'と思います' is usually used when saying what you think/your assumptions, that much I know, but is it possible to alter it so that you can say what others are thinking? For an example, how would you say, 'Mary thinks the stars are beautiful'?
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1Just precise the subject : "Hoshi ga kirei da to Mary ga omotte imasu" – Chewie Feb 26 '18 at 11:39
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Japanese is a language in which expressing others' feelings, thoughts, desires, etc. is done considerably more discreetly than expressing one's own.
It is 100% natural to say:
「私{わたし}は、星{ほし}はきれいだと思{おも}います。」
but it is not natural at all for a native speaker to say:
「田中{たなか}さんは、星はきれいだと思います。」
even if Tanaka has directly told the speaker that he (Tanaka) thinks that the stars are beautiful.
「思います」 is reserved for the speaker/writer; You cannot use it when the subject of the verb is another person. The same principle is applicable to other words like 「ほしい」、「したい」、「怖{こわ}い」, etc.
One could say instead:
「田中さんは、星はきれいだと思っています。」
If Tanaka has directly told you so. And you might say:
「田中さんは、星はきれいだと思っているようです。」
if the information has been obtained via a third person.
All this might sound strange to you, but you will need to get used to the idea. As a Japanese-speaker, I felt very strange, too, when encountering a sentence like "My father thinks I am crazy." in my English textbook a few years ago in junior high school and so did just about all of my classmates because that sentence made very little sense to us.
You might want to read:
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is Garu used only for ほしい and たい? 思ってがってるis incorrect? – Felipe Chaves de Oliveira Feb 26 '18 at 16:32
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just correcting myself, I actually know that you can use garu with many things, but can I use it with 思う? – Felipe Chaves de Oliveira Feb 26 '18 at 16:37
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