# too = tampoco



## Henrik Larsson

Tengo una duda curiosa, y es si "too" puede siginificar tampoco. Ya sé que muchas veces significa "también". Juzgar esto:

-Beats me *too * = Yo *tampoco* lo sé


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## te gato

Henrik Larsson said:
			
		

> Tengo una duda curiosa, y es si "too" puede siginificar tampoco. Ya sé que muchas veces significa "también". Juzgar esto:
> 
> -Beats me *too *= Yo *tampoco* lo sé


Hola Henrik;
Yes, they could be used for the same thing, but we just say *"BEATS ME"*
te gato


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## Artrella

te gato said:
			
		

> Hola Henrik;
> Yes, they could be used for the same thing, but we just say *"BEATS ME"*
> te gato





Hi te gato 
	

	
	
		
		

		
			





 !


Does "too" really mean "tampoco" here?  I think it means "también".

Wouldn't it mean "esto también me supera", meaning "I don't know this either"?


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## te gato

Artrella said:
			
		

> Hi te gato
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> Does "too" really mean "tampoco" here? I think it means "también".
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> Wouldn't it mean "esto también me supera", meaning "I don't know this either"?


Hola Artrella;
Love the cat..Thank you..
Yes.. You are correct..Yet from what I read *TOO* can be used as both."either and "neither".It is not the "proper" way but can be done... 
It is a lot of reading..
http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=either

te gato


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## Artrella

te gato said:
			
		

> Hola Artrella;
> Love the cat..Thank you..
> Yes.. You are correct..Yet from what I read *TOO* can be used as both."either and "neither".It is not the "proper" way but can be done...
> It is a lot of reading..
> http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=either
> 
> te gato





Thanks for the link, I'll read it tomorrow... now... go to bed!


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## te gato

Artrella said:
			
		

> Thanks for the link, I'll read it tomorrow... now... go to bed!


Artrella;
Who is to go to bed???
You or me?? For a second there You sounded like my mother.... 
te gato


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## Marc1

te gato said:
			
		

> Hola Artrella;
> Love the cat..Thank you..
> Yes.. You are correct..Yet from what I read *TOO* can be used as both."either and "neither".It is not the "proper" way but can be done...
> It is a lot of reading..
> http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=either
> 
> te gato



I don't see the relation between too and either, and couldn't find it inthe link.


too    ( P )  Pronunciation Key  (t)
adv. 
In addition; also: He's coming along too. 
More than enough; excessively: She worries too much. 
To a regrettable degree: My error was all too apparent. 
Very; extremely; immensely: He's only too willing to be of service. 
Informal. Indeed; so: You will too do it! 


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Middle English to, from Old English t, to, furthermore. See de- in Indo-European Roots.] 
Usage Note: Some language critics have objected to the use of not too as an equivalent of not very, as in She was not too pleased with the results. In many contexts this construction is entirely idiomatic and should pass without notice: It wasn't too long ago that deregulation was being hailed as the savior of the savings and loan industry. It was not too bright of them to build in an area where rock slides occur. In these cases not too adds a note of ironic understatement. ·Negation of too by can't may sometimes lead to ambiguities, as in You can't check your child's temperature too often, which may mean either that the temperature should be checked only occasionally or that it should be checked as frequently as possible. ·Too meaning “in addition” or “also” is sometimes used to introduce a sentence: There has been a cutback in federal subsidies. Too, rates have been increasing. There is nothing grammatically wrong with this usage, but some critics consider it awkward. 

[Download or Buy Now]
Source: The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.


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## Artrella

Marc1 said:
			
		

> Usage Note: Some language critics have objected to the use of not too as an equivalent of not very, as in *She was not too pleased with * *the results*. In many contexts this construction is entirely idiomatic and should pass without notice: It wasn't too long ago that deregulation was being hailed as the savior of the savings and loan industry. It was not too bright of them to build in an area where rock slides occur. In these cases not too adds a note of ironic understatement. ·  *Negation of too * *by can't may sometimes lead to ambiguities, as in You can't check your child's temperature too often, which may mean either that the temperature should be checked only occasionally or that it should be checked as frequently as possible.* ·Too meaning “in addition” or “also” is sometimes used to introduce a sentence: There has been a cutback in federal subsidies. *Too, rates have been* *increasing.* There is nothing grammatically wrong with this usage, but some critics consider it awkward.




This is really interesting Marc1.    These three things I've marked in bold type are really debatable for me.

I cannot understand what I marked with the arrow. I only get the first meaning mentioned there.

Saludos, A.


