# to like: 好き or 良い?



## Nino83

Hello.

My book says that 好き indicates long-term/general tastes while 良い is used for single, specific actions.
For example:
I like movies (in general) => 映画が好きだ。
I liked (this/)the movie =>  (この)映画は良かった。(lit. this film was good)

Is it right?

Second question.
好き takes this structure: subject/experiencer は object/patient が => John likes movies. ジョンは映画が好きだ。
Does 良い take the same structure? => John liked this movie. ジョンはこの映画が良かった。


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## frequency

難しいなｗ


Nino83 said:


> 好き indicates long-term/general tastes while 良い is used for single, specific actions.


For 好き, I agree with this.



> I like movies (in general) => 映画が好きだ。


Yes.


> while 良い is used for single, specific actions.
> I liked (this/)the movie =>  (この)映画は良かった。(lit. this film was good)


良い is an adjective..so it doesn't stand for single, specific actions. I think that the writer of your book wanted to say 良い＋past (=良かった) could mean single, specific actions.
This example is in the past form, so that movie 1) used to be good. Or 2) you had a good time by watching the movie. A single, specific past? Maybe yes.




> 好き takes this structure: subject/experiencer は object/patient が => John likes movies. ジョンは映画が好きだ。


Yes!


> John liked this movie.


Sorry but I'd read, ジョンはこの映画が好きだった。

If you say, ジョンにはこの映画が良かった。
For John, this movie was good. You say that this movie was appropriate for John.


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## Nino83

frequency said:


> I think that the writer of your book wanted to say 良い＋past (=良かった) could mean single, specific actions.


Right!
She says that この映画が好きでしたか。 means "did you like, in the past, this movie, seen that now you don't like it?".
Do you confirm this interpretation?


frequency said:


> For John, this movie was good. You say that this movie was appropriate for John.


Ah, ok! 
It's like to say, for example, that a movie is appropriate for kids, 子供にはこの映画が良いです。, right?


frequency said:


> ジョンはこの映画が好きだった。


Good.
So 好きだった works also for single, specific (past) actions.


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## frequency

Nino83 said:


> She says that この映画が好きでしたか。 means "did you like, in the past, this movie, seen that now you don't like it?".


Yes, fine.


> this movie is appropriate for kids, 子供にはこの映画が良いです。, right?


Yes, fine.



> So 好きだった works also for single, specific (past) actions.


Yes. And I humbly suggest you that you can separately use 好き and （sthが）良い according to what you intend to mean.


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## Nino83

Mh...I wonder why in the interrogative sentence it has one meaning (この映画が好きでしたか, imperfective/habitual aspect) while in the affirmative one (ジョンにはこの映画が良かった, perfective aspect) it has another meaning.


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## frequency

Nino83 said:


> この映画が好きでしたか,


I think you know about keiyo-doushi 好き. You're making the question of あなたはこの映画が好きでした。 ジョンはこの映画が好きでした。is okay, too, and you know how to make the question of this.



> while in the affirmative one (ジョンにはこの映画が良かった, perfective aspect) it has another meaning.


This is more complicated. 良い is an adjective, not keiyo-doushi. And you know 良い means quality.

When you say この映画が良かった, t_his movie was good/this was a good movie_. At any point in the past, that movie was good.
And you know, ジョンには is an adverb. Well, strangely, to the sentence この映画が良かった if you add ジョンには, it "automatically" means that This movie was good/appropriate for John.

Is it a perfective aspect? Adjective + simple past means "just one point in the past" to us, I think.


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## Nino83

(Sorry, I made a mistake in #5. The second sentence should have been この映画が好きだった instead of この映画が良かった) 


frequency said:


> Is it a perfective aspect?


I'm referring to the difference between:
この映画が好きでしたか => did you use to like this film? (imperfective/habitual, it's a "long-term" taste, preference)
この映画が好きだった => I('ve) liked this film (perfective, it's a specific action, I liked this film, now, a moment ago, yesterday).


frequency said:


> ジョンはこの映画が好きでした。is okay, too, and you know how to make the question of this.


ジョンはこの映画が好きでしたか
Does it mean "did John like this film?" or "did John used to like this film?" or both?


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## frequency

Nino83 said:


> この映画が好きでしたか => did you use to like this film? (imperfective/habitual, it's a "long-term" taste, preference)
> この映画が良かった => I('ve) liked this film. (perfective, I liked this film, now, a moment ago, yesterday).


Good point. They both are in the past form. The speaker is asking if you liked it in the past, and saying this movie was good in the past.

Is the speaker asking if you still like it? Is he still thinking this movie is good? No, these points are not included in the questions. 



> ジョンはこの映画が好きでしたか
> Does it mean "did John like this film?" or "did John used to like this film?" or both?


Yes, both.
Who liked it? John did. Ah sorry, I said something silly. You're asking about "his past". lol


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## Nino83

frequency said:


> Yes, both.


Ah, ok. So I can use 好き for both long-term and short-term tastes, is it right?
子供のときにキャンデーが好きだった => When I was a kid, I used to like candies.
昨日(あの)映画が好きだった => I liked the film yesterday.


