Breakdown of Je crois que l'astéroïde a une trajectoire bizarre.
je
I
un
a / an (masculine)
avoir
to have
bizarre
strange
croire
to believe
que
that (introducing a clause)
la trajectoire
the trajectory
l'astéroïde
the asteroid (m)
Questions & Answers about Je crois que l'astéroïde a une trajectoire bizarre.
Why is the verb a in the indicative here, when a belief or opinion often triggers the subjunctive?
In French, affirmative statements of belief like je crois que or je pense que express a high degree of certainty or probability in the speaker's mind, so they take the indicative mood. This follows the exact same logic as il est probable que. However, if you express doubt by making it negative (je ne crois pas que) or asking a question (crois-tu que), you cross over into improbability and must use the subjunctive (ait).
Since astéroïde starts with a vowel, the article is l'. How can I remember its gender?
Could I put the adjective before the noun and say une bizarre trajectoire?
It is much more natural to put bizarre after the noun. While a specific group of short, common adjectives (often remembered by the acronym BAGS: Beauty, Age, Goodness, Size) precede the noun, most descriptive adjectives—including those expressing a distinct or unusual quality like bizarre—strictly follow the noun they modify.
If I wanted to say "I believed that..." instead, would the mood or tense of a change?
The mood would stay indicative because an affirmative belief still expresses certainty, even in the past. However, the tense would change. To match the past context of Je croyais que... (I believed that...), you would shift the second verb to the imperfect tense: Je croyais que l'astéroïde avait une trajectoire bizarre.
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