13

Do viruses あります or います?

Currently, I'm under the impression that animals and humans use います (though see this question), while plants and inanimate objects use あります. Do viruses fall under the latter category?

Community
  • 1
Golden Cuy
  • 16,209
  • 15
  • 74
  • 184

3 Answers3

12

I personally think both existing answers should be sufficient for this question, but since they cannot seem to gather consensus, allow me to give it my own try:

The short answer is that both いる and ある forms can be used in a scientific (biological) context. Simple as that.

  1. A quick poll of available colleagues gave out that some preferred いる, some preferred ある, but neither form was particularly shocking to their ears.

  2. Google Scholar gives 16 papers with いる and 70 with ある. There is clearly a preference for the latter, but not so significant that the former could be considered improper.

  3. There is just no way to derive a logical/grammatical (prescriptivist) rule as to which form should be used, considering there is no universal biological consensus as to whether viruses are "alive" (and even less so as to whether they are "animate" or "inanimate" objects). The best you will ever get is a descriptivist rule based on usage.

Dave
  • 9,019
  • 4
  • 38
  • 74
  • I agree with your third point and this is elaboration. Academic consensus is irrelevant. That takes us back to the notorious view on the meaning developed by the American structural linguist Bloomfield who claimed that the meaning of salt was not to be established until science discovered its chemical formula is NaCl. Very ridiculous. –  Apr 02 '12 at 04:11
  • 4
    Actually, it does not matter how it is considered academically. What matters is how the ordinary native speakers perceive it. If the English speakers consider rice as a tiny continuous substance rather than dicontinuous grain, then, rice is an uncountable noun. Likewise, if Japanese native speakers perceive or believe that ウイルス is animate, then it is syntactically animate, whether or not it is academically so. –  Apr 02 '12 at 04:12
  • 3
    @sawa: I think the truth (as often) lies somewhere in between. For viruses, salt and many other words, you can neither ignore the layman definition nor the scientific one. A good example, imho, is the multiple definitions of words like 'fruit'. Depending on context (and whether you are looking at science or everyday life), a tomato is a fruit or a vegetable... No "right" or "wrong" here, merely context. – Dave Apr 02 '12 at 05:26
5

I usually say ウイルスがいます/いるよ, not ウイルスがあります/あるよ.

Edit: So I just found that います may be used more in daily conversations than scientific articles or theses.

  • 2
    Chocolate, you should write what you commented to another answer as part of your answer. It is suggestive. –  Apr 01 '12 at 15:43
  • With all due respect, what you usually say may not be technically correct or even representative of a large segment of the population. – Ian Apr 01 '12 at 21:03
  • 3
    @Ian-san 「what you usually say may not be technically correct」って言われましても、このスレに関して言えば、私がこの回答を投稿したときにはまだAndrew Grimmさんが 「biological. My work involves bioinformatics analysis of virus DNA sequences」って書いていませんでしたので、私は「日常会話」における用法のみに関して答えたんですけどいけなかったのですか・・・。それから、会話で「水ぶくれのなかに/空気中に/シャーレに」と来て「ウイルスが"あります"/"ありません"」って表現が、ホントにa large segment of the populationによって使われてると思われてるのですか・・・？(~_~;) –  Apr 01 '12 at 23:22
1

Search on google:

http://goo.gl/W8hjk ⇐ います gets less than 10000 results.

http://goo.gl/ajJq2 ⇐ あります gets 3.3M retuls.

Enough said ?

