Kun niukkuus katoaa, ahneudesta ei kärsitä.
When scarcity disappears, one does not suffer from greed.
Breakdown of Kun niukkuus katoaa, ahneudesta ei kärsitä.
ei
no / not (en, et, ei, emme, ette, eivät)
kun
when (conjunction)
kadota
to disappear
kärsiä
to suffer
niukkuus
scarcity
ahneus
greed
Questions & Answers about Kun niukkuus katoaa, ahneudesta ei kärsitä.
Why is kärsitä in the passive form here when 'suffer' doesn't have a direct object?
In Finnish, the passive isn't just for actions done to a specific object. You can also passivize intransitive verbs (verbs without an object, like kärsiä) to express what 'people in general' do, or what 'one' does. Here, ei kärsitä means 'people do not suffer' or 'one does not suffer' as a generic human condition.
How exactly is the negative passive ei kärsitä formed from the verb kärsiä?
To form the negative present passive, you take the affirmative passive form (kärsitään) and drop the final -an or -än. This leaves the passive connegative form kärsitä, which you use directly after the negative verb ei.
Why is the word for greed in the elative case (ahneudesta)?
The verb kärsiä (to suffer) strongly governs the elative case (-sta or -stä) for the source of the suffering. You must learn this rection pattern as a fixed pair: kärsiä jostakin (to suffer from something).
Both niukkuus and ahneus are abstract nouns. How are they derived?
They are formed by adding the suffix -us or -uus to an adjective base, similar to adding '-ness' or '-ity' in English. The adjective niukka (scarce) becomes niukkuus (scarcity), and ahne (greedy) becomes ahneus (greed).
Why does the verb katoaa have a t when its dictionary form is kadota?
kadota (to disappear) is a type 4 verb. These verbs uniquely have the weak consonant grade in their infinitive form (the d) but flip to the strong consonant grade when conjugated (the t). The stem becomes katoa-, to which we add the vowel lengthening for the third-person singular.
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