# 应该小心



## alexonline

大家好：


I`m trying to figure out Chinese modal verbs, in this case 应该 and 要,hence the problem:

1.when 应该 and 要 are followed by a *verb*, there`s no problem for me to understand their meaning,it equals the English 'need to','must','have to',ex.: 你应该休息 - 'you need to rest', 我要去 - 'I have to go'

2.but when 应该 and 要 are  followed by an *adjective*,they seem to have the meaning 'need to be', instead of just 'need',like in 司机应该小心 -  'drivers need to be careful'.

So my question is: is there a 'to be' part in 应该 and 要 in #2 for native speakers or they see the sentence in #2 as just a sequence of words 'drivers need careful'?



谢谢。


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## Mamanunique

I'm a native speaker and I have the "to be" part in my mind when I see such sentences.


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## SI SON

Un...as a "*native"* speaker of Mandarin(Taiwan) and Cantonese (Macau), I think the sentence #2 "司机应该小心" seem a little bit strange and unusual to me.
In my opinion, "司机应该*要*小心" will be better.
In this case, the meaning is "the drivers need to *be* careful"
Is it helpful?


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## SuperXW

First of all, you should have noticed that *"be" is usually absent before Chinese adjectives*. An adjective can often express the meaning by itself.
E.g.
你的东西好，他的不好。 Your thing (is) good. His (is) not good.
他很聪明。He (is) very smart.
你傻啊？ (Are) you stupid?

Secondly, to native Chinese speakers (Mainland), 小心 is not necessarily an adjective. It is *often used as a verb*, or even an adverb.
E.g.
你小心！别让我再看到你！ You, be careful! Don't let me to see you again!
小心！别上当！ Be careful! Don't be fooled!
小心驾驶！ Drive carefully!

That's why 应该小心 is natural.


SI SON said:


> Un...as a "*native"* speaker of Mandarin(Taiwan) and Cantonese (Macau), I think the sentence #2 "司机应该小心" seem a little bit strange and unusual to me.
> In my opinion, "司机应该*要*小心" will be better.
> In this case, the meaning is "the drivers need to *be* careful"
> Is it helpful?


In Mainland Mandarin it is natural with or without 要.


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## alexonline

Thank you,Mamanunique!  



SuperXW said:


> First of all, you should have noticed that *"be" is usually absent before Chinese adjectives*. An adjective can often express the meaning by itself.



Yes,I know that.



SuperXW said:


> Secondly, to native Chinese speakers (Mainland), 小心 is not necessarily an adjective. It is *often used as a verb*, or even an adverb



I`ll bear that in mind,thanks a lot,SuperXW.

But my question is: if we take a 100% Chinese adjective (I`d appreciate it if you could help me with that ) or a word that`s in a position in a sentence that  makes that word nothing else but an adjective, and we`ll have to use it with a modal verb in the construction {应该/要/能 + Adj} ,would that  modal verb have a 'to be' part in its meaning?

Is 开车时司机应该清醒  'You must be sober when driving' appropriate in this case?


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## fyl

I don't think this question is well defined.
"to be" is a concept in English. There is nothing equivalent in Chinese. How can one think it is a part of a Chinese word?
As mentioned by SuperXW, it is correct to use adjectives as 谓语 in Chinese. In fact, it is often incorrect to add anything like '是' between subject and adjective.
Roughly speaking, adjectives can function as verbs in Chinese. From this point of view, "to be" is a part of 小心, not 应该/要. I believe learners have learnt/will learn basic grammars like 他很小心.


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## alexonline

fyl said:


> ..."to be" is a concept in English. There is nothing equivalent in Chinese. How can one think it is a part of a Chinese word?



Well,that`s what I`m trying to find out,fyl. So,it seems a Chinese native sees 开车时司机应该清醒 as '...drivers need sober'.
But then this idea doesn`t add up with:



Mamanunique said:


> I'm a native speaker and I have the "to be" part in my mind when I see such sentences (司机应该小心).


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## fyl

^  I'm native in Mandarin and I disagree with Mamanunique on this question if he means "to be" is a part of 应该. But if he means "to be" is a part of 小心, that can be reasonable from some point of view as I have mentioned, though it is not really a sound conclusion.