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## te gato

Marc1 said:
			
		

> I don't see the relation between too and either, and couldn't find it inthe link.
> 
> Mark1 and artrella;
> I am so very sorry,  You both are correct and I was wrong..
> I retract My statement..
> When I went back and Re-read it It said that it was used BUT the Improper way to say it..according to the Scholars.
> So My apologies again
> te gato


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## Artrella

te gato said:
			
		

> Marc1 said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I don't see the relation between too and either, and couldn't find it inthe link.
> 
> Mark1 and artrella;
> I am so very sorry,  You both are correct and I was wrong..
> I retract My statement..
> When I went back and Re-read it It said that it was used BUT the Improper way to say it..according to the Scholars.
> So My apologies again
> te gato
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Bueno, a mí me vino re súper bien, leí lo tuyo y lo de Marc1, aprendí un montón ... y todavía no me fui a dormir!!!
Click to expand...


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## mylam

Artrella said:
			
		

> This is really interesting Marc1. These three things I've marked in bold type are really debatable for me.
> 
> I cannot understand what I marked with the arrow. I only get the first meaning mentioned there.


 


> *Negation of too **by can't may sometimes lead to ambiguities, as in You can't check your child's temperature too often, which may mean either that the temperature should be checked only occasionally or that it should be checked as frequently as possible.*


 
"You can't check your child's temperature too often" puede significar "Es imposible revisar la temperatura de tu ni~o demasiado seguido". (No me suena muy bien el espa~ol... a ver si me ayudes  )

Myla


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## Gil

Henrik Larsson said:
			
		

> Tengo una duda curiosa, y es si "too" puede siginificar tampoco. Ya sé que muchas veces significa "también". Juzgar esto:
> 
> -Beats me *too * = Yo *tampoco* lo sé


If it beats me, I suppose it means that i don't know  and the  "too" means that I am not alone.  
So if I don't know:  "Yo tampoco no lo sé"
Estoy estudiando español y creía que "tampoco" solo se usaba en una frase negativa.  ¿Falta un no en el ejemplo?
¿No tenía razón?


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## mylam

Gil said:
			
		

> If it beats me, I suppose it means that i don't know and the "too" means that I am not alone.
> So if I don't know: "Yo tampoco no lo sé"
> Estoy estudiando español y creía que "tampoco" solo se usaba en una frase negativa. ¿Falta un no en el ejemplo?
> ¿No tenía razón?


 
Gil, a mi tambien me enseñaron que "tampoco" se usa en frases negativas. Pero sé que se dice "Yo no lo sé tampoco" (sigue la regla que aprendimos), o "Yo tampoco lo sé", y no estoy segura porque! Esperemos a un nativo que nos ayude...


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## gaer

I THINK I see a problem. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

The way we use "also" and "too" in English is a bit flexible, so you might switch "too" with either también or tampoco, but the meanings seem to be clearly different in Spanish.

My usual warning. I'm a beginner, so be easy on me, okay?

German: Ich auch nicht=I also not. The translation is always something like: "Nor I." "Me either". "Me neither".

In a longer sentence, this same structure, in German, might produce this kind of result.

Auch ich verstehe es nicht. Literally: Also I understand it not. This COULD be translated as: I also [too] don't understand it. And this would equal: I don't understand it either.

I think for this concept, tampoco would be the right word in Spanish.

no he visto esa película, - yo tampoco, 

I haven't seen that film, - neither/nor have I

OR

I haven't seen that film. I ALSO [too] haven't seen it. This is stretching the idea of "too" a bit, because it sounds awkward here, but I'll bet there are other sentences using tampoco that could be translated with "too" without sounding strange.

I THINK también, also translated with too, has a totally different meaning: también juegan al tenis, they also play tennis, they too play tennis, they play tennis too.

Again, warning: I'm not attempting to explain anything, just trying to make sure I understand the differece. But could this be the source of some confusion, the fact that two completely different words in Spanish may sometimes use the same word for translation into English?


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## Marc1

Gil said:
			
		

> If it beats me, I suppose it means that i don't know  and the  "too" means that I am not alone.
> So if I don't know:  "Yo tampoco no lo sé"
> Estoy estudiando español y creía que "tampoco" solo se usaba en una frase negativa.  ¿Falta un no en el ejemplo?
> ¿No tenía razón?



You cannot do that ... "interlanguage" grammar  

Beats me, means "It beats me too" This would mean literlay "Yo también no lo se" yet since that is akward in spanish you may say "Yo también ignoro eso" or ... yo tampoco lo se. So too does not mean tampoco it means también. The fact that in spanish we have other rules for the negative does *not* make too = tampoco.


