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10:26 thimbronion gregorynyssa: I recently encountered 猜测. Is this digraph more often used than just 猜alone?
10:27 thimbronion Also is 猜测 a proper verb?
~ 11 hours 37 minutes ~
22:05 gregorynyssa Yes, it is a proper verb.
22:06 gregorynyssa Many monographic verbs have a digraphic version, because there are instances where
22:07 gregorynyssa the monographic version would not parse correctly if placed into a given sentence.
22:08 gregorynyssa For instance, if you wanted to say "His plan was to guess quickly."
22:08 gregorynyssa In Chinese this would be "ta de yuanlai de jihua, shi lai xunsu caice."
22:08 gregorynyssa You cannot use "cai" in this case, because monographic verbs generally cannot be used
22:08 gregorynyssa with adverbs, and "quickly" is an adverb.
22:09 gregorynyssa In this example that I have given, you see the usage of "lai" again to mark an infinitive.
22:09 gregorynyssa "His plan was (to guess quickly)." The parenthetical segment is a verbal noun (infinitive).
22:10 gregorynyssa If you were to say "ta de yuanlai de jihua, shi lai xunsu cai" or
22:10 gregorynyssa "ta de yuanlai de jihua, shi xunsu cai"
22:10 gregorynyssa That just sounds wrong. The sentence doesn't parse in either case.
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