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## Peiyang

I just think 小心 here should be a verb and I will say 司机应该小心*点* but not 司机应该小心. 
By the way, I will say " I *do want* to go" in English when I want to express "我要去“, instead of "I have to go."


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## Mamanunique

I meant I see 司机应该小心 as “drivers need *to be* careful" ,not just a sequence of words " drivers need careful". I think “driver need careful" means they want to be careful， 司机想要小心(出于某种原因他们很难小心起来，注意力不能集中）,although "careful" should be "carefulness".


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## SI SON

SuperXW said:


> Secondly, to native Chinese speakers (Mainland), 小心 is not necessarily an adjective. It is *often used as a verb*, or even an adverb.
> In Mainland Mandarin it is natural with or without 要.



In daily life communication, *when it is without "要",* I usually hear the following "司机应该小心 点/些" *in south Mainland*.
Without the words such as "点" or "些", the sentence will be strange to me.
In addition, sentence like "我应该吃東西", most people will prefer the better one like "我应该吃 点/些 東西" in daily life.
My point herein is that *some words should be added into* the sentence to *make it more commoner* because the language is a tool for *daily* communication.

However, your instances that "小心！别上当！" and 小心驾驶！" are both perfect! The classical examples for the verb form of "小心".

Anyway, *different usage habit* of different "方言" *should be considered* in this case. I am not telling that anybody is wrong, but in my native experience in south mainland, *Taiwan and Macau*, the sentence should be alike what I mentioned above.


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## Fantasys

司机应该小心 could be translated to driver should be careful （to drive) or driver should be careful when driving, so it's the same with 应该+verb. you could always translate 应该 to should. when you use 应该+verb, means you should do something, when use 应该+adj, means you should do something with ... for example here, should do something carefully. so 应该+adj=应该+verb+adv.


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## retrogradedwithwind

Well it's an interesting question.

The word "be" is so alien to Chinese that the Chinese people can not understand the western philosophic term "being". Many many papers are talking about a simple question: what is "being"?

It seems that foreigners cannot also understand why the Chinese language doesn't need a "be" in its sentences.


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## alexonline

Thanks,everyone for your comments,I really appreciate your attempts to help! At the same time I`m well aware that sometimes it`s really hard to explain things in one`s mother tongue, however weird it would sound. I`ve encountered the same problems in my mother tongue,too,and not once or twice.

The point is that I`m an advocate of comparative approach in learning foreign languages,i.e. for me it`s easier to understand a phenomenon, say, in Chinese if I compare it with one in Russian,English or a couple of more ones that I`ve happened to be familiar with.Then I know that in sentences like 她很漂亮 or 教书很有意思 there`s no 'to be' before adjectives/adverbs exactly like in Russian, ( 'Она красивая', 'Преподавать интересно'), in 过来，跟阿姨一起照张相吧  过来 is like an English 'come over' and so on. The only problem then for me is to find out how native speakers shape/see/interpret a certain thought/phrase/sentence. So I can perfectly understand that:



retrogradedwithwind said:


> It seems that foreigners cannot also understand why the Chinese language doesn't need a "be" in its sentences.



but it`s not about me ,as I already got it.



Peiyang said:


> I just think 小心 here should be a verb and I will say 司机应该小心*点* but not 司机应该小心.



Comment like this and similar ones before have led me to suggest that a word in Chinese can be considered an adjective only in certain positions in a sentence:

a) adjectives
1.before a noun:  （这是）真皮
2.as a predicate: 你的东西好，他的不好
3.before a verb (looks more like an adverb,though): 小心驾驶！

and maybe others,I don`t know yet,it still remains to be found out.

b) verbs
But I`ve got the impression (please,correct me if I`m wrong) that a word  (even if it`s a 100% adjective) following a modal verb automatically becomes a verb :

小心的司机 （小心 'careful'）, but   司机应该小心  （小心 'to take care'）
清醒的司机 （小心 'sober'）, but  开车时司机应该清醒  （清醒 'to be sober/wide-awake'）
耐心的教师（小心 'patient'）,but  教师对学生应该耐心 （耐心 'to be patient'）,

whereas 应该 means 'should' and 'have to'. So for you guys (as I see it) there`s no difference between the sentences
这所房子太老了 , 应该拆掉  'to take down'  and  教师对学生应该耐心 'to be patient', 我们应该尽快报警  'to report to the police/to call the police' and 你应该注意 ‘pay attention to; attend to; take notice of; be careful; look out’.

