# para ver si la consolaba



## chajadan

I read the following snippet: 

"Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba un poco." 

What makes the most sense to me would be "si su padre la consolaría un poco". Is the quoted example of the imperfect a normal usage? I believe the direct object "la" of consolar refers to Ramona herself, given complete context.

--charlie


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## bolli

Hi Charlie,

Yes, the tense "consolaba" is absolutely correct; "consolaría" is not right.

As to "la",  yes, it does refer to Ramona.

take care


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## elchoco

on what would the "would" be conditional?

the imperfect is fine because she "went" in the preterite.

Check out the folk song Asturiana for an example:

*Por ver si me consolaba,*
*Arrimé a un pino verde,*
*Por ver si me consolaba.*

*Por verme llorar, lloraba.*
*Y el pino como era verde,*
*Por verme llorar, lloraba.*

(There's a great setting of this song by Falla and a nice version by teresa berganza on youtube !!!!)


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## chajadan

I suppose my problem is in my mental translating. The English translation I would give would be:

"Ramona went to the dining room to see if her father would console her a little."

I have come to believe that the future referenced from the past takes the conditional, such as "Supe que vendrían." Meanwhile, I'm only used to the imperfect being used for on-going or habitual actions.

Apparently I have a new use to familiarize myself with. Any help as to why the imperfect works here would be appreciated.

--charlie


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## bolli

I don't know exactly reason for using "consolaba", but we often translate the "would" as an imperfect, for instance, when we refer to habits in the past with a similar meaning  as "used to":

" Every afternoon Mary would sit by the window waiting for something to happen"= "Cada tarde Mary se sentaba junto a la ventana, esperando que algo ocurriera".

Does it make sense?


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## chajadan

I am familiar with that use of the imperfect, "would" as in "tended to" or "used to" - a habitual event. What is unfamiliar to me is imperfect being used for an event that hasn't even happened yet - she's going to see if it will.

--charlie


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## chajadan

I still don't understand this usage of the imperfect. Can anyone clarify it for me? What is the rule that is being followed here that makes it correct?

--charlie


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## Sköll

chajadan said:


> I still don't understand this usage of the imperfect. Can anyone clarify it for me? What is the rule that is being followed here that makes it correct?
> 
> --charlie



I think both versions are possible:

Voy al comedor para ver si mi padre me consuel*a* un poco.
Fui al comedor para ver si mi padre me consolaba un poco.

Voy al comedor para ver si mi padre me va a consolar un poco.
  Fui al comedor para ver si mi padre me iba a consolar un poco.

 Voy al comedor para ver si mi padre me consolará un poco.
  Fui al comedor para ver si mi padre me consolaría un poco.

I also like to know why "consolaría" is considered incorrect.


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## flljob

chajadan said:


> I still don't understand this usage of the imperfect. Can anyone clarify it for me? What is the rule that is being followed here that makes it correct?
> 
> --charlie


 
El imperfecto se usa cuando acompaña a un pretérito simple.

Llegué cuando ellos se iban.

Cantaban tan mal, que me reí.

Me dormí de lo aburrido que estaba el concierto.


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## flljob

Sköll said:


> I think both versions are possible:
> 
> Voy al comedor para ver si mi padre me consuel*a* un poco.
> Fui al comedor para ver si mi padre me consolaba un poco.
> 
> Voy al comedor para ver si mi padre me va a consolar un poco. Yo nunca lo diría. Diría  ...para ver si mi padre me consuela.
> Fui al comedor para ver si mi padre me iba a consolar un poco. Jamás la usaría. Diría ...me consolaba.
> 
> Voy al comedor para ver si mi padre me consolará un poco. Tampoco la usaría.
> Fui al comedor para ver si mi padre me consolaría un poco. Jamás la usaría.
> 
> I also like to know why "consolaría" is considered incorrect.


 
Me sentí triste y sabía que si acudía a mi padre, él me consolaría.


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## chajadan

Wouldn't it be:

Me sentí triste y sabía que si acudiera a mi padre, él me consolaría.

or even:

Me sentí triste y sabía que cuando acudía a mi padre, él me consolaba.

--charlie


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## flljob

chajadan said:


> Wouldn't it be:
> 
> Me sentí triste y sabía que si *acudía *a mi padre, él me consolaría.
> 
> or even:
> 
> Me sentí triste y sabía que cuando *acudiera *a mi padre, él me *consolaría*.
> 
> --charlie


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## L'Inconnu

chajadan said:


> I still don't understand this usage of the imperfect. Can anyone clarify it for me? What is the rule that is being followed here that makes it correct?
> 
> --charlie


 
Even if we agree that it’s colloquial usage, I can’t find this construction in any of several grammar references. However, there may be a way to rationalize its usage. In English, you can also say:
Ramona went into the dining room to see if her father _was going_ to console her. ​We are using the past continuous mode of the verb "to go" to refer to an event that will take place in the future, relative to some time in past. As the imperfect tense of Spanish often corresponds to our past continuous, I’m wondering if a Spanish speaker would understand me if I said:
Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la _iba_ a consolar. 
​


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## flljob

Se entiende, pero es incorrecta.

Saludos


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## L'Inconnu

flljob said:


> El imperfecto se usa cuando acompaña a un pretérito simple


 
Pues, la frase siguiente no es correcta?

María _dijo_ que _vendría_ mañana.


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## flljob

L'Inconnu said:


> Pues, la frase siguiente no es correcta?
> 
> María _dijo_ que _vendría_ mañana.


  Esta sí, pero la otra no.


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## chajadan

The way I try to understand these formations is by converting them from the present tense. I can make sense of the following:

Usages of cuando that relate general truths:

Cuando acudo a mi padre, él me consuela.
Cuando acudía a mi padre, él me consolaba.

I believe (but am not sure) that si can replace cuando in the above:

Si acudo a mi padre, él me consuela.
Si acudía a mi padre, él me consolaba.

Then we have the conditional based off of hypothetical actions:

Si acudo a mi padre, él me consolará.
Si acudiera a mi padre, él me consolaría.

What is the present tense of this:

Si acudía a mi padre, él me consolaría.

Is it:

Si acudo a mi padre, él me consolará.


--charlie


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## flljob

Si acudía a mi padre, él me consolaba.
Si acudiera a mi padre, él me consolaría.


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## flljob

El verbo acudir, por su significado, es perfectivo. Cuando acudes a un sitio se entiende como una acción acabada. Si dices yo acudía, quieres decir que es una acción que acostumbrabas hacer. Acudía a misa, era una acción que se repetía. Ibas a misa cada domingo, por ejemplo.
Cuando acudí a mi padre, me consoló. Solo fue una vez.
Cuando acudía a mi padre, me consolaba. Quiere decir que la acción fue repetitiva. Cada vez que lo necesitabas acudías a él, y él te consolaba.

Con el verbo caminar, en cambio, si dices yo caminaba por el parque cuando me lo encontré. El imperfecto no signfica que acostumbrabas caminar por el parque, sino que una vez que ibas por el parque, te lo encontraste.

Espero no haber complicado más las cosas.

Saludos


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## chajadan

Those last two uses you described are the only ones I'm really used to for the imperfect, so nothing was made more complicated for me.

The imperfect describes either a habitual event, or an on-going event that is background or interrupted.

I'm sad to say that I'm still not quite clear on or at all used to the imperfect being used when going to see if something will in fact happen. In my first posted sentence, Ramona is going to the kitchen to see if her father will console her - that is my understanding - not to find out if he consoles her in general - she would already know that and not need to go to find out what is generally so; she would only need to go to see if in this particular case it will be.

I hope I'm making clear exactly what confuses me.

--charlie


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## flljob

Ramona va a la cocina para ver si su padre la consolará. Yo lo entendería como que Ramona va a poner a prueba a su padre. Va a ver que tan benévolo es con ella. Y de cualquier manera, a mí me suena rara la concordancia.

Ramona va a la cocina para ver si su padre la consuela. Ella espera que su padre tenga esa actitud con ella.


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## L'Inconnu

I take it you would accept this sentence:

Ramona fue al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre la consuel*e*.


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## flljob

Ramona fue al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre la *consolara*. Porque está en pasado.


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## flljob

1. Ramona fue al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre la *consolara.*
2. Ramona fue al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre la consuel*e*. 

La 1 se puede entender que las dos acciones pertenecen al pasado. Pero también se puede entender con el sentido de la 2:

La 2 se entiende que en este momento se acaba de ir Ramona al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre la *consuele*. Todavía no ve a su padre.

Ojalá que alguien más participe.


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## L'Inconnu

flljob said:


> Ramona fue al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre la *consolara*. Porque está en pasado.


 
entendido


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## L'Inconnu

My grammar book says that you don’t use the present subjunctive with ´if´. Presumably, the same rule applies to the present conditional. These two tenses/moods are logically related in that they both deal with hypothetical conditions. Notice their interchangeability in the following phrase: 
Si hubiera tenido el dinero, *hubiera/habria* comprado el libro ​So, ruling out these tenses, why do we use the imperfect instead of the future in your example? We expect to use the imperfect for ongoing past activities or conditions which do not end at a defined moment, and to use the future for events that will happen. In your example, the event hasn’t happened yet, that is, from Ramona’s point of view. But it is a past event from the narrator’s point of view, and we don’t know the exact moment in time when it ended. There seems to be no other way to rationalize it, other than to accept it as another use of the imperfect.


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## chajadan

So far I'm with you L'Inconnu, I just have to accept it as a new use I'm not yet familiar with. Unfortunately, I don't have enough context to know how to use it. I've read thousands of pages in Spanish novels and don't recall even encountering it before. I would have naturally just said:

...para ver si me consolaría...

What might help me I think would be if I was comfortable with this one:

Voy al comedor para ver si mi padre me consuela un poco.

If I was comfortable with that, I would assume the transformation to the past tense would be the original sentence in question:

Fui al comedar para ver si mi padre me consolaba un poco.

But the present tense example given above doesn't quite fit in my understanding either -- if she is going to see about it then see doesn't quite yet know what to expect, i.e. it is an unknown. I'm wondering if "si me consuela" could be a simple future, such as "Voy a España mañana", though I have doubts about that. My only other interpretation would be this:

If we just say, "mi padre me consuela un poco"...", it could be a general truth, "cada vez que le acudo."  To say that we want to see if "mi padre me consuela un poco" sounds to me, from that perspective, to be questioning what her father's general response is, for some reason not yet knowing his general response to the condition. If he has a general response, it exists in the present in some sense, even though events have not yet brought it to light.

