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En réponse à Adam Walker <carrajena@hidden.email>: > Does the ser/estar distinction exist in Romlangs beyond Iberia? Spanish > has them. Portuguese does. So does Catalan, but the others don't do > that, right? I don't think I want a similar distinction in C-a. What > about the por/para distinction. How wide spread is that? French has pour/par, although the distinction is different. I'm > concidering a three way distinction on "for" -- peru/peu/para(or worse > pera). I don't know why I'd do this to myself since por and para > already drive me to distraction in Spanish, A distraction? It's an extremely simple, useful and logical distinction, much simpler than French pour/par distinction. How can it be a distraction? English on the other is just ambiguous in not distinguishing those two things. And what is the distinction then? Simple: "por" indicates *cause*, "para" indicates *goal*. Two opposite ideas that deserve to be treated differently. I always found the por/para distinction to be one of the good thing of Spanish grammar, simple and effective. Christophe. http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr It takes a straight mind to create a twisted conlang.