<p>&quot;感&quot;, more objective, the feeling that surroundings impose on you. &quot;冷感&quot;, &quot;热感&quot;<br />
&quot;觉&quot;, more subjective, the feeling from your heart (/mind/senses) about surroundings. &quot;味觉&quot;, &quot;视觉&quot;</p>
<p>Yes, they are quite similar, and in some cases, they both mean &quot;feel/feeling&quot;.</p>
<p>But in some other cases, you can find the difference by comparing &quot;感到&quot; and &quot;觉得&quot;.<br />
&quot;我感到房子在摇动&quot;, I have a feeling that the house is shaking.<br />
&quot;我觉得房子在摇动&quot;, I think the house is shaking (maybe not, actually).</p>
<p>In fact, there are quite a lot of chinese words made of characters with similar meaning, like 奔跑/游泳/旋转/图画/增加. Two of the reasons I know:</p>
<ol>
<li>it can <strong>avoid ambiguity</strong> with the same pronunciation (which reminds me of the different characters with same pronunciation in Japanese).</li>
<li>it <strong>improves the symmetry</strong> and fluency of a sentence, as most words in chinese are made of two characters.</li>
</ol>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-01-22T00:25:19.830Z
2021-01-22T00:57:37.423Z
2021-01-22T00:57:37.423Z
Shaw
<p>actually this group of words is called 同义复合词
Synonymous compound</p>
<p>its advantage:</p>
<p>1.make the definition more clear. if you only use one character, it may have many different meanings.</p>
<p>2.enlarge the meaning. eg: 牙齿，牙 and 齿 both mean a certain part of the tooth, but when combined, it means the whole group of teeth.</p>
<p>3.increase rhythm. in some ancient poems, there are character restrictions, like 5 or 7, so in order to reach 5 or 7, people use 同义复合词. these words now becomes our everyday use.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-01-22T06:49:59.903Z
2021-01-22T07:08:52.023Z
2021-01-22T07:08:52.023Z
XyYang
<p>感觉 means to feel; however, both 感 and 觉 both mean to feel by themselves. Why does the word 感觉 exist then? I've noticed that a lot of words are redundant.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-01-22T06:54:27.537Z
More generally, there is this question: [Why use combined characters that have the same meaning?](https://chinese.stackexchange.com/q/31011/8099).
Becky 李蓓
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-01-22T08:14:32.297Z
For a fairly in-depth discussion of the stress-related aspects of monosyllabic vs. disyllabic words, see Duanmu, S. (2007). The phonology of standard Chinese. He discusses this specific question in one of the later chapters in the book.
Olle Linge
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-01-22T08:54:28.290Z
Discussion on the same Topic, but for "redundant" words in the English language. https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/369752/a-word-for-using-two-words-next-to-each-other-that-mean-the-same-thing
Wayne Cheah
CC BY-SA 4.0
2021-01-22T11:29:55.920Z
I haven't gotten proof, but as a native Chinese user, I believe many of these type of words contain 2 characters with **slightly** different meaning. E.g. 悲哀. I believe 哀 is a sadder version of 悲. The same can be observed in Japanese, where they've borrowed these 2 characters and assigned the same native pronunciation: ka-na-shi (悲し, 哀し). I would love to see someone expand on this.
Daniel Cheung
<word>
Is the word 感觉 not redundant?
# Is the word 感觉 not redundant?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2021-01-21)

感觉 means to feel; however, both 感 and 觉 both mean to feel by themselves. Why does the word 感觉 exist then? I've noticed that a lot of words are redundant.

**Tags:** word

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: More generally, there is this question: [Why use combined characters that have the same meaning?](https://chinese.stackexchange.com/q/31011/8099).  
> **username_2**: For a fairly in-depth discussion of the stress-related aspects of monosyllabic vs. disyllabic words, see Duanmu, S. (2007). The phonology of standard Chinese. He discusses this specific question in one of the later chapters in the book.  
> **username_3**: Discussion on the same Topic, but for "redundant" words in the English language. https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/369752/a-word-for-using-two-words-next-to-each-other-that-mean-the-same-thing  
> **username_4**: I haven't gotten proof, but as a native Chinese user, I believe many of these type of words contain 2 characters with **slightly** different meaning. E.g. 悲哀. I believe 哀 is a sadder version of 悲. The same can be observed in Japanese, where they've borrowed these 2 characters and assigned the same native pronunciation: ka-na-shi (悲し, 哀し). I would love to see someone expand on this.  

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## 2 answers

### Answer by username_5 on 2021-01-22. Score: 2

"感", more objective, the feeling that surroundings impose on you. "冷感", "热感"  
"觉", more subjective, the feeling from your heart (/mind/senses) about surroundings. "味觉", "视觉"

Yes, they are quite similar, and in some cases, they both mean "feel/feeling".

But in some other cases, you can find the difference by comparing "感到" and "觉得".  
"我感到房子在摇动", I have a feeling that the house is shaking.  
"我觉得房子在摇动", I think the house is shaking (maybe not, actually).

In fact, there are quite a lot of chinese words made of characters with similar meaning, like 奔跑/游泳/旋转/图画/增加. Two of the reasons I know:

1. it can **avoid ambiguity** with the same pronunciation (which reminds me of the different characters with same pronunciation in Japanese).
2. it **improves the symmetry** and fluency of a sentence, as most words in chinese are made of two characters.


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### Answer by username_6 on 2021-01-22. Score: 2

actually this group of words is called 同义复合词
Synonymous compound

its advantage:

1.make the definition more clear. if you only use one character, it may have many different meanings.

2.enlarge the meaning. eg: 牙齿，牙 and 齿 both mean a certain part of the tooth, but when combined, it means the whole group of teeth.

3.increase rhythm. in some ancient poems, there are character restrictions, like 5 or 7, so in order to reach 5 or 7, people use 同义复合词. these words now becomes our everyday use.


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