person I'm talking to would mind me sitting down. Here the overlap with "may" is very strong; "may" often expresses whether something is allowed, by law, by custom, by social politeness: e.g. "May I sit down?". But "may", depending on context, also expresses one of several possibilities: "you may find yourself frustrated when choosing which word to use". Here, "may" overlaps with "might". Unfortunately, the situation is this: whether you can use "can" instead of "may" depends on context.
 * Agreed on "shall" and "should", but unfortunately you will also encounter "shall" in the sense of a future, overlapping with "will", but without any sense of obligation: "if it doesn't rain, I shall visit him this afternoon." (to my mind, this carries a flavour of resolution: "I have decided that I really will visit him!") "Could" is a matter of context. "Could he be allowed to go now?" is obviously a polite present-tense question, while "Could he have done it?" is obviously a question about the past. A similar situation arises with "were": "Were they to go home immediately..." expresses a hypothetical situation, probably in the immediate future. "They were already home..." expresses a situation in the past. Context makes it clear. What's really annoying is that although it's usually quite easy to read these things correctly, it's hard to write them correctly. The rules are full of exceptions, there are loads of situations where either will do, but equally loads of situations where if you use the wrong word, it's very wrong! Elemimele (talk) 20:45, 29 June 2021 (UTC)
 * To me, the future sense of "shall" in contemporary use applies solely when used in the first person ("I shall" or "we shall" - as in, "we shall overcome"). It feels somewhat old-fashioned and formal, but when used by a speaker can then be contrasted with the use of "I will" or "we will", expressing intention. In older use, the future sense can equally apply to other persons ("you shall be hung by the neck till you are dead"). --Lambiam 22:42, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

In typical American English, both "shall" and also "may" in the particular sense of seeking permission are approaching semi-obsolescence, except in literary language or certain indirect constructions. Anyway, in the case of those English modals which have two forms (can/could, shall/should, will/would, may/might), the opposition between the two is usually not present vs. past in any ordinary sense. (In some situations it can be, but more commonly it's not.) More often the so-called past-tense form has a meaning which Lambiam would call "irrealis"... AnonMoos (talk) 01:31, 30 June 2021 (UTC)
 * "Can I ask how old you are?" sounds OK. But replacing "may" by "can" in "If I may ask, how old are you?" results in a question that sounds strange to me. Because of such uses (which include "May I approach the bench?" and "You may now kiss the bride"), permissive "may" is not likely to go quietly into that good night any time soon. --Lambiam 08:19, 30 June 2021 (UTC)
 * In the U.S., these are basically fixed phrases. It's not a construction that most people would use productively in casual speech.  Sometimes a linguistic feature can hang on for a long time in fixed phrases, literary allusions, conventional ultra-polite expressions, quotations etc., even when it's no longer really part of the living languages... AnonMoos (talk) 09:02, 30 June 2021 (UTC)
 * An often-used response to "Can I ask..." is "You can ask!" implying they won't likely get the answer they're looking for. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 13:19, 3 July 2021 (UTC)

"The" and "a"
Do instances like "This color is mentioned in the 1930 A Dictionary of Color require the definite article "the", when the title itself uses indefinite "a"? Sounds odd to me. Is this a known situation? 212.180.235.46 (talk) 20:14, 29 June 2021 (UTC)


 * On first glance, it would, as it's differentiating a version of A Dictionary of Color from presumably other titles of the same name. It definitely sounds odd, so I'd add a descriptive noun like book after 1930. — Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 20:17, 29 June 2021 (UTC)

I would say ""This color is mentioned in the 1930 Dictionary of Color". The indefinite article might be there in the full title, but... is it really there? I mean, kinda? I think good writers would ignore it in that sentence. Temerarius (talk) 20:55, 29 June 2021 (UTC)
 * I concur with Temerarius; dropping the initial article in a title is common procedure when retaining it would be awkward (e.g., "Dickens's Christmas Carol"). Of course, one could obviate the problem by revising to "This color is mentioned in A Dictionary of Color (1930)". Deor (talk) 21:23, 29 June 2021 (UTC)


 * In any case, just leaving "the" out (*"This color is mentioned in 1930 ") is just wrong, whereas "This color is mentioned in the 1930 " is a bit awkward but not wrong. --Lambiam 22:24, 29 June 2021 (UTC)
 * It's not wrong, but I'd be tempted to change it to "This color is mentioned in A Dictionary of Color (1930)". Turner Street (talk) 14:09, 2 July 2021 (UTC)
 * ...as I've just noticed Deor suggested above... oh, well, at least we agree. Turner Street (talk) 14:10, 2 July 2021 (UTC)