Would appreciate a constructive feedback to this idea of mine.


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## SI SON

alexonline said:


> 清醒的司机 （小心 'sober'）, but  开车时司机应该清醒  （清醒 'to be sober/wide-awake'）
> 耐心的教师（小心 'patient'）,but  教师对学生应该耐心 （耐心 'to be patient'）,



#1"开车时司机应该清醒" should be #2 "开车时司机应该*保持*清醒"
#3"教师对学生应该耐心" should be #4"教师对学生应该*要有*耐心"
Of course, you can say #1 and #3 in daily life, we all know what you mean, but, the Chinese will be immediately know that you are not the native speaker. Un... a bit unusual usage.


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## fyl

alexonline said:


> But I`ve got the impression (please,correct me if I`m wrong) that a word  (even if it`s a 100% adjective) following a modal verb automatically becomes a verb :


Since people may argue your examples are not very good, here I have some more examples that sound natural, hopefully. For this structure modal verb+adj (and many other structures actually), only certain sentences sound natural for mysterious reasons that I'm not able to tell...
1. 到了这里，你必须老老实实的
2. 你应该小心一点
3. 做人必须要正直
4. 不要太认真
If we use 应该 to state fact or conjectures (not requirements or suggestions), it would be much easier to come up with examples: 1. 她应该很漂亮 (she should be beautiful=we guess she is beautiful, not 'she should try to become beautiful'. The same for the following examples.) 2. 他应该很老了, 3. 明天应该很冷, 4. 认真检查一遍之后错误应该很少, 5. 太阳上应该很热. But I'm not sure if they are still in the scope of this question.

Maybe it is not accurate to say "a word becomes a verb". The above examples may be just like the simple sentences "subject+adj". I don't see the grammar changed a lot if we insert a 应该. But I'm not able to tell for sure since for the 应该＋adj structure some sentences sound natural but others do not (are the natural sentences special fixed expressions?). The more I think about it, the more confused I get..


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## Peiyang

alexonline said:


> 教师对学生应该耐心 'to be patient',


I would say "教师对学生应该*有*耐心“ or "教师应该对学生耐心点“. Actually, I don't know a lot about Chinese grammar, I just get used to it.


alexonline said:


> 3.before a verb (looks more like an adverb,though): 小心驾驶！


I do think 小心 here is an adverb.


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## alexonline

Peiyang said:


> I would say "教师对学生应该*有*耐心“ or "教师应该对学生耐心点“.



I wonder if the two sentences mean the same thing to you,Peiyang: 教师对学生应该*有*耐心 and 教师应该对学生耐心*点.*
The reason I ask is that to me there`s some difference between them,教师对学生应该*有*耐心 being a piece of general advice to all teachers in the world,meaning  'Teachers should have patience towards students',but the second 教师应该对学生耐心点  ('Teachers should be more patient with students') implies that teachers are not patient enough (maybe in one particular school) and therefore should be more patient. Is it the same in Chinese or maybe  点 in 教师应该对学生耐心点 doesn`t mean 'more' but is just a rhythm-filler to make the last word of the sentence into a three-syllable one,because I already know that Chinese people don`t like it when a sentence ends in a one- or two-syllable word?


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## Peiyang

^The difference can be existed. However, the 点 may just acts as a symbol of rhythm-filler here, which means both of the sentence I provided can have the same meaning (also there can be a little difference like what you said). The exact meaning of "教师对学生应该耐心点“ should accord to the context, I think.
Actually, I just don't notice about that and I don't know what the grammar will say about that. If I want to say "that(not every) teacher should be more patient (more patient means he/she is patient) to students" I would just say "那个老师对学生应该*再耐心点*" If the teacher has no patience to his/her students, both sentence I provided are OK, I think. But 老师 , instead of 教师 , in my opinion, should be much better.
I sorry that I make you confused and I really hope that I can help you.


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## alexonline

^You don`t have to be sorry,your explanation is perfect and it`s helped a lot.Thank you ever so much,Peiyang!

@all: Thank you so much,everyone,for your help,I really appreciate it!


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