22 articles
grammar
Weather forecasts say 明日は晴れるでしょう, friends casually say もう届いただろう — both mean 'probably,' but the tone is different.
grammar
はず isn't a guess -- it's a reasoned expectation. 'He should be here by now' because you saw him leave. You have evidence, just not confirmation yet.
grammar
ように isn't just 'it seems like' — it also expresses purpose, effort, and indirect requests. Three uses, one particle.
grammar
They all translate to 'it seems like,' but 降りそうだ, 降るようだ, and 降るらしい are not the same -- which one means rain is most likely?
grammar
「田中さんは男らしい」 -- this doesn't mean he seems to be male; it means he's manly. らしい has two identities, so don't mix them up.
grammar
なさそうだ, そうもない, そうだった -- the negative and past forms of そうだ are easy to get wrong.
grammar
そうだ has two meanings — one is 'I heard that' and the other is 'it looks like' — different conjugations, completely different meanings.
grammar
「It looks heavy」 uses そうだ, while 「it seems heavy」 uses ようだ — one judges by appearance, the other by intuition. Mix them up and the subtlety of your Japanese is lost.
grammar
The 'seems like' of ようだ and the 'seems like' of らしい are different -- ようだ is based on your own feeling, while らしい is based on evidence.
grammar
'Unforgivable' uses べからず, 'inviolable' uses べからざる, 'regardless of the reason' uses いかん — classical Japanese grammar still alive in modern usage.