Sorry if I'm dragging this on, but when I see something that seems so out of place and other natives tell me it's perfectly fine, I feel I need to keep trying to understand until I do.

--charlie


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## Sköll

L'Inconnu said:


> My grammar book says that you don’t use the present subjunctive with ´if´. Presumably, the same rule applies to the present conditional. These two tenses/moods are logically related in that they both deal with hypothetical conditions. Notice their interchangeability in the following phrase:Si hubiera tenido el dinero, *hubiera/habria* comprado el libro ​So, ruling out these tenses, why do we use the imperfect instead of the future in your example? We expect to use the imperfect for ongoing past activities or conditions which do not end at a defined moment, and to use the future for events that will happen. In your example, the event hasn’t happened yet, that is, from Ramona’s point of view. But it is a past event from the narrator’s point of view, and we don’t know the exact moment in time when it ended. There seems to be no other way to rationalize it, other than to accept it as another use of the imperfect.



I just point out that the use of SI in the original sentence of this thread is not similar to a conditional sentence. In the original sentence SI is used to introduce an indirect interrogative sentence; similar to "no sé si es así". To see that it is not a conditional sentence, the subordinate clause can be replaced with a pronoun:

Ramona fue al comedor para ver eso.
eso = si su padre ...

Such substitution is not possible in a conditional sentence:

Si hubiera tenido el dinero, habría comprado el libro.
eso, habría comprado el libro.


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## L'Inconnu

My *guess* at the moment is that you have to put yourself in the perspective of the narrator. From the writer’s point of view, all the events are completed. Since the outcomes are already known, you relate them to the reader with the indicative. And, since you are describing a past event that terminated at an undefined moment, you use the imperfect. 

If you want to put yourself in Ramona’s position and, therefore, express the event as a hypothetical one, my best guess is to use the subjunctive. But you can’t use the present subjunctive after ‘if’, just as in English we say ‘if I were’ rather than "if I be". So, instead of ‘para ver si’ you have to use another conjunction, such as ‘a fin de que’. As you already know, the tenses of the two main verbs have to be in agreement. 

Ramona ha ido al comedor a fin de que su padre la consuel*e*. ​
Ramona fue al comedor a fin de que su padre la consolara. ​


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## L'Inconnu

Sköll said:


> I just point out that the use of SI in the original sentence of this thread is not similar to a conditional sentence. In the original sentence SI is used to introduce an indirect interrogative sentence; similar to "no sé si es así". To see that it is not a conditional sentence, the subordinate clause can be replaced with a pronoun:
> 
> Ramona fue al comedor para ver eso.
> eso = si su padre ...
> 
> Such substitution is not possible in a conditional sentence:
> 
> Si hubiera tenido el dinero, habría comprado el libro.
> eso, habría comprado el libro.


 
All this discussion makes me wonder whether or not it is grammatically correct for us to use ‘would’ after ‘if’. After all, we normally say ‘if I had…, I would…’. If we phrased the sentence without using ‘if’, it would match well with Spanish usage. 
Ramona went into the kicthen hoping that her father would console her.
Ramona fue al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre la consolara. ​


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## Sköll

The use of SI in the original sentence is equivalent to 'whether'. It is not equivalent to "if I had..., I would...": She went there to see whether his father would comfort/console her (or not).


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## L'Inconnu

It seems to me that this discussion about Spanish usage is providing us all with novel insight into our own respective languages. We now have TWO unsettled questions.

Many English speakers use ‘would’ after ‘if’, but since it doesn’t translate well into Spanish, perhaps it is grammatically flawed. Sköll's example using ‘whether or not’ would probably translate well into Spanish but, then again, he left out the word ‘if’. 

The same reasoning can be applied to Spanish usage. Apparently, it is common practice to use the imperfect when recounting a past event that had been an uncertainty at an earlier time in the story. It doesn’t translate well into English, however, nor can I find any example of how to use the imperfect this way in any reference. So, I am left with some doubt as to whether or not it is acceptable usage in formal writing. 

So, it seems that colloquial English doesn’t always translate well into Spanish, and vice versa. Should we be saying ‘If I *would have* done that’, or would it be better to say ‘If I *had* done that’? Should a Spanish speaker be saying ‘si su padre la *consolaba*’, or would it be better to say ‘si su padre la *consolara*’, etc.


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## Vikingo

chajadan said:


> I read the following snippet:
> 
> "Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba un poco."
> 
> What makes the most sense to me would be "si su padre la consolaría un poco". Is the quoted example of the imperfect a normal usage? I believe the direct object "la" of consolar refers to Ramona herself, given complete context.
> 
> --charlie


 
The imperfect is a normal and colloquial stand-in for the conditional in many cases, and I see your phrase as one of those.

According to Butt & Benjamin (14.5.4):



> The imperfect is often used in familiar speech instead of the conditional.
> 
> (a) When the conditional would refer to an immediate future. In this case Spanish resembles English: one can say "he said he would come" or "he said he was coming":
> 
> _Prometieron que venían/vendrían._
> _Juró que lo hacía/haría._
> _Pensaba que ya no venías/vendrías._
> _Sabíamos que los refuerzos llegaban/llegarian de un momento para otro._
> (...)
> (d) In familiar Spanish, to express a wish:
> 
> _Ya le decía yo cuatro verdades._
> _(...)_
> _Yo ahora me tomaba un helado y me quedaba tan bien._


 
I can't see anything wrong with the conditional either. Would anyone care to back up the view that the conditional is wrong?

Saludos


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## L'Inconnu

Vikingo said:


> The imperfect is a normal and colloquial stand-in for the conditional in many cases, and I see your phrase as one of those.
> 
> According to Butt & Benjamin (14.5.4):
> 
> 
> 
> I can't see anything wrong with the conditional either. Would anyone care to back up the view that the conditional is wrong?
> 
> Saludos


 
It seems to me that the controversy is over which tenses/moods are used in 'si/if' clauses. None of you examples shed light on this pivotal point.


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## Vikingo

L'Inconnu said:


> It seems to me that the controversy is over which tenses/moods are used in 'si/if' clauses. None of you examples shed light on this pivotal point.


 
I'm sorry that you feel that way. I know that 'si' can be used both with the conditional, indicative and subjunctive in several tenses depending on context. In what post did you see the light, and does it also answer my question about the conditional being wrong (which I doubt)?

Take care


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## L'Inconnu

Here are some ´si´ clauses outlined in my Spanish grammar:

Si *tengo* el dinero compraré el carro
Si *tuviera* el dinero compraría el carro
Si *hubiera* _*tenido*_ el dinero habría comprado el carro

Notice that after ‘si’, the present indicative, the imperfect subjunctive, or the pluperfect subjunctive is used. Moreover, these Spanish constructions parallel English usage.

If I *have* the time, I’ll do it.
If I *had* the time, I would do it.
If I *had had* the time, I would have done it. 

I am trying to say that the reason the English phrase ‘if her father *would* console her’ doesn’t translate well into Spanish is because it isn’t grammatically correct to use a conditional clause after ‘si/if’ in either language. To express the future within the context of a past narrative, the conditional clause follows the relative pronoun ‘*that*’.

He knew *that* one day he would be king.
El sabía *que* un día sería el rey.

I might also add that the reason ‘si tu padre la _*consolaba*_’ doesn’t translate well into English, is because it’s grammatically incorrect in the first place. When they are dealing with a hypothetical or uncertain event, Spanish speakers should use the subjunctive. 

Ramona fue al comedor para que su padre la _*consolara*_.


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## Vikingo

L'Inconnu said:


> I might also add that the reason ‘si tu padre la _*consolaba*_’ doesn’t translate well into English, is because it’s grammatically incorrect in the first place. When they are dealing with a hypothetical or uncertain event, Spanish speakers should use the subjunctive.


 
I'd be very careful about telling Spanish speakers what they should and shouldn't do at your level, and what's grammatically incorrect. There are always surprises around the corner when it comes to learning.

Here is a quote from the DPD about using "si" with the conditional.



> *1.3.* Conjunción que introduce oraciones interrogativas indirectas: (...) _No me dijo si iría o no a la fiesta_


 
I find our case similar, and it's also a "future from the past"-kind of usage. My first post was to ask whether or not this is one of the uses where the imperfect can stand in it's place, which I believe it is. But since I'm not a native, I'd like some feedback from people who know more than me.

Saludos


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## SevenDays

Hello

If you understand the meaning, then everything else falls into place.
Let’s keep this English distinction in mind; perhaps it will be of help:
If introduces a _condition._
Whether introduces _alternatives_.

_Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba_.
One action (“_consolar_”) doesn’t depend on a previous action being done (“_ir al comedor”_), so the conditional _consolaría_ shouldn’t be used.  The “*si*” in this sentence functions as “*whether*” (not as “_if_”), as Skoll already mentioned.  The writer is really saying (and correctly so):
Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba_ o si no la consolaba_.

Thus, the English translation should be:
Ramona went to the dining room to see _whether_ her father would console her _or not_.
(Whether introduces two alternatives: the father either will (1) console her (2) not console her. That’s the same idea as in Spanish. True, in English, “if” and “whether” are often interchangeable.  But, based on the intended Spanish meaning, this is a case where _si _follows _whether_, not _if.)_ 

So, in this example, the Spanish imperfect is used instead of the conditional to express a future in the past, and the future in the past refers to alternatives and not to conditionality.

Put another way, the conditional suggests "cause-and-effect."  
    Si hubiera ido al comedor, su padre la habria consolado
    Si hubiese ido al comedor, su padre la hubiera consolado
    Fue al comedor porque su padre dijo que la consolaría.
    .
But this is not what the writer had in mind; the _si_ in _Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba_ doesn’t suggest an “*if….then*” link.  In this context, the imperfect is called for.  

I hope this helps.
Cheers


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## L'Inconnu

Vikingo said:


> I'd be very careful about telling Spanish speakers what they should and shouldn't do at your level, and what's grammatically incorrect. There are always surprises around the corner when it comes to learning.
> 
> Here is a quote from the DPD about using "si" with the conditional.
> 
> 
> 
> I find our case similar, and it's also a "future from the past"-kind of usage. My first post was to ask whether or not this is one of the uses where the imperfect can stand in it's place, which I believe it is. But since I'm not a native, I'd like some feedback from people who know more than me.
> 
> Saludos


 
Well, if its in a reference, its fair enough for me. You live and learn.