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## mylam

gaer said:
			
		

> I THINK I see a problem. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> 
> The way we use "also" and "too" in English is a bit flexible, so you might switch "too" with either también or tampoco, but the meanings seem to be clearly different in Spanish.
> 
> My usual warning. I'm a beginner, so be easy on me, okay?
> 
> German: Ich auch nicht=I also not. The translation is always something like: "Nor I." "Me either". "Me neither".
> 
> In a longer sentence, this same structure, in German, might produce this kind of result.
> 
> Auch ich verstehe es nicht. Literally: Also I understand it not. This COULD be translated as: I also [too] don't understand it. And this would equal: I don't understand it either.
> 
> I think for this concept, tampoco would be the right word in Spanish.
> 
> no he visto esa película, - yo tampoco,
> 
> I haven't seen that film, - neither/nor have I
> 
> OR
> 
> I haven't seen that film. I ALSO [too] haven't seen it. This is stretching the idea of "too" a bit, because it sounds awkward here, but I'll bet there are other sentences using tampoco that could be translated with "too" without sounding strange.
> 
> I THINK también, also translated with too, has a totally different meaning: también juegan al tenis, they also play tennis, they too play tennis, they play tennis too.
> 
> Again, warning: I'm not attempting to explain anything, just trying to make sure I understand the differece. But could this be the source of some confusion, the fact that two completely different words in Spanish may sometimes use the same word for translation into English?


 
Well, gaer, from my minimal knowledge of German (much more minimal than your knowledge of Spanish, I assure you! ), and my limited knowledge of Spanish, this looks about right. Literal translations of these phrases between Spanish and English are wrong or very awkward, leading to confusion.


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## te gato

Marc1 said:
			
		

> You cannot do that ... "interlanguage" grammar
> 
> Beats me, means "It beats me too" This would mean literlay "Yo también no lo se" yet since that is akward in spanish you may say "Yo también ignoro eso" or ... yo tampoco lo se. So too does not mean tampoco it means también. The fact that in spanish we have other rules for the negative does *not* make too = tampoco.


Marc1;
I personaly apologize to you for misunderstanding the Spanish Language..When I translated the origional phrase I got NEITHER, NOT, EITHER, which in English correspond with TOO...but it was the wrong answer....but please remember that a lot of us are just starting out, and don't know as much as the rest of you, but still want to learn....
Forgive me.....
te gato


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## gaer

mylam said:
			
		

> Well, gaer, from my minimal knowledge of German (much more minimal than your knowledge of Spanish, I assure you! ), and my limited knowledge of Spanish, this looks about right. Literal translations of these phrases between Spanish and English are wrong or very awkward, leading to confusion.


 
Right.  Literal translation works so rarely, it's almost like lighting striking twice in the same place!

For me most of my errors occur when I don't understand the structure of a language and people who are explaining a language don't add that middle step, telling me (as closely as possible) what something means literally so that I can see how to get from "here to there".

For instance, I might be able to write: "Como se llama?" (I'm missing the extra question mark.) I might get such a simple sentence right because it's one of the few sentences I remember dimly from very bad experiences in high school Spanish. But what helps me is that this same thing happens in French (which I could read now) and German, which again does the same thing:

Wie heißt Du? Wie heißen Sie? This means, "How do you call yourself?"

And for this very reason, you will see "como" translated as "what", which leads to all sorts of problems. There must be thousands of such examples in every language!


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## gaer

te gato said:
			
		

> Marc1;
> I personaly apologize to you for misunderstanding the Spanish Language..When I translated the origional phrase I got NEITHER, NOT, EITHER, which in English correspond with TOO...but it was the wrong answer....but please remember that a lot of us are just starting out, and don't know as much as the rest of you, but still want to learn....
> Forgive me.....
> te gato


 
You should never need to apologize for making mistakes, in my opinion, not if you make a million. People come here to learn, and all of us may make incorrect suggestions, attempting to both help and learn at the same time.

Occasionally it seems that people are afraid that some kind of permanent damage will be done when one of us makes a mistake. In fact, when one of us "neophytes" makes a mistake, there are always many people around to straighten things out. But if there were only experts here, I personally would be too intimidated to try to learn more.


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## Marc1

te gato said:
			
		

> Marc1;
> I personaly apologize to you for misunderstanding the Spanish Language..When I translated the origional phrase I got NEITHER, NOT, EITHER, which in English correspond with TOO...but it was the wrong answer....but please remember that a lot of us are just starting out, and don't know as much as the rest of you, but still want to learn....
> Forgive me.....
> te gato



Hei Gato....what's all that "apologising" for? Did you offend me?  
Come on, we are all learning and if I remember correctly you have made susbtancial contributions in several occasions, so stop beating yourself.


