Aime and aime beaucoup

Question

The sentence is: he loves his Mum. How the hell is "aime" right and "aime beaucoup" wrong, especially given the inanity of "aime bien" meaning not "LOVE" but "LIKE"?

Accepted Answer

Bonjour Maarten,
Follow the link to a previous answer on this very topic: aime-and-aime-beaucoup
I hope this is helpful.
Bonne journée !

Answer

As is covered in the lesson, « aimer » can mean either to like, or to love (especially, but not exclusively for a person) depending on context.

By using « aimer beaucoup » or « aimer bien », you are defining the meaning of « aimer » to be 'to like', with beaucoup defining a stronger liking "a lot", whereas bien indicates a weaker level of liking, something similar to 'like well enough' in English.

It is not 'inane', just different to (or should that be 'from') English.