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## L'Inconnu

Having consulted the DPD, I’m now convinced that some Spanish speakers use the conditional tense after ’si’ to replace the subjunctive in cases of uncertain outcomes, that is, where we would use ‘whether or not’ in English. However, I still have some reservations as to whether or not it is always appropriate to replace the subjunctive with the imperfect tense. I found this sentence in the DPD:
Me preguntó (que) si *pensabas* ir a la fiesta.​Notice that ‘pensabas’ translates very smoothly into the past continuous of English:
I wondered if (whether or not) you *were planning* to go to the fiesta. ​However, our past continuous doesn’t work well in chajadan’s example:
"Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la *consolaba*."​Ramona went to the dining room to see if (whether or not) her father *was* consoling her (Ramona). ​Therefore, like chajadan, I don’t understand the Spanish usage in this case.


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## L'Inconnu

SevenDays said:


> the _si_ in _Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba_ doesn’t suggest an “*if….then*” link. In this context, the imperfect is called for.


 
Why don't you use the subjunctive? Isn't that the definitive verb tense/mood for dealing with uncertainties or cases of whether or not?


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## flljob

L'Inconnu said:


> Why don't you use the subjunctive? Isn't that the definitive verb tense/mood for dealing with uncertainties or cases of whether or not?


 
Creo que entre Sevendays y Sköll te han dado la mejor respuesta. No se trata de una if clause. Hazles caso.

Saludos


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## SevenDays

L'Inconnu said:


> Why don't you use the subjunctive? Isn't that the definitive verb tense/mood for dealing with uncertainties or cases of whether or not?



Hello

Uncertainty by itself doesn’t allow the subjunctive.  You need to have the proper syntax that allows the grammatical expression of that uncertainty.

Romana fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba

True, there is an uncertainty lurking in the background: _whether or not the father consoles Romana_.  But the structure of this sentence doesn’t allow the subjunctive.  You can’t simply insert the subjunctive just because you have a _whether or not_ uncertainty:
Romana fue al comedor para ver si su padre la _consolara_

You could change the sentence and introduce an element that allows the grammatical use of the subjunctive. For example, adding the conjunction *que*:

Romana fue al comedor para *que *su padre la *consolara*.

Of course, the meaning changes:
1. Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba
(Ramona understands her father [1] might console her or [2] might not console her.)

2. Ramona fue al comedor para que su padre la consolara
(Ramona *expects* that her father will console her)

It is the meaning of (1) that the writer wants to convey.

Hope this helps
Cheers


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## chajadan

I'm trying to determine exactly what is involved in the idea being expressed that leads to the need to use the imperfect.

Possibly, the conditional expresses what would in fact occur given a certain set of conditions, but in the original sentence posted, there is no guarantee of the result regardless of the conditions, the result is in question. Is that important? Do we not use the conditional because the result is in question?

~My main point of confusion~ is that I thought that an event that is expected to occur in the future from the perspective of the past and in fact already has occurred by now requires the conditional, always, such as "Me dijeron que se irían más tarde." I believe the only other similar construction is when you are talking about a still as of yet uncompleted action, such as "Me dijeron que se irán más tarde", though I believe that a simple future is probably used more often, "Me dijeron que se van más tarde.", though I am unsure.

So I suppose my final question is if this unfamiliar construction is similar in all cases. Please mark the following as grammatical or ungrammatical:

Yo quería saber si mi hermano me daba consejos. (a future determination, not an attempt to determine something about what is currently happening)
Fui al cuarto para ver si mi hermano me daba consejos.

Thanks
--charlie


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## iskndarbey

I'm a relatively fluent but non-native speaker of Spanish and I don't know terribly much about Spanish grammar, so I can't really address the issue at hand. I can say that the sentence in question sounds perfectly natural to me, but I must also say that "Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaría" sounds equally natural, with the exact same meaning. (The first could have an additional meaning -- _Ramona went to the dining room to see if her father was [already] consoling her_ -- but this is obviously pretty nonsensical given the context.) I'm not sure which form I would use were I to  say this sentence extemporaneously.

But native speakers seem to have given conflicting advice in this thread -- is "para ver si su padre la consolaría" considered grammatically incorrect? I doubt this is the case, but I'd be interested in hearing others' opinions.

(On a second reading of the thread it seems that it's mostly non-native speakers who are arguing that "si la consolaría" is also correct, so perhaps this is some abstruse point of grammar on which Spanish differs from other European languages for some reason. I will say that "para ver si su padre la consolara", as some have suggested the sentence should be, sounds awful and somewhat nonsensical to me.)


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## L'Inconnu

SevenDays said:


> You could change the sentence and introduce an element that allows the grammatical use of the subjunctive. For example, adding the conjunction *que*:
> 
> Romana fue al comedor para *que *su padre la *consolara*.
> 
> Of course, the meaning changes:
> 1. Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba
> (Ramona understands her father [1] might console her or [2] might not console her.)
> 
> 2. Ramona fue al comedor para que su padre la consolara
> (Ramona *expects* that her father will console her)
> 
> It is the meaning of (1) that the writer wants to convey.


 
We don’t agree. The indicative is primarily used to unequivocally state what is happening, what was happening, what has happened, and what had happened; whereas, the subjunctive is used to state things that *may* happen or *may* have happened. This is true for the subjunctive regardless of whether we use it to express wishes, fears, doubts, or even commands. Because of this fundamental principal, I consider the following three statements to have equivalent meanings:
Ramona fue al comedor para que su padre la consolara
Ramona fue al comedor a fin de que su padre la consolara
Ramona fue al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre la consolara​Admittedly, it is possible to use a continuous past mode to express uncertainty, especially in English. But in order for me to adopt the indicative for this purpose, I want two fundamental requirements to be satisfied: 1) It is acceptable usage, 2) It translates smoothly into English. The Diccionario Panhispánico de Dudas (http://buscon.rae.es/dpdI/SrvltGUIBusDPD?lema=si) gives two sample sentences where the imperfect is used in a clause following ‘si’:
Si no hacías lo que él decía, se enfadaba
If you didn’t do what he said, he would get angry​In this case the imperfect is used to make generalizations about frequent or habitual events in the past. To clarify this point we could substitute the word ‘whenever’ for ‘if’. 
Whenever you didn’t do what he said, he would get angry. ​Moreover, we could substitute ‘he got angry’ for ‘he would get angry’ in order to show that the imperfect corresponds to the past tense in English. 
If you didn’t do what he said, he got angry


Me preguntó (que) si pensabas ir a la fiesta.
I wondered if you were planning to go to the fiesta.​Notice, once again, that the imperfect corresponds to the past tense in English. This is because the conjecture is not based on what another person might do, but rather on what that person may have already done. The thought could be phrased as a question:
Have you thought about going to the fiesta?
Did you plan on going to the fiesta?​From a grammatical perspective, the question focuses not so much on whether the other person will or will not go to the fiesta, but rather on whether or not he/she has made plans to do so. If the answer to the question is ‘yes’, than the plans will have been made BEFORE the question was posed. Hence the past tense. 
"Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba un poco."​Because we are uncertain about what her father will do AFTER she enters the kitchen, the past tense does not apply in this case. Perhaps chajadan is confused because, just as I do, he expects the imperfect tense to correspond to a past event. Moreover, neither he nor I can find any dictionary, grammar, or other reference to illustrate clearly how the imperfect can be used in this way.

So to sum it up, even though I now understand the above sentence, I still consider it to be colloquial usage. Fine for a pop song, but not suitable for formal writing.


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## alegna456

just curious, could you say "he would have consoled me" 
"él me había consolado"?


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## delmessico

Let me see if a can give you my grain of salt:

"Maria fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba un poco" You are using a correct preterite (fue) and inperfect conjugation (consolaba). Maria was not sure if her father would console her (para ver si-to see if). Therefore the rule in most cases is: you accompany the preterite verb with an inperfect conjugation. Example: 
"Yo fui al supermercado para ver si encontraba comida"
"Maria fue a la cama para ver si dormia"
Now I would use the conditional verb: "consolaria" as follows:
"Si Maria va a la cocina, creo que su padre la consolaria". As you can see to use this conjugation we need to have Maria do something first. If she goes to the kitchen then her father might console her. The subject needs to do something first in order to obtain something, opposite to your original phrase in which she went to the kitchen on her own for she wanted to see if her father would console her.
In spanish there are so many variations and ways to express ourselves but I hope with time and patience you will achive your goals.


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## L'Inconnu

iskndarbey said:


> -- is "para ver si su padre la consolaría" considered grammatically incorrect?


 
I have two criteria: 1) A similar construction is illustrated in a grammar reference; 2) The expression translates well into English. Here is the grammar reference that Vikingo found:
http://buscon.rae.es/dpdI/SrvltGUIBusDPD?lema=si​No me _dijo_ si _iría_ o no a la fiesta
He didn’t _tell_ me if (whether or not) he _would go_ to the fiesta.

So we have the preterit being combined with the conditional in both Spanish and English. Since both my criteria are satisfied, I judge the following sentence to be acceptable.

Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la _consolaría_.

I might add that by establishing criterion (1) I am also showing that the expression is acceptable for _native_ speakers. At the moment, flljob is the only native speaker who contested this usage.


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## Sköll

L'Inconnu said:


> ...Since both my criteria are satisfied, I judge the following sentence to be acceptable.
> 
> Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la _consolaría_.



Unfortunately, it doesn't work like that. To me also the structure seems grammatical and perhaps the best option. But you cannot ignore what sounds natural. I think the few native speakers that have participated in this thread have made it clear that the sentence sounds awkward with the conditional tense.

We can keep looking for the reason why that is the case.


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## chajadan

L'Inconnu said:


> My *guess* at the moment is that you have to put yourself in the perspective of the narrator. From the writer’s point of view, all the events are completed. Since the outcomes are already known, you relate them to the reader with the indicative. And, since you are describing a past event that terminated at an undefined moment, you use the imperfect.
> [...]



Tempting guess, but even if the writer and the reader both know about a completed event, the indicative is not always used. For instance:

Conocí a Barack Obama antes de que se convirtiera en presidente.

The subjunctive is obligatory after antes (de) que, regardless of how well known its past occurrence is.

--charlie


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## chajadan

I'm not even comfortable with this:

Ramona va al comedor para ver si su padre la consuela.

At my current level of Spanish sentence origination, I would always say:

Ramona va al comedor para ver si su padre la consolará.

However, I'm fine with both of the following in English:

Ramona goes to the dining room to see if her father will console her.
Ramona goes to the dining room to see if her father consoles her.

What happens if we change the original sentence in question to this:

"Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaría mañana después del discurso."

