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Context on what happened earlier: He made a comment about his philosophy on becoming friends and she liked it.

「でも　うん。私は好きかな。人が好きだから」

「奇遇だね、俺も人が大好きで仕方ないんだ」

「そっか。私の方が好きだけどね」

However, I'm not quite sure what she means by 私の方が好きだけどね.

Is this like a "no no, I love them (more than you)". Or contrasting with him using 大好き to say that she doesn't like them that much. Or is it something else?

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    Where is this from? Can you give more text leading up to this part?
    – Amani Kilumanga
    Commented Mar 17, 2016 at 3:57

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Without any context, （あなたより）私の方が好き can mean either of:

  • I love someone more than you love him/her.
  • Someone loves me more than he/she loves you.

But it doesn't mean "I love you more than I love someone." nor "I love someone more than I love you."

In this context, this sentence means "I love people (=mankind in general) more than you love people."

If one wants to say "I only like them, not love them." then it will be something like 「私の方は単なる"好き"だけどね」「私は大好きというほどではないけどね」.

BTW, Isn't "I love them more than you" an ambiguous English sentence, too? :-)

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  • RE: "I love them more than you". The "them" makes it less ambiguous.
    – Amani Kilumanga
    Commented Mar 17, 2016 at 4:15
  • @AmaniKilumanga Ah, you mean "I love him more than you." would be more straightforwardly ambiguous, right?
    – naruto
    Commented Mar 17, 2016 at 4:21
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    I mean in Japanese, the object isn't specified in any form. So the term is on its own more ambiguous than in English, where you need some kind of object. You can't say "I love more than you" (ok, maybe you can, but the meaning is different).
    – Amani Kilumanga
    Commented Mar 17, 2016 at 4:28

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