oldergod
  • 5,161
  • 20
  • 26
  • 5
    But this may not be very accurate.. – Pacerier Apr 01 '12 at 12:57
  • 2
    Ah! So it's the context. When you talk about whether there are any viruses in a blister, air in a room or on a petri dish, you say 'この水ぶくれの中には/この部屋の空気中には/このシャーレには、ウイルスがいます/いません', and when you talk about existence of different kinds of viruses on earth or talk about what kind of viruses there are, you say 'といった/という/~~などのウイルスがあります' etc. –  Apr 01 '12 at 13:34
  • 2
    But how come this answer is downvoted while my post, which shows no grounds or sources, is upvoted... –  Apr 01 '12 at 13:37
  • It's one thing to take Google result counts with a grain of salt... but generally speaking if two queries have a 1000x difference in order of magnitude, this is definitely meaningful. – Dave Apr 01 '12 at 14:49
  • @Dave 208 vs. 349 is a 1000x difference? –  Apr 01 '12 at 15:39
  • Take the traditional word for virus 病毒, search 病毒がある・いる and you will find 0 results for いる. I think should be enough to prove that from at least a technical perspective ある. Remember just because something is alive doesn't mean いる is correct, trees for example us ある. – Ian Apr 01 '12 at 21:13
  • 1
    @Ian I don't think 病毒 can be equated with ウイルス, so I don't think your argument is valid. Furthermore, the choice of ある/いる is not something that can be determined technically like you try to. Also, I don't think anyone claims that いる is used for alive things. The conventional claim is that it is for animals. Trees are plants, clearly not an animal. –  Apr 01 '12 at 21:17
  • @sawa According to wikipedia 病毒 was the official term for virus used by the 日本細菌学会 prior to the establishment of the 日本ウイルス学会 in 1953. 病毒 is still used in China. They share an equivalent meaning when used in medical terms even if 病毒 is outdated. The reason I picked this word is because it eliminates the possibility that the term ウイルス functions differently when talking in computer terms. – Ian Apr 01 '12 at 21:50
  • 2
    @Ian If you insist that 病毒 and ウイルス sound equivalent to you, I have to say the the Japanese that you acquired is different from the one I acquired. Chinese is irrelevant. –  Apr 01 '12 at 22:41
  • 2
    @sawa It would probably be more constructive if you read the information provided by wikipedia rather than insisting on repeating your own personal opinion. – Ian Apr 01 '12 at 23:34
  • @sawa-san and Ian san, 手元の紙の辞書を見ましたら、"virus:①〚医〛ウイルス、ビールス②コンピューターウイルス"大修館Genius 4英和 "virus:①〚医〛ウイルス、ビールス;（一般的に）（感染性の）病原体、病菌②〚口〛ウイルス性疾患③害悪、弊害④コンピューターウイルス"旺文社Lexis英和,"びょうどく【病毒】a disease germ 病毒をまき散らすspread infection [a disease]"小学館Progressive和英, "ウイルス virus 『医』ウイルス、ビールス the common cold virus かぜウイルス/a virus disease ウイルス性の病気."大修館Genius和英--で、私の持っている５冊の主な学習者用英和・和英（中）辞典のうちvirusに「病毒」という語を(「ウイルス」の後にですが)挙げているのはProgressive英和のみです。参考になりましたら。 –  Apr 02 '12 at 00:49
  • 1
    @Chocolate さん、どうもありがとう。結局、「病毒」なんてことばは普通には使わないし、使ったとしても、「ウイルス」とは違って、「病毒がいる」なんて、決して言わないですよね。 –  Apr 02 '12 at 01:08
  • 1
    @Ian It seems like the "Japanese" that you are talking about is not the Japanese that I have in mind, nor the Japanese that many people normally have in mind. Perhaps you are talking about another language also called "Japanese", which is artificially defined in wikipedia. So, to you, wikipedia is the Bible, right? To me, it is not. –  Apr 02 '12 at 01:13
  • @sawa: not sure where you get these figures. OP gets two counts differing by several order of magnitude. The fact that only the first n result pages are browsable does not mean the total count estimates are completely meaningless. Flaw: criticising the use of Argumentum ad numerum for a question about usage is rather misplaced. – Dave Apr 02 '12 at 03:26
  • The bottom line is that, once again, this question has more to do with non-language fields than Japanese itself. Beside acknowledging existing usage (such as with Google counts), trying to derive a logical rule based on grammar will inevitably bump into the fact that no two scientists fully agree on whether viruses are "alive" (by most definitions, they aren't). – Dave Apr 02 '12 at 03:28
  • 2
    5,720,000 results for 「ウイルスがある」seem to contain 「ウイルスが（、）ある(=とある/特定の)~~」too. –  Apr 02 '12 at 03:50
  • 1
    The comments for this answer are getting kind of... well... I feel bad for the answerer... – atlantiza Apr 02 '12 at 04:58