Breakdown of Ei edes ihmiskeho selviydy ilman vettä.
ei
no / not (negative verb)
vesi
water
ilman
without
edes
even
selviytyä
to survive
ihmiskeho
the human body
Questions & Answers about Ei edes ihmiskeho selviydy ilman vettä.
Why do we use Ei edes here instead of just edes for "not even"?
In Finnish, edes is used for "even" in negative contexts, but it requires an active negative verb to accompany it. The negative verb here is ei, which matches the third-person singular subject ihmiskeho (the human body). Together, the phrase ei edes creates the meaning "not even."
Why is the verb written as selviydy instead of its affirmative form selviytyy?
This is because it follows the negative verb ei. To find the correct negative stem for a verb, you take the first-person singular form (I survive = selviydyn) and drop the -n ending. Notice the consonant gradation: the strong t from the dictionary form selviytyä weakens to a d in the negative stem selviydy.
Why is the word for water, vesi, written in the partitive case as vettä?
The preposition ilman (without) always dictates that the word following it must be in the partitive case. Therefore, the nominative vesi becomes the partitive vettä.
Why is the first part of the compound word ihmiskeho written as ihmis- instead of ihminen?
When nouns ending in -nen, like ihminen (human), are used as the first half of a compound word, they drop the -nen and use their combining stem ending in -s. You will see this exact ihmis- stem in many other common compounds, such as ihmisoikeus (human right) or ihmishenki (human life).
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