- 27 Apr 2018
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Hi, everyone! y:
I have two quick questions after reading Minna No Nihongo's Beginner 1 Reader, chapter 23.
The sentence is:
所で、コーヒーは体に悪いと思っている人はいませんか。
I could understand the gist within the overall context of the paragraph, but I wasn't sure why the construction ませんか was used. At this point in the Minna textbook, ませんか has only been discussed as being used for invitations. Google translate renders this sentence as: "Is there anyone who thinks coffee is bad for your health?", in which case ませんか is used as a sort of rhetorical question. I've tried to find something in my Dictionary Of Basic Japanese Grammar but I must have missed it somewhere.
So my first question is if anyone would care to explain the use of ませんか in this sentence?
Second question is the use of 人は if います is indicating "existence of such and such". Why wasn't が used, particularly if コーヒー is the overall topic (and not the subject of the と clause)?
Sidebar comment: I've noticed that my Minna books very occasionally will use constructions that they haven't yet fully explained. This might be intentional on the part of the authors so that readers get used to trying to make sense of things in real life situations they are unfamiliar with. (Which for beginners in real life would be 90% of everything they encounter...)
Thanks in advance for any help!:emoji_pray:
I have two quick questions after reading Minna No Nihongo's Beginner 1 Reader, chapter 23.
The sentence is:
所で、コーヒーは体に悪いと思っている人はいませんか。
I could understand the gist within the overall context of the paragraph, but I wasn't sure why the construction ませんか was used. At this point in the Minna textbook, ませんか has only been discussed as being used for invitations. Google translate renders this sentence as: "Is there anyone who thinks coffee is bad for your health?", in which case ませんか is used as a sort of rhetorical question. I've tried to find something in my Dictionary Of Basic Japanese Grammar but I must have missed it somewhere.
So my first question is if anyone would care to explain the use of ませんか in this sentence?
Second question is the use of 人は if います is indicating "existence of such and such". Why wasn't が used, particularly if コーヒー is the overall topic (and not the subject of the と clause)?
Sidebar comment: I've noticed that my Minna books very occasionally will use constructions that they haven't yet fully explained. This might be intentional on the part of the authors so that readers get used to trying to make sense of things in real life situations they are unfamiliar with. (Which for beginners in real life would be 90% of everything they encounter...)
Thanks in advance for any help!:emoji_pray: