Ah, true. Though I often see it used this way, taking the group as a singular noun. It sounds a little jarring upon examination, but I think it may be going the way of were and was, few and less.
So it is supposed to be a verb in the translation? To determine?
Well, which verb is the best one to choose is the point of Vanilla’s question, but it’s not an adjective in the Japanese.
I bet a Japanese person did that translation.
From what I learned informal study is that すみませんでした implies you will not make that same mistake again. For example, if you were late to class, but that was the first and only instance (and don’t intend to make the mistake again), you would say 遅くなってすみませんでした。If you are habitually late to class and it may or may not happen again, you would say 遅くなってすみません。
The same case goes for ありがとうございますand ありがとうございました。 If you thank your professor for something, and they regularly help you out, you would say ありがとうございます。If you helped out a stranger with directions (and you’ll probably never see them again), they would say ありがとうございました。
Aaaaaaactually, it’s more complicated than that and is currently probably changing:
Although still considered ungrammatical according to standard British and American usage, are we seeing the gradual process in which police falls into line with other collective nouns and it becomes acceptable to use it with a singular verb?
No.
No we are not.
You quoted it as saying it’s ungrammatical in standard dialects of English, and it would be irrelevant to the discussion even if it had changed (as I noted).
Yeahhh, haha. I was just curious about the level of certainty that they translated the police as having. Although I guess “were determined” and “had determined” mean different things and “were determined” gives off a more “suspected” vibe.
So while studying some grammar over on 文プロ today, I came across this sentence:
あそこの公園より、家に近い公園の方が広い。
My question in this case, since we’re talking about a park that’s over somewhere away from the speaker, but since the park is technically a thing, could/would you not use あの公園 instead of あそこの? Is there really a difference? The way I see it, it’d just be the difference between “That park over there” and “That place over there’s park”?
As you said, they don’t mean literally the same thing, but either one is acceptable to use.
ありがとう。Just wanted to make sure there wasn’t a specific reason for the usage.
I’d actually say in many places we are.
But the good news about language change is it works like this: The people who don’t like it bitch, then they die and the change keeps continuing. Hwæt art thou worry?
When you consider how few collective plurals there are (and I mean exclusive plurals, since British English is very flexible since plural verb usage has a different nuance than singular verb usage), it’s actually quite strange that “police” is only acceptable as a plural.
American English tends very much on the side of using collective singulars (the mafia, the government, etc), meanwhile the only collective plurals I ever see in the states are “police,” “minority/majority” (primarily in the form of “the majority of the Republicans are in favor of…”), and "faculty (since writing “faculty members” is more work 
).
I think the biggest reason why people don’t like it is the sound of the “ees” sound write by “is” vs the flow of “essar” in fast speech. Though we do say “Your lease is…,” so I guess not? ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Okay so… one being “I replaced” the other being “It got replaced”? I understand the difference more easily with words like to lower/to fall (下げる/下がる). But seeing as it’s “to replace” in English either way, it’s confusing me
Some english words just don’t have pairs like they do in Japanese. In English, for example, ‘drop’ can be either intransitive or transitive:
Intransitive sense: The ball dropped. [The ball is the subject, no object]
Transitive sense: I dropped the ball. [I am the subject, ball is the object]
Some Japanese intransitive words don’t really translate into English, because there is no intransitive version of the word in English. These are often translated using the passive voice in WaniKani. For example: To mix, and to be mixed.
Passive sense (similar to intransitive): The paint was mixed.
Active/Transitive sense: I mixed the paint.
The intransitive “The paint mixed” would be seen as quite odd in English, but understandable. Words like ‘throw’ don’t work at all: “The ball threw” is nonsense.
Well, it doesnt have to take those particles, but whatever. You can have かわる without が and かえる without を, although in that case it would just be from the direct object being implied.
それよりも 写真に代わる物証を探せ。
So in this setnence 写真に代わる is describing 物証 and basically just an adj describing what kind of evidence to look for (attributive verb is the technical term, I think). Evidence that can substitute for/replace the photos. Not sure the context of the sentence, maybe they got the photos illegally and cant use them in court, who knows.
それをこれに代える
So this one is saying replace that with this. Its basically saying それを代える while using に to specify what to replace it for. So it would be grouped like this (それ)を((これ)に代える).
So thats pretty confusing, right? So whats the different between the two. Well in the first one, 代わる was just used with 写真 to describe 物証. 物証 is what then went on to take the “main verb” of that sentence, 探せ（探す）. In the second sentence though, 代える was actually acting on それ and これに was used to further describe 代える. Thats my terrible explanation, hopefully it helps.
With volitional form, do you say it with a long vowel? For example is 起きよう pronounced okiyō or okiyou? It’s okiyō, right?
Yes. It’s a long お sound. Here’s a site where a male and female Japanese speaker pronounce all of the conjugations of hundreds of verbs. This link should lead you to the pronunciation of 起きる’s volitional tense. Hopefully that helps.
警察官は信頼しうるひとです。
Policeman are people you can trust.
Hi. This sentence is from Bunpro 得る / 得る grammar point. Was wondering what’s the function of the し. It’s probably something simple I can’t wrap my mind around right now but why is the し needed there before うる. Why not just 信頼うる?
Thanks.
信頼 is a する verb. So paired with 得る as an auxiliary suffix, する turns into し (the ～ます stem). 信頼 by itself isn’t a verb, so the し is imperative to use the 得る suffix. Hopefully that answers your question!