I just finished reading
[this](http://roa.rutgers.edu/files/324-0699/roa-324-woolford-1.pdf) paper,
which describes the situations in which Japanese allows a dative subject and a
nominative object. For example, the verb 分かる can be used like this:

> 彼に英語が分かる

"彼" is the subject but is marked with "に" instead of "が", and similarly "英語",
the object, is marked irregularly with the nominative particle "が" instead of
the usual "を". According to the paper, this happens in Japanese when a verb 1)
licenses this case marking and 2) the verb is transitive (there is an object).
There are two parts to my questions:

1)The 可能形 licenses dative subjects:

> 「彼に英語が話せる」

but not

> ｢彼に英語が話す」

This is still ruled out for intransitives, so 5a in the paper shows that you
cannot say 「*赤ちゃんにもう歩ける」. Does this change if we add another argument such as
a location? Can I say 「人間にはその道が歩けない」 (let's say it's covered in lava or
something).

  2. The paper also mentions that there are exceptions to this rule, one of them being certain kinds of questions. Can anyone think of a Japanese question with a transitive verb or a verb that doesn't normally allow a dative subject, but which has a dative subject anyway?
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question
particles verbs dative-subject-constructions
Dative subjects
1. >Can I say 「人間にはその道が歩けない」   
Yes I think you can say that. Maybe you can also say 人間にはその道は歩けない/人間にその道は歩けない.  

  2. Hmm... Would it be something like... you can say 君に(この車が)運転できるかい? but not 僕に運転できます。?? 私には耐えられない/私に耐えられるだろうか but not 私に耐えられます。?? or maybe 私にやって行けるだろうか/私にはやって行けない but not 私にやって行けます。??
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Looking at the examples in [the paper linked
above](http://roa.rutgers.edu/files/324-0699/roa-324-woolford-1.pdf), of
Japanese sentences purportedly showing "dative subjects" (page 8 in the PDF),
I note that **the nouns marked by に in the Japanese are only subjects after
translating into English**.

For verbs in the potential, much as in passive constructions, the に in these
sentences marks the **agent** , not the subject.

Compare:

  * Passive: 「彼に英語が話される」 → "English **is spoken by** him."
  * Potential: 「彼に英語が話せる」 → "English **is speakable by** him."

In both sentences, the verbs are intransitive, 英語 is the subject of those
intransitive verbs, and 彼 is marked as the agent of the actions.

Notably, intransitive verbs of potential that are derived from transitive
verbs, like 話【はな】せる above, still semantically describe an action happening
upon something, where that something is not the agent -- this is different
from a "regular" intransitive verb, which semantically does not happen upon
something, but instead describes an action occurring by means of that
something itself.

More [here in an older answer
post](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/91189/why-
is-%e3%81%99%e3%82%8bs-potential-
form-%e3%81%a7%e3%81%8d%e3%82%8b/92681#92681), regarding the development and
semantics of Japanese potential verbs.

In like fashion, the verbs わかる and できる mark the subjects with が and the agents
with に. While not derived from transitive verbs, they function grammatically
and semantically in a similar way -- they describe a quality of the subject,
as something that is "do-able by" an agent marked with に.

* * *

The author of [the linked paper _Case
Patterns_](http://roa.rutgers.edu/files/324-0699/roa-324-woolford-1.pdf) is
one Ellen Woolford, who appears to be [this
person](https://www.umass.edu/linguistics/member/ellen-woolford). She
specializes in syntax, but doesn't seem to have any particular familiarity
with Japanese itself.

In the linked paper, she pulls the Japanese examples of purported "dative
subjects" from Masayoshi Shibatani's 1977 work _Grammatical Relations and
Surface Cases_ , available [here via
JSTOR](https://www.jstor.org/stable/412912) (free registration required).
Shibatani goes in quite deeply, and his work is rife with abbreviations that
make it quite difficult to read for non-specialists. That said, his analysis
from page 799 (referenced by Woolford's paper) consistently describes subjects
marked by に and objects marked by が, for sentences using verbs that Japanese-
language references consistently describe as 自動詞 or "intransitive verbs" that
take no objects -- verbs that only become "transitive" after translating into
the common English glosses, verbs like intransitive ある translated as the
transitive "to have".

Reading a bit further in Shibatani on pages 800-801, he makes a complicated
argument about "subject"-ness based on how reflexive (using 「自分」) and
honorific constructions focus on the noun marked with に. I posit that
construing this as "subject-ness" is a mistake -- this indicates not that the
に-marked nouns are subjects, but rather that the agents in such constructions
have a higher primacy of focus for reflexives or honorifics than do the
grammatical が-marked subjects of the intransitive verbs.

Re-casting this as "dative subject" and "nominative object" for verb
constructions like ある is a strange stretch. Many languages use intransitive
constructions not dissimilar to Japanese ある ("there exists") to express that
someone "has" something. Compare:

  * JA: 彼には家がある → "by him, there is a house" → "he has a house"
  * HU: _[nek]{に}[i]{彼} [ház]{家}[a]{POS} [van]{ある}_ → "by him/her, a [third-person singular possessor] house there is" → "s/he has a house"
  * NV: _[kin]{家} [bee]{彼に} [hólǫ́]{ある}_ → "a house by him/her there is" → "s/he has a house"

In each case, the verb is simply a marker that something exists -- this is not
transitive in any of these languages, and the statement only manifests any
transitivity after translation into idiomatic English using the transitive
verb "have". Claiming the existence of a "dative subject" and "nominative
object" violates the principle of [Occam's
razor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor), and does much to muddy
the waters.
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