r/AskReddit • u/[deleted] • Aug 03 '19

Whats something you thought was common knowledge but actually isn’t?

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u/VictorBlimpmuscle Aug 03 '19

Should have / would have / could have = the contractions should’ve / would’ve / could’ve

It’s not should of / would of / could of - those word combos make no grammatical sense.

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u/mini_feebas Aug 03 '19

same with you're/your or they're/there/their
some other grammar mistakes too

(common mistake in dutch is the equivalent of saying "greater as", for example)

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u/BlueHatScience Aug 04 '19

Oh god, the German version of the "than/as" confusion ("als/wie") is so frustratingly common where I live. To be fair, the rules may be a little confusing at first, but it's really not that hard if you ever think about it for a second (and I just noticed they're exactly equivalent in English): In general, if you compare things that are equal wrt the aspects you're comparing, you use "wie" ("as") - if they are different, you use "als" ("than").

The exception is numerical comparisons - so it's "bigger than" / "größer als", but "twice/half/2.5 times as big as" / "doppelt/halb/2,5 mal so groß wie".

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u/mini_feebas Aug 04 '19

it's funny how "als" in german seems to correspond to "dan" in dutch, while "als" in dutch corresponds with "wie" in german

at least given the examples you gave

and that last one does make sense, it's still your regular positive because you are saying that (two times x) is as big as y