I am assuming that the imperfect would not fit there, but it's already clear to those reading this thread that I'm not clear on all the uses of the imperfect 

--charlie


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## alegna456

can we say that in regards to comparing English and Spanish grammar one would use the conditional tense [consolaria] only in an "if....then..." statement?
For example: "Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consoleraba"
                  Ramona went to the dining room to see if her father would console her
"Si ella fue al comedor, el la consolaria" = if she went to the dining room, he woud console her...etc. I believe in an "if...then" sentence one may use the conditional, does this rule have any validity?


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## flljob

L'Inconnu said:


> I have two criteria: 1) A similar construction is illustrated in a grammar reference; 2) The expression translates well into English. Here is the grammar reference that Vikingo found:
> http://buscon.rae.es/dpdI/SrvltGUIBusDPD?lema=si​Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la _consolaría_.


 
La oración problema corresponde al siguiente punto:


*1.1.1.* «Reales». Se denominan así porque la condición expresada es un hecho posible o realizable. El verbo de la prótasis va en indicativo, en cualquiera de sus tiempos, salvo en el futuro simple o futuro, futuro compuesto o antefuturo, condicional simple o pospretérito y condicional compuesto o antepospretérito; el verbo de la apódosis va en indicativo o en imperativo:_Si llueve, me quedaré en casa*; Si no hacías lo que él decía, se enfadaba*; Si vas a salir, ponte el abrigo_. En el lenguaje administrativo se conserva aún el uso arcaico en la prótasis de los tiempos futuros de subjuntivo: _Si no se presentare el escrito en el plazo indicado, el demandante perderá sus derechos; Si el solicitante no hubiere acreditado suficientemente sus méritos, se considerará inválida su petición_.

Corresponde a oraciones del tipo:
Fui a ver a mi madre para ver si me decía la verdad.
Concursé para ver si me daban la beca.
Fui a la biblioteca para investigar quién era el escritor más leído.




Saludos


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## flljob

chajadan said:


> I still don't understand this usage of the imperfect. Can anyone clarify it for me? What is the rule that is being followed here that makes it correct?
> 
> --charlie


 
Es una oración final en la que el verbo de la oración principal es _fue_, y el verbo de la subordinada está en infinitivo porque el sujeto (Ramona) es el mismo que el de la principal (Ramona). Este infinitivo de la subordinada introduce una oración completiva (sustantiva) interrogativa indirecta con la conjunción _si_. Si quieres conjugar el verbo _ver_, lo tendrías que usar en subjuntivo, pero esto es incorrecto en este tipo de oraciones. El verbo de la subordinada sustantiva tiene que estar en imperfecto de indicativo para que concuerde con el pasado simple de la oración principal.

Espero que haya quedado claro.

Saludos


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## Sköll

flljob said:


> Es una oración final en la que el verbo de la oración principal es _fue_, y el verbo de la subordinada está en infinitivo porque el sujeto (Ramona) es el mismo que el de la principal (Ramona). Este infinitivo de la subordinada introduce una oración completiva (sustantiva) interrogativa indirecta con la preposición _si_. Si quieres conjugar el verbo _ver_, lo tendrías que usar en subjuntivo, pero esto es incorrecto en este tipo de oraciones. El verbo de la subordinada sustantiva tiene que estar en imperfecto de indicativo para que concuerde con el pasado simple de la oración principal.
> 
> Espero que haya quedado claro.
> 
> Saludos





flljob said:


> Voy al comedor para ver si mi padre me va a consolar un poco. Yo nunca lo diría. Diría  ...para ver si mi padre me consuela.
> 
> Voy al comedor para ver si mi padre me consolará un poco. Tampoco la usaría.


   Ahora la pregunta es por qué nunca dirías estas dos frases. ¿Qué tienen de malo?


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## flljob

Yo no las diría así, y creo que nadie que tenga como lengua materna el español las diría.
Supongo que hay un error de concordancia temporal. Incluso si la oración principal está en futuro, diría:
Iré al comedor para ver si mi padre me consuela.


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## manicha

Como hablante nativa, os aseguro que la forma correcta, natural, normal y 100% válida en todos los registros para decir esa frase es: Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba. Creo que tanto Skoll como Sevendays lo han explicado bien. "Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaría" podría valer, pero en ese caso Ramona está comprobando si, en el futuro, si padre estaría dispuesto a consolarla. Me explico. Podría ser algo como "Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaría, en caso de que al día siguiente ella suspendiese el examen".
Pero en cualquier contexto menos rebuscado, lo normal es esa combinación. 
Fui a casa de Pedro para ver si me prestaba dinero. (necesito dinero, y se lo pido a Pedro)
Fui a casa de Pedro para ver si me prestaría dinero. (Tal vez necesite dinero en un futuro, y quiero saber por adelantado si eél estaría dispuesto a prestármelo).
En cuanto a los ejemplos dados, L'inconnu, 
Me preguntó (que) si pensabas ir a la fiesta.
I wondered if you were planning to go to the fiesta.
no es un ejemplo válido. En la oración en castellano, el sujeto es él/ella, no yo. La traducción sería algo así como "He asked me if you here planning yo go to the fiesta".


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## alegna456

Gracias manicha!! Entonces, gramaticamente podria ser "prestaria"? y depende en lo que quieres decir con la oracion o lo que sea el sentido de la oracion?


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## manicha

Podría ser, pero no cuando la frase se dice en sentido general. Es un ejemplo muy, muy rebuscado. El 99,9% de las veces la forma normal es la otra. Parece que es una cuestión que hay que revisar en los libros de gramática española, porque me he dado cuenta de que a muchos hablantes no nativos os parece rara, y sin embargo es una frase normalísima. A ver si algún editor nos lee y lo explica bien en sus libros


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## flljob

No, no es correcto usar el potencial. Lee con cuidado el mensaje 58 de Manicha. Está claro que tiene un sentido completamente diferente.


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## Bandama

chajadan said:


> So I suppose my final question is if this unfamiliar construction is similar in all cases. Please mark the following as grammatical or ungrammatical:
> 
> Yo quería saber si mi hermano me daba consejos. (a future determination, not an attempt to determine something about what is currently happening)
> Fui al cuarto para ver si mi hermano me daba consejos.
> 
> Thanks
> --charlie



Hola.

Creo que no te habían respondido esta pregunta concreta. Espero que te sirva de algo para comprender el uso español del imperfecto que los nativos han señalado ya en varios mensajes y que yo corroboro.

"Yo quería saber si mi hermano me *daría* un consejo" 

(Creo que esto es lo que buscas, aunque es una frase un poco extraña en español porque en este caso no significa que estabas buscando un consejo sino únicamente saber si tu hermano te lo daría o no)

Más común con el condicional sería este ejemplo: 

"Yo quería saber si mi hermano *vendría* con nosotros (al día siguiente)".

que es el pasado de:

"Yo quiero saber si mi hermano *vendrá* con nosotros (mañana)"

Pero ten en cuenta que es más habitual la utilización del presente en este caso, sobre todo cuando la acción no es lejana en el futuro.

"Quiero saber si mi hermano *viene* con nosotros (ahora/ más tarde)"

por lo que el pasado sería con el imperfecto:

"Quería saber si mi hermano *venía* con nosotros (en ese momento/ más tarde)

Nota: En realidad, como ya han señalado en otro mensaje, en el habla coloquial es normal utilizar el imperfecto en lugar del condicional en muchos casos, sobre todo con la función de futuro en el pasado.


Respecto a la otra frase, lo normal es, efectivamente, con el imperfecto:

"Fui al cuarto para ver si mi hermano me *daba* un consejo" 

que es el pasado de:

"Voy al cuarto para ver si mi hermano me *da* un consejo"

Como ves, no se utiliza el futuro en este caso. Y, por lo tanto, en en pasado no tiene ningún sentido utilizar el condicional para expresar "futuro en el pasado".

Tal vez lo veas más claramente con este ejemplo:

"Llama al teatro para ver si *quedan* entradas" (No "si quedarán entradas")

"Llama al teatro para ver si aún te *venden* una entrada" (No "si te venderán una entrada"

Como ves, no importa que la segunda acción (quedar/ vender entradas) sea anterior o posterior a la primera (llamar por teléfono). Lo importante es comunicar una finalidad.


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## L'Inconnu

manicha said:


> Como hablante nativa, os aseguro que la forma correcta, natural, normal y 100% válida en todos los registros para decir esa frase es: Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba.


 
Está claro que esta construcción se usa por hablantes de español. Pero, no es claro que es válido, porque no puedo encontrar un sólo ejemplo de esta clase en ningún dictionario o libro de gramática. ¡Ya, consulté siete! Cuando tu encuentres uno, asegúrate que estará relacionado con la frase dada por chajadan.


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## alegna456

Muchas gracias manicha


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## L'Inconnu

flljob said:


> La oración problema corresponde al siguiente punto: _*Si no hacías lo que él decía, se enfadaba*_.


 
No. Haz caso que en la versión inglés, el tiempo de los verbos son en el pasado. 
If you *did* not do what he *said* he *became* angry.​Eso es porque se trata de acontecimientos que se hacía por hábito. No es igual a la oración problema de chajadan, porque su frasé se trata de un acontecimiento que aún no había pasado de partir del momento cuando Ramona fue al comedor. 




flljob said:


> Corresponde a oraciones del tipo:
> Fui a ver a mi madre para ver si me decía la verdad.
> Concursé para ver si me daban la beca.
> Fui a la biblioteca para investigar quién era el escritor más leído.


Fui a la biblioteca para investigar quién era el escritor más leído.
I went to the library in order to investigate which author’s books *had been* read most frequently. 

Fui a ver a mi madre para ver si me decía la verdad.
I went to see if my mother *would* tell me the truth.​Nota que en la primera frase, en la versión inglés el verbo es en un tiempo pasado, pero en la segunda frase el verbo es en el potencial. Las dos frases no son iguales con respecto al momento que pasa el acontecimiento de la oración dependiente, en comparación con el tiempo de la claúsula independiente.

En la primera frase, es entendido que se *anotó* registros *antes* de tu investigación. En la segunda, aún *no* habías hablado con tu madre al tiempo que partiste. A partir de este momento, de tu punto de vista, lo que tu madre te *dirá* es un acontecimiento que puede o no pasar en el *futuro*. 