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## Marc1

gaer said:
			
		

> You should never need to apologize for making mistakes, in my opinion, not if you make a million. People come here to learn, and all of us may make incorrect suggestions, attempting to both help and learn at the same time.
> 
> Occasionally it seems that people are afraid that some kind of permanent damage will be done when one of us makes a mistake. In fact, when one of us "neophytes" makes a mistake, there are always many people around to straighten things out. But if there were only experts here, I personally would be too intimidated to try to learn more.


Couldn't agree more, there are no real experts here, perhaps with some exceptions unknown to me. We are in my opinion just amateurs with an interest in languages.
It is easy sometimes to misread in a response to a debate, some eagerness to be "right" but a real debate has for objective not to win but to exchange opinions and experiences to enrich both sides. Winning or losing, that is being right or wrong is irrelevant to the exercise.


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## te gato

Marc1 said:
			
		

> Hei Gato....what's all that "apologising" for? Did you offend me?
> Come on, we are all learning and if I remember correctly you have made susbtancial contributions in several occasions, so stop beating yourself.


Mark1;
Thank you 
te gato


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## cubaMania

Artrella said:
			
		

> This is really interesting Marc1. These three things I've marked in bold type are really debatable for me.
> 
> I cannot understand what I marked with the arrow. I only get the first meaning mentioned there.
> 
> Saludos, A.


 
I'm going to ignore the whole tambien/tampoco issue related to the "also" or "also not" meaning of "too" and address the other "too", i.e. the "demasiado" of "too much"

The part Artrella marked with an arrow is this:
*Negation of too by can't may sometimes lead to ambiguities, as in You can't check your child's temperature too often, which may mean either that the temperature should be checked only occasionally or that it should be checked as frequently as possible.*
Try these on for size:
You can't check your child's temperature too often. = You mustn't check your child's temperature too often. (Just check it occasionally.)
You can't check your child's temperature too often. = No matter how often you check your child's temperature, it's not too often.  (Do it as often as possible.)
The sad news is that, confusing as it is, in normal spoken English we could easily hear that identical sentence spoken with either of those two meanings intended.  Perhaps a careful speaker would use "mustn't" instead of "can't" for the first meaning, thus avoiding the ambiguity.


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## gaer

cubaMania said:
			
		

> You can't check your child's temperature too often. = You mustn't check your child's temperature too often. (Just check it occasionally.)


I see your point, but I can't think of any situation in which I would misread that. Theoretically it is ambiguous, yes, but I think it would be clear in context, and for the other meaning (much as you suggested) I would say:

Don't check your child's temperature too often. 
Make sure you don't check your child's temperature too often.
You mustn't check your child's temperature too often.

BUT:

If you put that statement into a warning, then it could cause major problems! 

Actually, I probably should have just said: "I agree with you!"


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## Arwen

Henrik Larsson said:
			
		

> Tengo una duda curiosa, y es si "too" puede siginificar tampoco. Ya sé que muchas veces significa "también". Juzgar esto:
> 
> -Beats me *too * = Yo *tampoco* lo sé



too significa tambien, solo qye a veces si lo traducimos literalmente en espanol significaria tampoco...


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## Artrella

cubaMania said:
			
		

> The part Artrella marked with an arrow is this:
> 
> * Perhaps a careful speaker would use "mustn't*" instead of "can't" for the first meaning, thus avoiding the ambiguity.





That is what I needed! Thank you cubaMania!


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## Juliet Lucy

Dear All,

Here's my take on this long, long discussion which I read with interest.

I am not a Spanish expert, but I hope my English grammar is quite good as I used to teach. Here's what I think- it's quite simple!


If a statement is positive, like "I like ice cream," and you agree, you use the word "too."

For instance:"I like ice cream." "Yes, me too!". This corresponds in Spanish, I believe, to "tambien." "A mi, me gusta los helados." "Yo tambien!" 

If the statement is negative, and you agree, you use the words "neither," or "either." 

For instance, in the following: "I don't like ice cream." "No, neither do I." This corresponds in Spanish, I believe, to "tampoco."
OR, "I don't like ice cream." "I don't, either."

"Either" is used when the verb is negative, (I don't either) and "neither" when the verb is positive (Neither do I )

"A mi, no me gusta los helados." "Yo tampoco."

I hope my Spanish is correct, but certainly this is how you use "too" and "either/neither" in English - one to agree with a positive statement, and the other to agree with a negative statement.

The phrase "it beats me, too," is confusing. "It beats me" is a positive, impersonal way of saying a negative thing. It's much easier if you turned it round and said, "I don't understand, either," which would correspond, I believe, to, "Yo tampoco, no entiendo," and which observes the rule I set out above.

I hope I kept it simple!
Best
Juliet


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