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## frequency

Nino83 said:


> Ah, ok. So I can use 好き for both long-term and short-term tastes, is it right?
> 子供のときにキャンデーを好きだった => When I was a kid, I used to like candies.
> _昨日(あの)映画が好きだった => I liked the film yesterday._


Well done, Nino. Finally, I've noticed what the writer wants to say.

You can't use 好きだった for your short-term tastes or experience. I think keiyo-doushi may have this tendency. (I don't say that all keiyo-doushi words are so.)

Now I'm pretty sure that the writer wants to say that you can say 昨日あの映画が良かった。 INSTEAD of saying 昨日あの映画が好きだった。


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## Nino83

frequency said:


> Now I'm pretty sure that the writer wants to say that you can say 昨日あの映画が良かった。 INSTEAD of saying 昨日あの映画が好きだった。


Thank you! 
And if I want to say "John liked the film yesterday" (short-term taste), which adjective/verb should I use?


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## frequency

Nino83 said:


> And if I want to say "John liked the film yesterday" (short-term taste), which adjective/verb should I use?


Good! We have several ways. I'd say ジョンは昨日の映画が気に入りました。

This is greatly different to the English structure, but consider like this.
There are (main) parts,

映画　　気に入る      気に入る    映画 (Now I'm omitting the word order)

You want to connect these two, が can do. And arrange the order rightly. 映画が気に入る. And 昨日 and ジョンは are the parts you can add to it.


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## Nino83

frequency said:


> ジョンは昨日の映画が気に入りました。


Great! 
(The literal translantion seems somewhat poetic, to enter in someone's spirit, heart) 
I'll add 気に入る to the list of verbs to know. 
So the difference between 好き and 気に入る is similar to the one between 幸せ and 嬉しい. You have a lot of adjective pairs with this difference, i.e long-term vs. short term.


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## ktdd

Nino83 said:


> I'll add 気に入る to the list of verbs to know.


That's a useful phrase to have. And the tip of an iceberg waiting for you to discover, lol. 気 is probably the most versatile word in the entire language. 気がする、気がつく、気にする、気になる、気をつける、気を配る、気の毒、気のせい... the list is endless.
(A side note: In one episode of 『日本人の知らない日本語』, 春子 was chided by 鷹栖先生 because all her students except Jack gave the reading of 気に入らない as きにはいらない. And she was like "Maybe きにはいらない is the correct answer?" lol)

==========
Okay back to the topic. I have a related question.
I've seen this a couple of times:
あなたのことを好き
I know it's quite colloquial. But my question is, is the use of を here an accepted alternative? Can it be applied to other nouns / situations?
Also, if the stimulus (the thing we like) is marked by を, can we mark the experiencer (the person who likes it) by が, like 彼があなたのことを好き?


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## DaylightDelight

ktdd said:


> あなたのことを好き
> I know it's quite colloquial. But my question is, is the use of を here an accepted alternative? Can it be applied to other nouns / situations?


This sounds somewhat unnatural. It's usually あなた(のこと)が好き. Can it work in other situations?
カレーを好き, この映画を好き, 猫より犬を好き... No, I don' t think so.  Even あなたを好き does not really work, as far as I'm concerned.



ktdd said:


> Also, if the stimulus (the thing we like) is marked by を, can we mark the experiencer (the person who likes it) by が, like 彼があなたのことを好き?


Hmm, not really.  Only in reported speech it does sound somewhat natural: 彼があなたを好きなんだって
But in this case the actual verb is implied 言った, not 好き: 彼が{あなたを好きなんだって}(言っていた).

I can't think of other cases where ～を好き sounds natural.


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## Nino83

ktdd said:


> 気 is probably the most versatile word in the entire language.


Interesting. Thanks


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## ktdd

Thank you for your answer, DaylightDelight. Confirms my suspicion that this is but a quirk.


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## DaylightDelight

I've given some more thought to the matter of 〜を好き.
I think it generally works in subclauses like:
あなたを好きになったのは
あの人を好きだという気持ち
それで彼を好きになった​
These constructions even work with inanimate objects, I believe:
映画を好きになったのは
それからカレーを好きになった​
I don't have any grammatical explanations for this, though.


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## frequency

Nino83 said:


> Great!
> (The literal translantion seems somewhat poetic, to enter in someone's spirit, heart)
> I'll add 気に入る to the list of verbs to know.


気に入る・・yes, that would be like that but not poetic to us. lol
気に入る is an idiom. If you use 気に入った, you can say that you still like it. この映画が気に入りました。I've come to like this movie. I've become a fan of this movie.
この映画が好きだった。 can't be like this.



Nino83 said:


> So the difference between 好き and 気に入る is similar to the one between 幸せ and 嬉しい. You have a lot of adjective pairs with this difference, i.e long-term vs. short term.


Maybe. Good.


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## frequency

ktdd said:


> I've seen this a couple of times:
> あなたのことを好き


Good. This is possible when you say


ktdd said:


> 彼があなたのことを好き


Guess why? You want to avoid repeating が. See in this example you're clearly saying who likes whom.