Además, el modo del verbo que es lo más apropiado para expresar una incertidumbre es el subjuntivo. 
Fui a ver mi madre, con la esperanza de que me *dijera* la verdad.​


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## elianecanspeak

L'Inconnu said:


> Here are some ´si´ clauses outlined in my Spanish grammar:
> 
> Si *tengo* el dinero compraré el carro
> Si *tuviera* el dinero compraría el carro
> Si *hubiera* _*tenido*_ el dinero habría comprado el carro
> 
> Notice that after ‘si’, the present indicative, the imperfect subjunctive, or the pluperfect subjunctive is used. Moreover, these Spanish constructions parallel English usage.
> 
> If I *have* the time, I’ll do it.
> If I *had* the time, I would do it.
> If I *had had* the time, I would have done it.



There is a problem with your assumption about the English translation of the second sentence, if I correctly understand what you are saying.

The Spanish, which uses the imperfect subjunctive, does not refer to a past event.  It refers to a less time-bound idea, and is better translated as 

*"If I were to have the time I would do it".*  Tuviera is not a past tense  in this usage.


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## alegna456

What is the difference between _*si haya tenido*..._ and _*si hubiera tenido*...
_From my understanding, _haya_ is the present subjunctive of _haber_, yet I believe when translated it would also be "had had." Where as _hubiera_ is the imperfect subjunctive, so then does that mean its translation would be "would have had"? I dont understand the difference in translation when you translate this into English because both _haya tenido_ and _hubiera tenido_ are in essence, in the past tense no?


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## elianecanspeak

The present perfect, for which "haya" is used to conjugate the subjunctive form, is used for very recent events; often used in newspaper articles.

"Si hubiera tenido" means "If I had had (enough time, the money, etc.), ... followed by a past conditional (I would have) . . . habría ido de vacaciones."

I think you can also use "hubiera ido" in the second clause, but check it out in a grammar book


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## L'Inconnu

elianecanspeak said:


> There is a problem with your assumption about the English translation of the second sentence, if I correctly understand what you are saying.
> 
> The Spanish, which uses the imperfect subjunctive, does not refer to a past event. It refers to a less time-bound idea, and is better translated as
> 
> *"If I were to have the time I would do it".* Tuviera is not a past tense in this usage.


 
Nor is the verb 'had' the past tense in the examples I gave you. I was trying to say that Spanish is a reflection of our own language. If I were to say, "I think it’s about time we *bought* a new car", would you say that ‘bought’ is the past tense of the verb ‘to buy’? No, because it’s our subjunctive.

So, you see that there is an excellent correspondence between the verb tenses and modes of the two languages. In fact, this entire controversy is based on exactly this principal. Take the word ‘decir’, for example. Its imperfect form ‘decía’ usually corresponds to our continuous past mode. 'I was saying'. Other translations are possible, but they don't apply to cajadan's example.

I was saying
I had been saying
I used to say/I would say
Let’s say/suppose we say

‘I was saying’ means you were in the process of saying something but never finished saying it. ‘I had been saying’ is more or less the same as ‘I was saying’, except that you were saying it over a period of time. ‘I used to say’ refers to what you did frequently in the past. ‘Let’s say’ is a suggestion. Now, suppose I asked you to consider the following phrase: 
I went to find out if she *was telling* me the truth.​Then, suppose I asked you to choose which of following two phrases most closely matches the meaning of the first phrase?
I went to see if she *had* *told* me the truth
I went to see if she *would tell* me the truth
I presume that you would pick phrase number one. Well, the Spanish speakers seem to think that the above phrase more closely matches phrase number 2. So I told them to show me an example of a phrase in a dictionary or a textbook of Spanish grammar where their imperfect tense corresponds to our conditional tense. They have yet to show me one such example. Which is why I am saying that their usage is colloquial and not suitable for formal writing.


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## flljob

¿Tú te comprabas un coche viejo? Would you buy an old car?

¿Si tuvieras dinero, te comprabas un coche viejo?

Solo quiero aclarar que la oración que originó todo este hilote no es condicional. Es una oración final, en la que la subordinada está compuesta, a su vez, por una principal y una subordinada. La confusión tal vez la origine el hecho de que la subordinada (que es una oración compleja) tiene como principal un verbo en infinitivo. Cambiemos el sujeto de la principal.

Llevé a Ramona a la cocina para que viera si su papá la consolaba. La subordinada forzosamente va en subjuntivo, en imperfecto porque la principal está en pretérito. En la oración original, el sujeto de la principal es el mismo que el de la subordinada, por lo que tiene que ir en infinitivo. Otro ejemplo:

*Voy* a la biblioteca para *averiguar* si *tienen* libros de gramática. Como ves, la subordinada de la subordinada está en indicativo (*tienen*), y el verbo de la subordinada principal está en infinitivo. Si cambias al pasado el verbo de la principal: *Fui* a la biblioteca para *ver* si *tenían* libros de gramática.
Si el sujeto de la subordinada no coincide con el de la principal, tienes que usar obligatoriamente el subjuntivo: *Fuimos* (*nosotros*) a la biblioteca para que *vieras* (*tú*) si *tenían* libros de gramática. La subordinada tiene su verbo principal en imperfecto de subjuntivo para que haya concordancia de tiempos con el de la principal. La subordinada de la subordinada sigue estando en *indicativo*, porque es el hecho que vas a averiguar.


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## Bandama

L'Inconnu said:


> Now, suppose I asked you to consider the following phrase:I went to find out if she *was telling* me the truth.​Then, suppose I asked you to choose which of following two phrases most closely matches the meaning of the first phrase?
> 
> I went to see if she *had* *told* me the truth
> I went to see if she *would tell* me the truth
> I presume that you would pick phrase number one. Well, the Spanish speakers seem to think that the above phrase more closely matches phrase number 2. So I told them to show me an example of a phrase in a dictionary or a textbook of Spanish grammar where their imperfect tense corresponds to our conditional tense. They have yet to show me one such example. Which is why I am saying that their usage is colloquial and not suitable for formal writing.



Hello L'Inconnu,

First of all, I can assure you that this usage of the imperfect tense is not colloquial in Spanish, but the standard one. I'm sorry I cannot provide you with references (I have no grammar books with me), but I hope my experience as a native speaker (as well as the other messages by Spanish speakers) will suffice you.

I can only tell you that the use of "would" in these kind of sentences sounds as strange to me as the imperfect does to you. Something that may help you understand this usage is the fact that "para ver si" conveys the idea of "purpose", and therefore the time relation between the first and the second verb is not important. It is definitively not the same (at least for a native Spanish speaker) as a sentence like: "Me dijo que vendría", in which this relation tells us about whether the second action happened before or after the first one.

As for the sentence you wrote ("I went to find out if she would telling me the truth"), I think all Spanish speakers will tell you it matches number 1(had told). The traslation of "was telling" in this case would be "estaba diciendo", and not "decía". I know that the use of the imperfect tense is not easy for speakers of non-Latin languages, but it is obvious that it cannot always be translated for the past continuous. In these kind of sentences (with "para ver si") we prefer the use of "estaba + gerundio" or "pluscuamperfecto" to stress that the second action was before the first one. If there is not such time breach, we consider it as a pure "pupose" sentence and we don't feel the need of stressing any time relation between the first an second action. This is the case in most situations, in which, yes, we use the imperfect tense and not the conditional.

I hope this helps.


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## L'Inconnu

Bandama said:


> Nota: En realidad, como ya han señalado en otro mensaje, en el habla *coloquial* es normal utilizar el imperfecto en lugar del condicional en muchos casos, sobre todo con la función de futuro en el pasado.


 
En inglés también, si aceptamos que el imperfecto es igual al pretérito o al pasado continuo de inglés. Se hace normalmente con el verbo ‘Ir’
Yo quería saber si mi hermano me *iba* (was going) dar un consejo​Otros verbos son usados de veces.
Yo quería saber si mi hermano *pensaba* (was thinking) a vener con nosotros 

Yo quería saber si mi hermano *podía* (could) vener con nosotros

Yo quería saber si mi hermano *quería* (wanted) vener con nosotros
​


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## roanheads

In the case, only , of reported speech ( which applies in this case ) it is correct to use the imperfect indicative in the subordinate clause.
Also, in an if clause where the condition is equally likely or unlikely to be fulfilled , the subjunctive is not necessary , ( whether it is or not , of course ,may be a matter of opinion )
However, in this thread we are considering reported speech, which to me takes the correct imperfect indicative of " consolaba "


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## flljob

L'Inconnu said:


> En inglés también, si aceptamos que el imperfecto es igual al pretérito o al pasado continuo de inglés. Se hace normalmente con el verbo ‘Ir’
> Yo quería saber si mi hermano me *iba* (was going) dar un consejo​Otros verbos son usados de veces.
> Yo quería saber si mi hermano *pensaba* (was thinking) a vener con nosotros
> 
> Yo quería saber si mi hermano *podía* (could) vener con nosotros
> 
> Yo quería saber si mi hermano *quería* (wanted) vener con nosotros
> ​


 
No sé en inglés, pero en español estas oraciones *no* son condicionales. Son oraciones complejas formadas por una principal y una sustantiva en fundión de complemento directo:

[Yo quería saber] (principal) [si mi hermano *pensaba* (was thinking) venir con nosotros]
La prueba es que la subordinada la puedes sustituir con *lo*:
Yo quería saber*lo*. 

Saludos


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## delimer

Interpreto que esto se debe a que la proposición de propósito (Adverbial Clause of Purpose "so that...") en castellano/español utiliza el pretérito imperfecto  siempre.

Ejemplos: La llamé temprano para que estudiara (_I woke her up early so that she might study) _. Ese "might" es un condicional pero en la traducción debemos usar pasado. Es una cuestión de correlación verbal que difiere en ambos idiomas.


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## manicha

L'Inconnu, aún no ha habido ni un sólo hablante nativo de español que te diga que la oración no es correcta; no es un uso coloquial, es el uso estándar. Como comprenderás, cuando nosotros estudiamos español no sistematizamos las combinaciones verbales válidas para una oración, como se suele hacer cuando se estudia un idioma extranjero; pero de lo que estoy segura es de que podría encontrar cientos de ejemplos en periódicos, libros y demás de frases muy similares a la propuesta.


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## L'Inconnu

Bandama said:


> As for the sentence you wrote ("I went to find out if she was telling me the truth"), I think all Spanish speakers will tell you it matches number 1(had told). The traslation of "was telling" in this case would be "estaba diciendo", and not "decía". I know that the use of the imperfect tense is not easy for speakers of non-Latin languages, but it is obvious that it cannot always be translated for the past continuous. In these kind of sentences (with "para ver si") we prefer the use of "estaba + gerundio" or "pluscuamperfecto" to stress that the second action was before the first one. If there is not such time breach, we consider it as a pure "pupose" sentence and we don't feel the need of stressing any time relation between the first an second action. This is the case in most situations, in which, yes, we use the imperfect tense and not the conditional.


