The word “go” has lots of meanings besides physically moving to a place. It also means to change state (“the milk went bad”, “he’ll go crazy when he finds out”) and to indicate immediate future tense (“I’m going to read this book now”). Not to mention some other less relevant uses.
It's weird how we say "go to sleep" as if sleep is a place
Submitted 10 months ago by FreshParsnip@lemmy.ca to showerthoughts@lemmy.world
Comments
leadore@lemmy.world 10 months ago
hedge_lord@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Yeah I think it’s going to make me go insane
Schwim@lemmy.zip 10 months ago
“It’s time to achieve unconsciousness, kiddo.”
Agent641@lemmy.world 10 months ago
The void calls ceaselessly, child.
stupidcasey@lemmy.world 10 months ago
moonburster@lemmy.world 10 months ago
In Dutch “go” means to go do a thing as well and I use it English in a similar fashion. Never thought of it weird before
davidgro@lemmy.world 10 months ago
The Dreaming
Goldholz@lemmy.blahaj.zone 10 months ago
In german we say either say “go” or “laying to sleep/rest”
9point6@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Huh that’s funny, “laying to rest” in English is an expression for burying someone after they have died
Duke_Nukem_1990@feddit.org 10 months ago
We also call the event of publicly watching soccer matches etc. “public viewing” so…
Goldholz@lemmy.blahaj.zone 10 months ago
Yeah we also say “they are not yet under the world of the living” if someone is still asleep
Bigfishbest@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Tel’aran’rhiod
gilgameth@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Instructions unclear, summoned Cthulhu.
Nemoder@lemmy.ml 10 months ago
If you have trouble going to sleep then try falling asleep instead.
neatchee@lemmy.world 10 months ago
I’m 90% sure that it was originally in the form of “to go <there/place> and <verb>” and has just been shortened over time. A refined colloquialism, if you go for that sort of thing
GuyFawkes@midwest.social 10 months ago
Naw, just a state of mind.
apfelwoiSchoppen@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Well then take a piss.
PineRune@lemmy.world 10 months ago
I’d rather leave a piss.
spongebue@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Go poop.
TachyonTele@piefed.social 10 months ago
That's what i say in the bathroom, like it's a team sport.
Goooo Poop!
RizzRustbolt@lemmy.world 10 months ago
It’s a state.
Zachariah@lemmy.world 10 months ago
EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com 10 months ago
In Spanish, they talk about hunger and thirst as if they are physical objects.
roofuskit@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Feelings are things we have.
shalafi@lemmy.world 10 months ago
J’ai froid.
Deconceptualist@leminal.space 10 months ago
German too. Ich habe Hunger. Sie haben Durst.
LogicalDrivel@sopuli.xyz 10 months ago
Sie haben Durst
Durst
Heh, Fred Thirst
teft@piefed.world 10 months ago
I think that's more that tener doesn't always mean a physical thing.
As an example in spanish they use tener for age. As in "tengo 20 años" literally is "I have 20 years" but it means "I am 20"
Or ten cuidado means "take care" or "be careful". Both phrases use tener in a nonphysical sense in the same way as in english we use "to have". Like to have compassion or to have doubts.
IAmNorRealTakeYourMeds@lemmy.world 10 months ago
but it works because abstract concepts are things an individual can own.
Like “Tengo quidado” is “i own the the abstract concept of care”.
it could work in English, but it just sounds strange or poetic, like “i have hunger”
roofuskit@lemmy.world 10 months ago
I’m going to go, to my bed, to sleep.
Stillwater@sh.itjust.works 10 months ago
We “go” to lots of things that aren’t places. Im going to prove it with this sentence.
LovableSidekick@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Let’s not go off the rails.
samus12345@sh.itjust.works 10 months ago
Different usage. You wouldn’t say “I’m going to prove.” or tell someone “Go to prove.” Are there any examples of “I’m going to [word].” or “Go to [word].” where the [word] is not a physical place?
OutlierBlue@lemmy.ca 10 months ago
Yes. We regularly say “go to [verb]”.
Go to eat
Go to learn
Go to exerciseSaying “go to sleep” is exectly the same.
Stillwater@sh.itjust.works 10 months ago
Not many… Heres what i came up with though: Go to great lengths
Go to an extreme
Go to bat for something
Go to town on something
TranquilTurbulence@lemmy.zip 10 months ago
Planning to go into detail, or was that it?
pruwybn@discuss.tchncs.de 10 months ago
I’m going to go to sleep.
Double going!
megane_kun@lemmy.zip 10 months ago
I’ve got to go think about it for a second, and then I get to realize what it meant.
Empricorn@feddit.nl 10 months ago
Go to ass.
IAmNorRealTakeYourMeds@lemmy.world 10 months ago
if you insist ;-)
deegeese@sopuli.xyz 10 months ago
In English, ‘go to’ can be used as the future subjunctive tense of the verb being conjugated.
hoshikarakitaridia@lemmy.world 10 months ago
Sounds fancy. I hope it’s not expensive to use.
WhatGodIsMadeOf@feddit.org 10 months ago
I wish it was. I wish it was…
Fiivemacs@lemmy.ca 10 months ago
you don’t go places when you sleep?
TranquilTurbulence@lemmy.zip 10 months ago
I sure do. Just last night, I went to a store that was closed. The shopkeeper had hired a very tall and furry troll to guard the store at night. She said the shop is closed, and seemed a bit irritated. We shook hands for no apparent reasons, and then I went away. I sat into a car, we drove off, accidentally drove off road, plowed through the 1 m thick snow, fell off a cliff. We nearly crashed into a house, but somehow managed to land on a road right next to it.
That’s why you don’t try to do your shopping in the middle of the night.
Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world 10 months ago
As a stress sleepwalker, yes I do.
TheWeirdestCunt@lemmy.today 10 months ago
I wish I did, I don’t dream so for me it’s pretty much just skipping anywhere from 6 to 10 hours and suddenly it’s the next morning.
LovableSidekick@lemmy.world 10 months ago
One night my little daughter asked me, “Where is dreamland?” I explained that it’s a made-up place you think of while you’re asleep, and how everyone has their own. Kids take things so literally, when we talked about “going to dreamland” at bedtime she probably wondered if it was an actual place we went somehow - but where could it be? Great question.
FreshParsnip@lemmy.ca 10 months ago
I think I believed that for a time when I was a kid, that dreamland was a physical place people went to when sleeping