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I’ve already read over a similar question, and I still wonder if the following three phrases have nuances of meaning?

Can we form question tags in French?

"Yeah, what a marvellous age we live in, don’t we/huh/right? Wonder what they will invent next!"

  1. « Ouais, dans quelle époque on vit, pas vrai ?

  2. « Ouais, dans quelle époque on vit, c'est ça ?

  3. « Ouais, dans quelle époque on vit, n'est-ce-pas ?

Qu'est-ce qu'ils vont encore inventer... »

Incidentally, can you use the word "encore" to mean "next" rather than "still" or "again"? In this particular context, what is the purpose of the phrase "encore inventer"?

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    The most common such is ", non ?"
    – Drew
    Feb 13, 2016 at 18:12
  • or, "si ?" with a negative question. Feb 13, 2016 at 20:41

2 Answers 2

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"C'est ça ?" is used when there is a doubt, it is odd here as the question is rhetorical.

"N'est-ce pas ?" is too formal and clashes with the colloquial "Ouais".

Encore can indeed mean next.

I would then translate the English sentence that way:

Ouais, dans quelle époque on vit, pas vrai ? Qu'est ce qu'ils vont pas encore inventer !

I added "pas" to make the sentence more idiomatic.

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  • @jilliagre Thanks. The "pas" placed before "encore" has me puzzled. What purpose does the "pas" serve here? Feb 13, 2016 at 17:42
  • "Qu'est-ce qu'ils vont encore inventer ?" would mean you are really wondering what they will invent next which is close to the English sentence. "Qu'est-ce qu'ils vont pas encore inventer ?" is more idiomatic and means you don't really care about what they will invent next, but simply state in a rhetorical way they keep inventing odd / unwanted things, .
    – jlliagre
    Feb 15, 2016 at 12:27
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Sentence 2 is incorrect... I mean, we don't say that. Sentence 1 is definitely what you should say in French. In fact, "pas vrai" is a colloquial form of "n'est-ce pas". Which means that the third sentence is correct, but I may say unusual.

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