 
So, there is a *practical* difference between _decía_ and _estaba diciendo_. My French background didn’t prepare for this. Essentially, French speakers have no equivalent to _estaba diciendo_. They can only say _decía_. Therefore, they construct chajadan’s sentence much like English speakers do. I _did_ learn something useful from the French, however. Sometimes what sounds ‘cool’ is more important than what is grammatically correct. In some cases, a compromise is possible.
Fue al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre *estuviera* dispuesto a consolarla.

Fue al comedor con la esperanza de que su padre la *consolara*. ​I expect that the first sentence will sound better to native speakers, because it seems more natural to use the subjunctive of the verb ‘estar’. Then, compared to their normal usage, my more sophisticated expression may strike Spanish speakers as being rather eloquent. If that’s too complicated to manage, it is easy to say:
Fue al comedor buscando el consuelo de su padre. ​Finally, I think I can now summarize what I’ve learned about _colloquial_ Spanish usage. English speakers have to recognize cases where ‘was going to’ seems more appropriate than ‘would’, that is, when the hypothetical event will occur in the immediate future. Apparently, Spanish speakers don’t consider the following two sentences to be strictly equivalent.
I went to see if he *was going* *to* help me.
I went to see if he _*would *_help me.
The first sentence suggests that he _may_ help me the moment I see him. The second suggests that he _may_ help me at some more distant time in the future. When we think the first case applies, we drop ‘was going’ and use ‘was helping’.
Fui para ver si me *ayudaba*.​The only unresolved issue is why this usage can’t be found in a dictionary. There are two points of view: 1) the dictionary _dictates_ usage, 2) the dictionary _reflects_ usage. I take it, flljob and other Spanish speakers share the second point of view and, therefore, believe the construction _should_ be included in a desk reference.


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## L'Inconnu

Ya, pienso que comprenderlo.
Ramona went into the dining room to see if her father *was going to* console her. ​Es possible de traducir esta frase como siguiente:
Ramona fue al comedor buscando el consuelo de su padre. ​En esto caso la potencial no se aplica. Pero hay otra traducción que se dice normalmente
Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la *consolaba*_._​No obstante, hay casos donde el verbo _buscar_ no se aplica, y por eso se usa el potencial
I asked him if he *would* *come*.
Le pregunté que si el *vendría*.​


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## flljob

delimer said:


> Interpreto que esto se debe a que la proposición de propósito (Adverbial Clause of Purpose "so that...") en castellano/español utiliza el pretérito imperfecto siempre.
> 
> Ejemplos: La llamé temprano para que estudiara (_I woke her up early so that she might study) _. Ese "might" es un condicional pero en la traducción debemos usar pasado. Es una cuestión de correlación verbal que difiere en ambos idiomas.


 
Solo que la oración principal esté en pasado; si no, el verbo de la subordinada tendría que estar en presente:

La llamo temprano para que estudie.
La llamaré temprano para que estudie.


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## delimer

¡¡¡Correcto!!!


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## SevenDays

Why _should _the Spanish imperfect correspond to the English conditional in cases, such as the Ramona example and countless others, where the Spanish imperfect _doesn’t function _as a conditional?  And if the Spanish imperfect doesn’t translate well into the English conditional, or viceversa, why should the Spanish imperfect be considered questionable or even colloquial? I just don’t follow your logic, L’Inconnu, but perhaps I have misunderstood you.       

The imperfect is more common in Spanish than in English, particularly to speak about the future and the present in the past.  It’s only natural, therefore, to find nuances in the Spanish use that don’t readily translate into English.  In such cases, it seems to me the best course is to understand the meaning, and then figure out how best to convey that meaning in English.   

Perhaps I’ve also misunderstood you in this:
Are you calling _*I asked him if he would come*_ a conditional sentence?  Where is the condition, implied or explicit, to be fulfilled?  I also wonder whether you would consider _*le pregunté si el venía*_ (preterite-imperfect) ungrammatical or colloquial. 

Cheers


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## delimer

"Are you coming alone?" (=¿Venís solo?)
I asked him if he was coming alone. (=Le pregunté si venía solo y me contestó que traía a la novia.)

"Will he come alone?" (=¿Vendrá solo?)
I wondered if he would come alone.(=Me preguntaba si vendría solo.)

Both examples are gramatically correct and colloquial for the simple reason that you're reporting somebody's questions.


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## chajadan

So my current question is about possible ambiguity. Let's say that in the first sentence, la refers to another female, such as Ramona's sister. Ramona is worried about her sister because she heard about her bad experience and she wants to see if her father is currently consoling her, which would fit best:

Ramona se preocupaba del estado de su hermana...
1. Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba.
2. Ramona fue al comedor para ser si su padre estaba consolandola.

In both sentences, "la" refers to Ramona's sister.

Are both fine? Or is 1. not a proper way to ask about what is currently going on and only used to see if the action will be provided? What I'm wondering is if sentence 1. may be correctly used for ~both~ cases, to determine what is on-going ~and~ to determine if it would be supplied.


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## Bandama

chajadan said:


> So my current question is about possible ambiguity. Let's say that in the first sentence, la refers to another female, such as Ramona's sister. Ramona is worried about her sister because she heard about her bad experience and she wants to see if her father is currently consoling her, which would fit best:
> 
> Ramona se preocupaba del estado de su hermana...
> 1. Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba.
> 2. Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre estaba consolandola.
> 
> In both sentences, "la" refers to Ramona's sister.
> 
> Are both fine? Or is 1. not a proper way to ask about what is currently going on and only used to see if the action will be provided? What I'm wondering is if sentence 1. may be correctly used for ~both~ cases, to determine what is on-going ~and~ to determine if it would be supplied.



Hola Chajadan y L'Inconnu.

Voy a escribir en español _para ver si_ me hago entender mejor. Estas dos frases de Chajadan pueden ser bastante útiles. En realidad, lo que vemos es que muchas veces los ejemplos suenan muy rebuscados porque, aparte del tiempo verbal que rige o no en una determinada situación, está el hecho de que no utilizamos todos los verbos de la misma manera. "Consolar", por ejemplo (para seguir con el mismo caso), no tiene mucho sentido para nosotros como una hipótesis de futuro (lo explicaré más tarde), y lo mismo ocurre con muchos otros verbos con los que utilizamos un número restringido de tiempos verbales.

Es importante saber también, como ya dje en otro mensaje, que _*para ver si*_ tiene una connotación de finalidad (purpose) que hace que sólo tenga sentido en presente (o imperfecto, en el pasado) y no en futuro (o condicional, en el pasado). Observen la primera frase de este mensaje.

Así pues, con algunos ejemplos en este foro el hablante nativo tiene que hacer un esfuerzo de la imaginación para comentar qué significan en su idioma porque, aunque puedan ser correctos, nunca se dirían así. De las siguientes frases:

1. Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba.
2. Ramona fue al comedor para ser si su padre estaba consolandola.

yo sólo utilizaría la 2 para el caso que Chajadan expone (si su padre estaba consolando _a su hermana_). En realidad, es una situación un poco extraña, y yo tendería a decir:

"Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la estaba consolando _suficientemente/adecuadamente_" (o algo parecido)

Esto es así, justamente porque _para ver si_ denota finalidad, y en circunstancias normales se utiliza para expresar que lo que se hace tiene como objetivo conseguir un propósito. La frase 1 suena extraña referida a la hermana porque significa en realidad "I went to the dinning room in order for my father to consol her", cuando en realidad quieres decir: ""I went to the dinning room to see if my father was consoling her". Y, claro, expresar la finalidad de un acto que realiza una persona pero que se dirige a otra no es sencillo sin añadir elementos clarificadores. 

Creo que todo sería más sencillo si utilizáramos "*para saber si*", que carece de ese sentido de finalidad. En este caso, las posibilidades (aunque extrañas) serían las siguientes (siempre referidas a la hermana):

1. Ramona fue al comedor para saber si su padre la había consolado/había estado consonlando
(... if her father had consoled/had been consoling her)
2.Ramona fue al comedor para saber si su padre la consolaba/estaba consolando
(...if her father was consoling her)
3. Ramona fue al comedor para saber si su padre la consolaría/iba a consolarla/ la consolará (futuro posible para acción no completada).
(... if her father would/was going to/ will console her)

En cualquier caso, como dije antes, todo esto suena inverosímil por lo que expliqué de los ejemplos y los verbos: normalmente, vamos a ver a otra persona para que nos dé consuelo, no para saber si nos lo está dando o no. Me gustaría encontrar el ejemplo perfecto en la que todas los tiempos perfectos se utilizan indistintamente, pero no es fácil. Esto significa que en el habla corriente no suele haber ambigüedades, como sugería L'Inconnu, porque todas las combinaciones no son posibles por una simple cuestión de lógica y de sentido. En cualqueir caso, ahí va mi intento. Empezaré con un caso en el que las formas continuas no son posibles:

1. Fui al médico para ver/saber si había tenido la gripe A (si la había tenido en el pasado y ya me había curado).
2. Fui al médico para ver/saber si tenía la gripe A (si la tenía en esos momentos)
3 Fui al médíco para ver/saber si iba a tener/tendría/ tendré la gripe A (si era posible que me contagiara en el futuro. De todas maneras, esta últma frase no es común en español. Creo que la mayoría de la gente diría "para saber si tenía riesgo de contagiarme")

Ahora otro ejemplo con formas continuas:

1. Llamé a Juan para saber si había estado jugando al tenis (toda la tarde).
2. Llamé a Juan para saber si habiá jugado al tenis (la tarde anterior).
3. Llamé a Juan para saber si jugaba al tenis (si lo hacía en general)
4. Llamé a Juan para saber si estaba jugando al tenis (si lo estaba haciendo en esos momentos)
5. Llamé a Juan para saber si iba a jugar al tenis (si tenía la intención de hacerlo o no)
6. Llamé a Juan para saber si jugaría al tenis (si estaría dispuesto a hacerlo hipotéticamente en el futuro).

Nota para L'Inconnu: el imperfecto español no es exactamente igual al frances. Entre otras cosas, existe en español la posibilidad del imperfecto continuo, y estas dos formas no son siempre intercambiables, como vemos en el ejemplo de arriba.

En este caso, el uso de para saber que/ para ver que son idénticos, pero esto no es así cuando la frase implica una finalidad.

a. Llamé a Juan *para ver* *si* me devolvía el dinero (lo llamé con el fin de que me devolviera el dinero)
b. Llamé a juan *para saber si* me devolvería el dinero (lo llamé con el fin de_ saber_ si tenía la intención de devolverme el dinero o no).

