# 思想だと思う



## Allegromoderato2

"自分しかいないと思っているよりは、ほんの少しましな思想だと思う。" (from "キッチン" by 吉本ばなな)

Hello furiendos. What does it mean?


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## Flaminius

It's a fragmentary quote, and it's difficult to translate.  What is it exactly that you have problem with?  思想 itself is a philosophy or an idea.


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## Allegromoderato2

Flaminius said:


> It's a fragmentary quote, and it's difficult to translate.  What is it exactly that you have problem with?  思想 itself is a philosophy or an idea.






Here it is the complete background.


What is the role of da?


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## Flaminius

The role of _da_ is the copula.  [The conviction] that I will have myself and the kitchen is a slightly more tolerable idea than feeling all alone.

Is this translation you wanted to do?  Then sorry for stealing the joy from you, but I honestly didn't understand what you wanted to know.


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## Allegromoderato2

Flaminius said:


> The role of _da_ is the copula.  [The conviction] that I will have myself and the kitchen is a slightly more tolerable idea than feeling all alone.
> 
> Is this translation you wanted to do?  Then sorry for stealing the joy from you, but I honestly didn't understand what you wanted to know.


I got it. Now it makes sense.

I was not being able to grasp what this da meant. It's literally "I think it's (da) a better thought", right?


I am not used to seeing a copula not at the end of the sentence, so I thought it was another thing.
Txs


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## Flaminius

The copula is placed at the end of a sentence like any other verbs in Japanese.


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## Allegromoderato2

Flaminius said:


> The copula is placed at the end of a sentence like any other verbs in Japanese.


I meant, exactly at the end. In this sentence da is before 思う


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## Flaminius

Think it this way.  The verb at the end of the sentence is pretty hard a rule to break in Japanese.  If you see a verb, therefore, you have at least to try to see if this is not the end of an embedded sentence.  There are a lot of reasons for a sentence to be inside another, but two salient candidates are relativisation and quotative.  The latter is the case here, for there is the quotative complementiser _-to_.


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## SoLaTiDoberman

自分しかいないと思っているよりは、ほんの少しましな思想だと思う。
＝「自分しかいないと思っているよりは、ほんの少しましな思想だ」と思う。
＝「自分しかいないと思っているよりは、ほんの少しましな思想である」と思う。


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## Allegromoderato2

Flaminius said:


> Think it this way.  The verb at the end of the sentence is pretty hard a rule to break in Japanese.  If you see a verb, therefore, you have at least to try to see if this is not the end of an embedded sentence.  There are a lot of reasons for a sentence to be inside another, but two salient candidates are relativisation and quotative.  The latter is the case here, for there is the quotative complementiser _-to_.





SoLaTiDoberman said:


> 自分しかいないと思っているよりは、ほんの少しましな思想だと思う。
> ＝「自分しかいないと思っているよりは、ほんの少しましな思想だ」と思う。
> ＝「自分しかいないと思っているよりは、ほんの少しましな思想である」と思う。



Hello my friends. Thanks!


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