Take the 2-minute tour ×     • The verb 好く exists.    • 好く is
transitive.  By extension, "to like ~" is predicted to be:  a.
~を好く。  However, empirical data shows that this pattern is the
accepted form:  b. ~が好きだ。  Question: Is ~を好く used and is it even
grammatical? If it is not used, why is it so?  share|improve
this question I always use 形容動詞 “好きだ” and never use the verb
“好く” except for fixed phrases such as 虫の好かない. But if you search
“好いている,” you find a lot of examples. There might be a dialectal
difference. –  Tsuyoshi Ito Feb 9 '12 at 12:38 By the way, I
think that 好く is a “change-in-state verb” (see this answer),
that is, it means the change from not liking to liking, and “to
like” is 好いている. –  Tsuyoshi Ito Feb 9 '12 at 12:49 I have a
stereotypical (not seriously confirmed) impression that the verb
好く is used in Kagoshima dialect: おいどんはあんたば好いとう = "私はあなたを好いている"
(Perhaps, its ungrammatical; It's just my stereotype.) –  sawa
Feb 9 '12 at 13:16 add comment  1 Answer  up vote 2 down vote
accepted  Is ~を好く used