En el caso "a", como ya hemos visto, no es posible el condicional.

Yo lo que creo que ocurre es que* "would" en inglés tiene un sentido de disposición/voluntad del que el condicional carece en español*. Por eso, cuando se dice en inglés:

"I talked to my boss to see if he would give me a rise/raise"

con el "to see if" no se está expresando sólo una duda sino una finalidad (purpose). Por eso, la traducció correcta *no* puede ser:

"Hablé con mi jefe para saber si me daría un aumento" (Esto suena como una mala traducción de doblaje de películas)

sino

"Hablé con mi jefe para ver si me daba un aumento" 


Hasta luego. Espero haber añadido con estos ejemplos algo de luz a este interesante hilo.


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## chajadan

So Bandama,

How would you say:

Ramona went to the dining room to see if her father was consoling her (the sister).


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## chajadan

Bandama said:


> ...porque _para ver si_ denota finalidad, y en circunstancias normales se utiliza para expresar que lo que se hace tiene como objetivo conseguir un propósito. La frase 1 suena extraña referida a la hermana porque significa en realidad "I went to the dinning room in order for my father to consol her", cuando en realidad quieres decir: ""I went to the dinning room to see if my father was consoling her". Y, claro, expresar la finalidad de un acto que realiza una persona pero que se dirige a otra no es sencillo sin añadir elementos clarificadores.



I went to the dining room in order for my father to console her = Fui al comedor para que mi padre la consolara... ¿no? Tal vez en general no tenga sentido, así como dices, porque el acontecimiento de ir al comedor en sí mismo no cumple ningún requisito de consolar a la hermana.


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## chajadan

Bandama said:


> Creo que todo sería más sencillo si utilizáramos "*para saber si*", que carece de ese sentido de finalidad. En este caso, las posibilidades (aunque extrañas) serían las siguientes (siempre referidas a la hermana):
> 
> [...]
> 3. Ramona fue al comedor para saber si su padre la consolaría/iba a consolarla/ la consolará (futuro posible para acción no completada).
> (... if her father would/was going to/ will console her)




Ésta es la estructura que yo esperaba. Ramona fue al comedor para saber si su padre la consolaría (futuro posible, acción no completada y no garantizada)

De verdad, no veo ninguna diferencia (de finalidad) entre "para ver si" y "para saber si". Como en ingles, las dos frases siguientes me parecen del todo sinónimas:

Ramona went to the dining room to see if her father would console her.
Ramona went to the dining room to find out if her father would console her.

En la frase original, no recibo señales de que quería decir: Ramona went to the dining room to get her father to consoler her -- lo que yo traduciría como "Ramona fue al comedor para conseguir que su padre la consolara."


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## chajadan

Bandama said:


> [...]normalmente, vamos a ver a otra persona para que nos dé consuelo, no para saber si nos lo está dando o no.



Estoy completamente de acuerdo. Es por eso que me extraño la frase original, "si su padre la consolaba" - estoy acostumbrado a que el imperfecto describe una acción repetitiva o que se está desarrollando. Si se estuviera desarrollando, Ramona ya lo sabría y no necesitaría ir al comedor para comprobarlo. Si fuera una reacción repetitiva, presenciar la acción solamente una vez no comprobaría el aspecto repetitivo generalizado.


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## Bandama

chajadan said:


> So Bandama
> 
> How would you say:
> 
> Ramona went to the dining room to see if her father was consoling her (the sister).



"Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la estaba consolando"

Aquí entiendo que la estaba consolando en esos momentos. "La consolaba" suena un poco extraño aquí porque se refiere a la generalidad y, como ya dije, parece necesitar una palabra como "adecuadamente".

Como ves, para ver si pierde a menudo el sentido de finalidad cuando la oración no tiene esa lógica (dos sujetos por ejemplo). Auque no necesariamente:

"La madre acompaño a su hijo para ver si lo admitían por fin en el colegio" (Aquí sí hay finalidad. Ese "por fin" es importante para verlo claro)



> I went to the dining room in order for my father to console her = Fui al comedor para que mi padre la consolara... ¿no? Tal vez en general no tenga sentido, así como dices, porque el acontecimiento de ir al comedor en sí mismo no cumple ningún requisito de consolar a la hermana.


"Fui al comedor para que mi padre la consolara.." es perfecta. Lo que yo digo es que "para ver si + imperfecto" tiene también un significado de finalidad, y en muchos casos es intercambiable con "para que + subjuntivo".

Si pongo "por fin", entonces está más claro el propósito:

"Fui al comedor para ver si mi padre por fin la consolaba" (aunque en este caso particular es un poco extraña la frase)


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## Bandama

> De verdad, no veo ninguna diferencia (de finalidad) entre "para ver si" y "para saber si". Como en ingles, las dos frases siguientes me parecen del todo sinónimas:
> 
> Ramona went to the dining room to see if her father would console her.
> Ramona went to the dining room to find out if her father would console her.
> 
> En la frase original, no recibo señales de que quería decir: Ramona went to the dining room to get her father to consoler her -- lo que yo traduciría como "Ramona fue al comedor para conseguir que su padre la consolara."


Sí la hay en español. No te sé decir por qué, pero es así. La frase original ("...para ver si su padre la consolaba") es prácticamente intercambiable con "Ramona fue al comedor para que su padre la consolara". Yo sólo veo un pequeño matiz de mayor indeterminación en "para ver si".

Lo que está claro es que "para saber si + condicional" no tiene esa connotación, y sólo expresa la duda de saber si la consolará o no. Esta última estructura, al contrario que el inglés, no es habitual en estos casos, probablemente porque (y ésta es mi hipótesis) esa finalidad está implícita en el "would". El hecho es que este tipo de frases en castellano implican finalidad (y no duda, que generalmente no tiene ningún sentido), y esto no se puede expresar con el "Saber si + condicional".


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## L'Inconnu

Ok, he encontrado la referencia que estaba buscando. 
http://www.cuadernoscervantes.com/ele_52_preterito.html​25. Dijo que *llegabas/llegarías* pronto. Nos comentó que el programa *empezaba/empezaría* a las 10 de la noche.

Confirma que en el ejemplo de chajadan se puede usar ‘consolaba’ o ‘consolaría’ cualquiera de los dos sería entendido.


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## L'Inconnu

SevenDays said:


> Why _should _the Spanish imperfect correspond to the English conditional in cases, such as the Ramona example and countless others, where the Spanish imperfect _doesn’t function _as a conditional? And if the Spanish imperfect doesn’t translate well into the English conditional, or viceversa, why should the Spanish imperfect be considered questionable or even colloquial? I just don’t follow your logic, L’Inconnu, but perhaps I have misunderstood you.
> 
> The imperfect is more common in Spanish than in English, particularly to speak about the future and the present in the past. It’s only natural, therefore, to find nuances in the Spanish use that don’t readily translate into English. In such cases, it seems to me the best course is to understand the meaning, and then figure out how best to convey that meaning in English.
> 
> Perhaps I’ve also misunderstood you in this:
> Are you calling _*I asked him if he would come*_ a conditional sentence? Where is the condition, implied or explicit, to be fulfilled? I also wonder whether you would consider _*le pregunté si el venía*_ (preterite-imperfect) ungrammatical or colloquial.
> 
> Cheers


 
All I am trying to say is that the closest English equivalent to 
para ver si me *ayudaba* ​is 
to see if he *was going* *to help* me.​This is not a strictly a conditional in English, but rather what you Spanish speakers are calling ‘_el futuro en el pasado_’. I’m trying to point that since we _do_ use our *past continuous* in cases where Spanish speakers use the *imperfect*, there is indeed a certain correspondance between the two languages. 

The argument seems to be whether or not Spanish speakers can also accept ‘para ver si me *ayudaría*’ as being practically the equivolent of ‘para ver si me *ayudaba*’. Just as ‘to see if he *would* help me’ is basically the same as ‘to see if he was *going to help* me’.

I have now found a reference that seems to suggest that ‘ayudaba’ and ‘ayudaría’ are interchangeable in most cases and, in particular, in chajadan’s example. 
http://www.cuadernoscervantes.com/ele_52_preterito.html​25. Dijo que *llegabas/llegarías* pronto. Nos comentó que el programa *empezaba/empezaría* a las 10 de la noche.


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## Bandama

L'Inconnu said:


> Ok, he encontrado la referencia que estaba buscando.http://www.cuadernoscervantes.com/ele_52_preterito.html​25. Dijo que *llegabas/llegarías* pronto. Nos comentó que el programa *empezaba/empezaría* a las 10 de la noche.
> 
> Confirma que en el ejemplo de chajadan se puede usar ‘consolaba’ o ‘consolaría’ cualquiera de los dos sería entendido.



I'm afraid this is not the same thing. I've had in mind this use of the imperfect tense since the beginning of our discussion, but have never felt this is the case in Chajadan's sentece. The reason for this is simple: no native speaker would say that "para ver si la consolaría" is correct. I think we are dealing with something different, probably related to "para ver si" and its meaning of "purpose".


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## L'Inconnu

delimer said:


> "Are you coming alone?" (=¿Venís solo?)
> I asked him if he was coming alone. (=Le pregunté si venía solo y me contestó que traía a la novia.)
> 
> "Will he come alone?" (=¿Vendrá solo?)
> I wondered if he would come alone.(=Me preguntaba si vendría solo.)
> 
> Both examples are gramatically correct and colloquial for the simple reason that you're reporting somebody's questions.


 
If someone had asked me (before this whole controversy started) to translate "Are you coming alone?" into Spanish, I would have said: "¿Vienes sólo?" I am now curious to know whether or not you find ‘vienes’ to be just as clear or natural sounding as ‘venía’

I asked him if he *was coming* alone = Le pregunté si *venía* solo

We both seem to be using our past continuous mode in this case. But it only works in English because your friend, or whomever you asked, made his decision to come _BEFORE_ you put the question to him. 
"I went to see if he *would* help me" ​The above sentence represents a different idea from an English speaker’s point of view, because he will not have made a decision until _AFTER_ you ask him. It now becomes a ‘si o no’ construction to English speakers. So, how do we English speakers rationalize your usage?
"Fui para ver si me ayudaba"​The closest English equivalent of the same phrase would be:
"I went to see if he *was going* *to help* me".​It’s a bit like trying to squeeze an oval shaped peg into a round whole. It seems, once again, that our past continuous mode best applies to a case where he (the person I go to for help) has _ALREADY_ made his decision _BEFORE_ I ask him. Unfortunately, I can’t find a better match, so it seems that it will have to do.


