far和much使用上的差異性？

Question

When it comes to teaching I don't think it's the instrument that you use as much as how you're taught. It's very important that children are taught cursive writing immediately. And the reason for that is that print writing is about form, cursive writing is about movement.

And they've done studies in Canada where they've found that children who are taught cursive immediately have far better self esteem, much more self-confident.

請問這裡的far better是不是也可以代換成much better，而much more也可以寫成far more嗎？ 那麼這之間語氣的差別在那呢？

資料來源: BBC World Service Learning English Weekender
http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/weekender/scripts/weekender_061229_handwriting.pdf

Answer 1

better 與 more self-confident 都是"比較級"的形容詞:
good (or well) ---> better
self-confident ---> more self-confident
修飾比較級的形容詞, 要用副詞. 要表達"比更(好)還要(好)", "(好)多了"的語意, 常用(以 better 為例):
Your have a far better car than I do.
You speak much better English than I do.
I have come up with a way better solution.
I know your offer is good, but hers is even better.
但是不用 very better


2006-12-30 11:51:27 補充：
所以文中只是變化不同的字彙, 語意相同.
還有, 不要把more跟far或much的綁在一起. 它是屬於 self-confident 這個形容詞的一部分, 這樣應該比較容易瞭解.

Answer 2

如果互換far跟much這兩個字...我是覺得除了拗口了點之外，是還好。但是better跟more這兩個比較/量詞就不能換了。
如果你仔細看...self esteem是名詞，而self-confident是形容詞喔!
自信的名詞是self-confidence.