> あなたのことを好き


This is not a serious error, but you know in this case が is just better. (because you don't need to clearly distinguish who likes whom.)


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## ktdd

Thank you for your replies, DD and freq.
That subclause observation is true I guess. I believe the last time I saw ～を好き is in reported speech, something like あなたのことを好きと言われた。
Also, to avoid repeating が is a valid reason I guess. Though I don't remember the details, one of the sentences I ran into was alone the line of 彼があなたのことを好きだということは I believe.
The 好きになる construction is interesting. Maybe the focus is more on the verb なる and 好きに is simply considered an adverb?


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## frequency

ktdd said:


> あなたのことを好きと言われた。


あなたのことが好きと言われた。
is still reported speech. が is better as
_が　②希望・能力・好悪などの対象になるものを表す。 「リンゴ－たべたい」 「あの人－好きだ」_
but を is okay, too.



> 彼があなたのことを好きだということは


You're avoiding repeating が, too, even if you use のこと.



> Maybe the focus is more on the verb なる and 好きに is simply considered an adverb?


This is ～＋に＋なる.
You can choose keiyo-doushi or keiyo-shi.
好きになる・静かになる (keiyo-doushi)
高くなる・白くなる (Keiyo-shi)
In these examples they all are adjectives. And I humbly suggest you memorise "keiyo-doushi or keiyo-shi ＋に＋なる".


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## ktdd

frequency said:


> In these examples they all are adjectives. And I humbly suggest you memorise "keiyo-doushi or keiyo-shi ＋に＋なる".


Trust me, I know what 連用形＋なる means. It signifies a change of state.
I also realized that なる alone isn't enough to explain the use of を before 好き. What I'm trying to say is, maybe 好きになる works kind of like a phrasal verb that can take a direct object. You know, in English, intransitive verbs don't have a passive voice. You can say "It rained" but not "I was rained." But if a phrasal verb is perceived to be transitive as a whole, it can be cast into passive. For example, "They laughed at him" -> "He was laughed at." I'm thinking whether something similar happened to 好きになる and changed its grammatical constraints.


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## frequency

ktdd said:


> a change of state.


Yes, excellent. That's why they're adjectives.

I roughly understood what you want to know.
あなた＿好き
あなたのこと＿好き

In brief, other particles than が and を are not good in these ones.
Say おまえに好きだ・おまえと好きだ・おまえも好きだ！ These failed revelations would make your girlfriend run away from you. Notice the last one implies that you have another girlfriend.
You know, I'm talking about the functions of particles.

I said を is okay, but I know おまえを好きだ sounds a bit Manuke. I think this is because が is usually prioritised when it is used with 好き.


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## ktdd

frequency said:


> I think this is because が is usually prioritised when it is used with 好き.


Yes, I know the canonical syntax is 人は＋物が＋好きだ. It's not something very hard to wrap one's head around and it's not unique to Japanese. As Nino can tell, in Italian, "I like ice cream" is "Mi piace il gelato," literally "The ice cream pleases me." In both languages the object of desire is placed in the nominative case / 主格.

But apparently there are people out there using を. I just wanted to know how acceptable it is under various circumstances.

I've found the sentence that caught my eye (from 「日本語能力試験」対策・日本語総まとめN1文法, P96):
彼があなたのことを好きだということは、言わずともわかる。（＝言わなくても）
The explanation you gave (to avoid repeating が) is a convincing one and I'm satisfied with it.

I'll just leave the ～を好きになる pattern as it is for the time being. Can we stop going back and forth on which particle is preferred with 好き? I know it's が okay?


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## 810senior

Well, this kind of stuff still remains in question.
As long as I see, を好き may be acceptable when it is grouped with some elements such as になる, だという and でいてくれる, even though I couldn't get a clue that it is grammatically correct.
・君を好きになったのはいつ頃のことだろう。 [Since when have I been in love with you?]
・彼を好きだという気持ち。 [The feeling that I love him]
・私のことをずっと好きでいてくれる？ [Would you love me for evermore?]

On top of that, there are some cases when I personally feel like using が sounds more natural.
・君*を*好きでよかった。 [I'm grad that I love you]
・君のこと*を*すきでいる。[I'm in love with you]


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## Flaminius

810senior said:


> On top of that, there are some cases when I personally feel like using が sounds more natural.
> ・君*を*好きでよかった。 [I'm grad that I love you]
> ・君のこと*を*すきでいる。[I'm in love with you]


To my mind these two sentences are unnatural with _-ga_.  I know it's a long shot but  think the cmplement of _suki_ is marked by _-o_ when it's embeded in a larger sentence.


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## ktdd

Thank you for your valuable input, 810senior and Flaminius.


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## frequency

810senior said:


> ・君を好きになったのはいつ頃のことだろう。 [Since when have I been in love with you?]
> ・彼を好きだという気持ち。 [The feeling that I love him]
> ・私のことをずっと好きでいてくれる？ [Would you love me for evermore?]
> ・君*を*好きでよかった。 [I'm grad that I love you]
> ・君のこと*を*すきでいる。[I'm in love with you]


Excellent!!


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