¿Cómo es que to learn tiene 2 variantes del pasado participio? ¿Es una de ellas más usada en los Estados Unidos o se usan ambas indistintamente?

Sí, learned es la forma que se usa más en EEUU, y learnt en el RU. Sin embargo, las dos se entienden perfectamente en todas partes.

Ah, una cosita más. Ten en cuenta que la palabra learned tambien tiene dos significados, cada uno de los cuales se pronuncia de manera distinta. Learned de dos sílabas significa erudito, mientras que learned de una sóla sílaba significa aprendido, aprendí, aprendiste, aprendió, aprendieron, o aprendimos.

Ah, una cosita más. Ten en cuenta que la palabra learned tambien tiene dos significados, cada uno de los cuales se pronuncia de manera distinta. Learned de dos sílabas significa erudito, mientras que learned de una sóla sílaba significa aprendido, aprendí, aprendiste, aprendió, aprendieron, o aprendimos.

My learned friend has provided an excellent explanation.

"learnt" is is one of a fairly large number of irregular past tenses (cf. lit, wrote, rode, snuck etc.). The general group of verbs of this sort are called "strong verbs" (by grammarians/philologists). Over time, there is a tendency for the irregular past tense to be replaced by the "regular" form (simply adding "ed") because that's the way most verbs work in English and that's what children/language learners expect (by simple analogy). Thus, many people (now) say "lighted" and "sneaked" in preference to the older/strong past form. Roughly speaking, irregularities in a (any) language tend to be preserved for the most common words (because there is frequent reinforcement to help us remember the irregularities) and tend to be lost in favor of the "regularized" form with words that are less frequently used.

In English, "to be" is far and away the leas regular verb (although have/go/do retain a fair number of irregularities). So also with the Romance languages. If one looks at the half-dozen verbs with the greatest number of irregular forms, one will will find that they rank high among the most used verbs.

¿Cómo es que to learn tiene 2 variantes del pasado participio? ¿Es una de ellas más usada en los Estados Unidos o se usan ambas indistintamente?

Sí, learned es la forma que se usa más en EEUU, y learnt en el RU. Sin embargo, las dos se entienden perfectamente en todas partes.

These two both are correct. "Learnt" is used more often in Europe and "learned" is used more often here, in the United States.

Is that because American English and British English, James?

Marco

Is that because American English and British English, James?

Es porque los ingleses no saben escribir su propio idioma. (guiñote)

Is that because American English and British English, James?

"Es porque los ingleses no saben escribir su propio idioma." (guiñote)

Does that mean the educational level needs to be improved in the States? Otherwise, people wouldn't know how to write their native language properly.

{guiñote}{guiñote}{guiñote}

Marco

Is that because American English and British English, James?

Es porque los ingleses no saben escribir su propio idioma. (guiñote)

eye'll have yu no eye am inglish and eye can rite an spel adecautley.

dats rait, Eddy, givit too dem! sou bee it!