Hello LearnJapanese. long time commenter first time poster.
I’ve been studying japanese for some time now and running into grammar that seems incomprehensible at first but then gradually coming to understand it is not a new experience for me. That said, no matter how much I improve, there seems to be one grammar mystery that haunts me like some sort of curse:
Why is it so common to see ～ても being used to connect two sentences that do not contradict eachother in any way?
Native sources tell me that ても Introduces a clause with a meaning opposite from the one you may expect basing yourself on the previous clause
“[逆接とは、前件から予想されるのとは反対のことが、 後件に来るということです](https://www.tomojuku.com/blog/noni-temo/temo/)。”
[Imabi tells me that て and も come together to mean something like “even if”](https://www.imabi.net/particle-mo-iii), and yet, so many sentences with temo do not have this “even if” aspect at all, on the contrary, they have a “precisely because” aspect to them
Here are some of the ても sentences i’ve pestered tutours, HiNative users and Daily Thread frequenters, as well as my own self for the past year or so:
(1) 外見の悪さを差し引いても性能は評価出来る [SOLVED. I MISUNDERSTOOD A DIFFERENT PART OF THE SENTECE, 評価出来る]
*Even If* (?) you make allowances for its bad appearance, its ability can be appreciated
What’s “even if” about this? No matter how i look at it, and indeed, no matter who i ask, natives and students alike, the sentence is saying that it’s precisely Because you’re making allowances for the objects apparance that you can appreciate its value, not in spite of it!
When i asked about this question on a daily thread several months ago, a kind user suggested that in this context the 差し引いても all together means something kile だけれど, making it an idiomatic expression, but i dont know where that leaves me
(2) 物事の表面的、一面的知識で納得している限り、自分の世界を狭くすることはあっても、物事の本当の姿を知る事は出来ない ([full context here](https://imgur.com/a/mfk6TDM))
As long as you content yourself with superficial, one-sided knowlege of things, *Even if* (?) you make your world narrower, you’ll never know the true state of things
Even If? Why? Both things “making your world narrower” and “not being able to know the true appearance of things” are basically in accordance with eachother. The author is writing two bad things about stopping at the surface level of things, what is temo about this?
A kind user on yesterday’s daily thread suggested that in this context, あっても has a meaning comparable to あるだけで, however these two are not universally interchangable
(3)部下に厳しく言いすぎると、嫌われることはあっても、尊敬されることはない
If you speak to harshly to your subordinates, *Even If* (?) you’ll be disliked, you won’t be respected
I don’t even think i need to elaborate on this one. Nothing is “even if” about this. “although you’ll be hated, you won’t be liked” just doesn’t make sense. As in, it makes no sense to me to make a redundant sentence like this.
This is not me attacking the japanese language, it’s me admitting that there’s clearly some fuller meaning to ても that i have failed to grasp
If anyone can help me overcome this i’ll be extremely grateful
edit: formatting
4 comments
I am by no means a native or an export of the Japanese language so take anything I say with a bag of salt but…
I personally absolutely do see the contrast in example 2 and 3. I think the issue is that you are thinking too much about the transliterated meaning of the sentence and gloss over the actual phrasing used in Japanese.
**Example 3**
嫌われることはあっても、尊敬されることはない
If you translate this more literally:
“Even if being hated might happen, being respected will not exist”
The contrast is between once event occurring (being hated) and the other not (being respected).
Or if you translated this in more natural English but keeping the contrasting nature of it:
“You might be hated but you will never be respected.”
**Example 2**
自分の世界を狭くすることはあっても、物事の本当の姿を知る事は出来ない
Same here:
You might narrow down your own world but you will never be able to see the true form of things.
The former will happen, the latter will not.
Aru at its core refers to existence or occurrence of something so most sentences using atte mo will say that the former part might occur but the latter part will definitely not occur. This is the contrast, not the meaning of whatever those occurrences hold.
**Example 3**
外見の悪さを差し引いても性能は評価出来る
This one I do not understand either. It’s definitely a sentence where I’d expect it to end in dekinai normally.
I’ve found Cure Dolly’s explanations useful when it comes to ても. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qV-TZbsH1kI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qV-TZbsH1kI)
If you translate it as “however much”, does it help?
Just go insane and create chatGpt account it knows almost everything i learn from there everyday making him as me questions and check if the answers i am giving are natural or not
The whole point of も (when used like that) is to state that although we have expectation x, what happens in reality is y.
So for example, in (3)部下に厳しく言いすぎると、嫌われることはあっても、尊敬されることはない
The expectation is that by being harsh with your underlings, you’ll be hated *and* you’ll be respected too (“those who are feared are respected”). But the speaker is saying that even if your behavior warrants hatred and enmity, it won’t make them respect you in turn.
In English we most likely wouldn’t have used “even” in that sentence, but it’s a word that generally captures the meaning of も well.