el ambiente de antemano

Question

does this phrase make sense'

Answer 1

I suspect that the original comes from on of those nature/nurture arguments. I have seen similar statements in English that suggest that a person's genetic makeup can influence/determine his environment and, thus, that what might seem to be the result of environment may, in fact, be genetically determined. i.e. Looks like nurture but is really nature.

Answer 2

If you are trying to translate something from English to Spanish, please give the full English sentence with context.

Answer 3

"Una problema con la investigación genética es que los genes pueden determinar el ambiente de antemano."

A native speaker would never say "una problema," so unless you mis-typed this, it wasn't written by a native and could therefore have other problems. But if it was just your typo, it means:

One problem with genetic study is that genes can determine the environment ahead of time.

I'm not sure what that means, but the question of genes versus environment is a common one, and maybe they are saying that genetic makeup can also affect a person's environment. We might be able to help more with another sentence or two of context.

Answer 4

Una problema con la investigación genética es que los genes pueden determinar el ambiente de antemano.

Answer 5

HI liane, no it doesn't. Can you give context'

Answer 6

Written like that, nothing meaningful: "the environment beforehand". However, those words inserted in a full sentence could mean something, but we can't guess unless we have it.

Give us a context, please. Read the forum rules!