# 知らぬ物は聞きようがねえ



## Riccardo91

Dear Japanese forum,

I was wondering if someone of you could clarify me the first sentence here. Context: during a battle, one of the fighters manages to avoid losing to his opponent using a very risky move. The opponent tells him this:

知らぬ物は聴くようがねえ... か。この土壇場で賭けに出るとはな！

I thought it could mean something like "desperate times call for desperate measures", but I'm not finding this on Google, so maybe it should be interpretated literally? "No need to ask what you don't know, huh?"

It may refer to the fact that the "risky move" consisted in using a weapon whose effects were unkknown... does this makes sense to you or is there another meaning?

Thank you very much!


----------



## 810senior

It's somewhat perplexing to me. 
If for 知らぬ物は*聞きようがない*, it means "you can't ask what you don't know" or "you can't hear something that's unknown to you".


----------



## Riccardo91

So I'm not the only one who thinks it's strange... Thank you for your answer.

So ようがない means "can't do"?

Riccardo


----------



## SoLaTiDoberman

I wonder whether your quoted sentence has typo or not.
These are different:
知らぬ物は聴くようがねえ... か。
知らぬ者は聴くようがねえ... か。
知らぬ者は聴きようがねえ... か。
知らぬ者は聞きようがねえ... か。
知らぬ物は聞きようがねえ... か。 (You didn't even ask it. It was because of the proverb, "no one can even ask about something that one doesn't know at all." )

I want to know the four (three) previous line in Japanese original sentence.
If you're playing a game, probably you cannot copy and paste those sentences.
So be careful to type them as they are.
Small typos may cause huge confusions to native speakers.

Even when you type them correctly, when the writer has a preference to write weird Japanese, the confusion will still remain. 
It often happens with Japanese video games. haha


----------



## karlalou

Riccardo91 said:


> So ようがない means "can't do"?


Yes, something like that. Literary 'There's no way, or method (=〜しよう、やりよう、やり方、方法), of doing it'.



Riccardo91 said:


> 知らぬ物は聴くようがねえ... か。この土壇場で賭けに出るとはな！
> 
> I thought it could mean something like "desperate times call for desperate measures"


It's probably 知らぬものは聞*き*ようがねえか, unless it's an author's attempt to create an unusual story.
The '... か' is showing that it's his supposition. He's aware he's not known to them and wants to boast that their daring movement was because of their ignorance about him.

Your "desperate times call for desperate measures" is close enough. 〜とはな！ is showing that the speaker is amazed. Of course it's about their desperate movement. I can't tell if it's his admiration or sarcasm. 土壇場 is 'desperate time' or 'the last moment', 賭け is 'gamble'. "How dare he's made such a gamble at the last moment!" I think it's something like that.


----------



## frequency

810senior said:


> If for 知らぬ物は*聞きようがない*, it means "you can't ask what you don't know"


Yup.
Isn't this 知らぬ物は*訊き*ようがない？
_(First of all,) how could I ask something I don't know?_ (I can't even ask, because I don't know first of all.)
Which is correct, I or you there?


----------



## 810senior

frequency said:


> Yup.
> Isn't this 知らぬ物は*訊き*ようがない？



Oops I should have started with a 1st person pronoun for further understanding.
I think as well to ask is better translation than to hear, to listen to, but just brought up as one of the possibilities.


----------



## frequency

Yes, I know that. That would be 訊きようがない。
I think he must be speaking to himself and telling the hearer at the same time, probably


----------



## Flaminius

*frequency*, do you mean _kiku_ in sense of asking a question should be written with 訊 but not with 聞?  Both are okay (otherwise, teachers should have a hard time discouraging 2nd graders from using <聞く> for 質問を聞く).
Source: https://kotobank.jp/word/聞く・聴く・訊く・利く-239874#E5.A4.A7.E8.BE.9E.E6.9E.97.20.E7.AC.AC.E4.B8.89.E7.89.88

A piece of evidence from a document by MEXT (ministry of education, technology, (pseudo-)science and a few other things):
5人の店主に聞いたこと


----------