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## chajadan

L'Inconnu, hiciste un buen trabajo encontrando un fuente académico que demuestra el uso del imperfecto para describir una acción futuro en el contexto del pasado. Antes, nunca había visto en español algo semejante. Es como en inglés:

I asked him if he was coming to the party tomorrow.

en lugar de

I asked him if he was going to come to the party tomorrow.


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## SevenDays

L'Inconnu said:


> Ok, he encontrado la referencia que estaba buscando.
> http://www.cuadernoscervantes.com/ele_52_preterito.html​25. Dijo que *llegabas/llegarías* pronto. Nos comentó que el programa *empezaba/empezaría* a las 10 de la noche.
> 
> Confirma que en el ejemplo de chajadan se puede usar ‘consolaba’ o ‘consolaría’ cualquiera de los dos sería entendido.



Hello

The link you gave us uses examples of reported (indirect) speech; what another person has said.  The link does caution, however, that even in such context the imperfect and the conditional are not _always _interchangeable.  

The Ramona example is not reported speech; it is a narrative that develops from _her perspective_.  If you are going to use the conditional _to mean a future in the past_, then you need to have a condition that justifies the use of this tense; otherwise, the conditional is out of place.  The uncertainty of not knowing what the father does once Ramona is in the dining room isn’t a condition; there is no logical “if…then” that explains Ramona’s decision to go the dining room, and there is no explicit or implied circumstance _that would result_ in her father helping or not helping Ramona.  The uncertainty only speaks to a future where the father _either_ consoles or not consoles Ramona. We just don’t know what he’ll do because such future is yet to happen.  You could expand the Ramona sentence to include a condition, and manicha gave a very good example of it (post #58).  (There is another reason why you need _consolaba_ in the original sentence: sequence of verbs, as Flljob explained in post #55.)  

But the link does show what every native speaker said: the imperfect is used to speak about a future in the past.  There is nothing invalid or colloquial about it, which I think is what you initially argued.

This is just my perspective, but I hope it helps

Cheers


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## chajadan

It is easy to find implied conditions, almost too easy. A simple sentence illustrates this:

Si Ramona fuera al comedor, su padre la consolaría.

I doubt anyone will find a problem with that sentence. There is a condition and a result. Now let's say that we supply the condition to determine the result:

Ramona fue al comedar para ver si su padre la consolaría (si ella fuera al comedor.)

First, I'm becoming more comfortable with "la consolaba" the longer we talk about this (Thanks to all!), and second, even though I just supplied the context to demonstrate the ability to see it that way, I've never believed this was in anyway a conditional sentence. When we say "Me dijeron que vendrían", we don't see that as a conditional sentence either, just as a way of describing the future from the perspective of the past. Somewhere I picked up that the future from the past always used the conditional, but apparently this just isn't so, as shown in at least one situation showed in a reference by L'Inconnu.


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## Melania_3838

Hi all, 

I just wanted to say that I have been lurking on this thread for a couple days now and I must say that all of you have taught me something valuable. This is something they don't teach in formal classes unfortunately. They only say that we should use preterite and imperfect together if something ongoing in the past was interrupted. I guess to make it less confusing for the learners, but I am glad I know this now.

Thanks guys!


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## L'Inconnu

I asked my friend if he *could/would *lend me some money.
Ramona went to see if her father *could*/*would* console her.

The disposition of my friend or Ramona’s father to be able to help *was* established BEFORE either I or Ramona made an inquiry. So English and Spanish speakers agree that the past tense is appropriate here. However, I still don’t know whether or not it is acceptable to say ‘podía dejar’ or ‘podía consolar’ instead of ‘dejaba’ or ‘consolaba’. This distinction is what _really_ confused from the very beginning, since this type of construction normally requires two verbs in both English and French.
Pregunté mi amigo si me *dejaba* (podía dejar?) dinero. 
Ramona fue para ver si su padre la *consolaba* (podía consolar?).​Further confusion arises when we substitute a conditional clause for the past tense. In English, we can substitute ‘would’ for ‘could’ in either of the two sentences. In Spanish, however, it depends on whether the hypothetical event will occur (if it does) immediately or in a more distant future. If the event will occur in the future, you use the conditional. If the event will occur immediately, you generally use the imperfect. However, according to the reference I found, you can also use the conditional for immediate events if you combine it with ‘pronto’. So, if I had expected my friend to give me the money some time in the future, I would say:
Pregunté mi amigo si me *dejaría *dinero.​If, on the other had, I had expected him to give me the money at the moment I asked him, I would say:
Pregunté mi amigo si me *dejaba/dejaría pronto* dinero.​Likewise, I could say:
Ramona fue _para ver si_ su padre la *consolaría* *pronto*. ​


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## Peterrobertini7

L'Inconnu said:


> If someone had asked me (before this whole controversy started) to translate "Are you coming alone?" into Spanish, I would have said: "¿Vienes sólo?" I am now curious to know whether or not you find ‘vienes’ to be just as clear or natural sounding as ‘venía’
> 
> I asked him if he *was coming* alone = Le pregunté si *venía* solo
> 
> We both seem to be using our past continuous mode in this case. But it only works in English because your friend, or whomever you asked, made his decision to come _BEFORE_ you put the question to him. "I went to see if he *would* help me" ​The above sentence represents a different idea from an English speaker’s point of view, because he will not have made a decision until _AFTER_ you ask him. It now becomes a ‘si o no’ construction to English speakers. So, how do we English speakers rationalize your usage?"Fui para ver si me ayudaba"​The closest English equivalent of the same phrase would be:"I went to see if he *was going* *to help* me".​It’s a bit like trying to squeeze an oval shaped peg into a round whole. It seems, once again, that our past continuous mode best applies to a case where he (the person I go to for help) has _ALREADY_ made his decision _BEFORE_ I ask him. Unfortunately, I can’t find a better match, so it seems that it will have to do.



The imperfect in Spanish can be AN UNREAL IMPERFECT:
Debían ahorcarlos (= deberían ahorcarlos)
Si tuviera dinero te daba (=te daría)
the original example with the imperfect is correct ( si me consolaba).


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## delimer

I asked my friend if he *could/would *lend me some money.
Ramona went to see if her father *could*/*would* console her.

My translation as a Spanish native speaker would be:

*Le pregunté a mi amigo si me podría/podía prestar plata./ si me prestaba plata.
Ramona fue a ver si su padre podría/podía consolarla/ si su padre la consolaba.
*


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## chajadan

I'm still concerned about ambiguity.

I asked my friend if he was lending me money. (He extended his hand with some cash in it, but I wasn't exactly sure what he was doing.)

versus

I asked my friend if he would lend me money.

It seems to me that both would would use "si me prestaba dinero", or is that not possible/true?


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## delimer

In Direct Speech we can say:

"¿Podrías/ Podría (=Could) you lend me some money?"
"¿Podés (=Can) you ........?

In Reported Speech:
"Podrías" (conditional, which is a polite formula) remains conditional
"Podés" (present, which is a form of address to "vos") becomes past (=podía)


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## elianecanspeak

*"Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba un poco." *

The way I think of it in English (because it actually makes sense to me in Spanish, although I have not spontaneously used the construction frequently) :

She went into the dining room to see if her father was watching TV (that evening, as was his wont -- as implied by the use of the imperfect).

She went into the dining room to see if her father was consoling her (as he usually did under similar circumstances -- as implied by the use of the imperfect).


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## Peterrobertini7

elianecanspeak said:


> [QUOTE "Ramona fue al comedor para ver si su padre la consolaba un poco."



The way I think of it in English (because it actually makes sense to me in Spanish, although I have not spontaneously used the construction frequently) :

She went into the dining room to see if her father was watching TV (that evening, as was his wont -- as implied by the use of the imperfect).

She went into the dining room to see if her father was consoling her (as he usually did under similar circumstances -- as implied by the use of the imperfect).[/quote]

I wonder because 'would' is an habitual past action, and besides the imperfect has connotation of repeated actions as well. 

*She went into the dining room to see if her father would console her.*


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## Forero

Creo que ya veo la luz, pero todavía dudo un poquito. Por favor, háganme una crítica:

En inglés el infinitivo no tiene tiempo. Se usa el "futuro del pasado" porque la consolación o tendría lugar o no después de que yo fui al comedor:

_I went to the dining room to see whether my father would console me a little._

Pero en español el infinitivo tiene un tiempo "virtual" como el de un subjuntivo:

_Fui al comedor a ver si mi padre me consolaba un poco.
_[cf. _Fui al comedor con mi hermana para que viéramos si nuestro padre nos consolaba._]

La consolación tuvo lugar, o no, simultáneamente con el ver. La vi ocurriendo.


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## Valvs

Forero said:


> En inglés el infinitivo no tiene tiempo. Se usa el "futuro del pasado" porque la consolación o tendría lugar o no después de que yo fui al comedor:
> ....
> La consolación tuvo lugar, o no, simultáneamente con el ver. La vi ocurriendo.



I've been thinking along similar, if not exactly the same, lines. While trying to wrap my mind around what Bandama said about the "finality" of the verb "ver" and the difference between "ir para ver si..." and "ir para saber si...", I finally concluded that in Spanish, "ver" in such constructions must preserve, to a certain degree, its literal meaning and that it implies actual observation of something that is taking place or has taken place (unlike in English, where "to see if", when used figuratively, means pretty much the same as "to find out if"). If my conclusion is correct, then it becomes easier to understand why all the native Spanish speakers who have posted in this thread object so strongly against using the conditional after "para ver si." Apparently, in Spanish you can't "see"  (_ver_) something that has not yet happened, but only _will_ happen.


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## elianecanspeak

Valvs said:


> I Apparently, in Spanish you can't "see"  (_ver_) something that has not yet happaned, but only _will_ happen.



I don't understand what this means.



Valvs said:


> I finally concluded that in Spanish, "ver" in such constructions must preserve, to a certain degree, its literal meaning and that it implies actual observation of something that is taking place or has taken place (unlike in English, where "to see if", when used figuratively, means pretty much the same as "to find out if").



In my LaRousse: (ver=comprobar)
"Voy a ir  lo que pasa"
"Eso habrá por verlo"  [*Elianecanspeak's edit*: this was wrong: I conflated *"Eso habrá que verlo",* as Valvs points out , with "*eso está por ver*"  --Sorry


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## Valvs

elianecanspeak said:


> I don't understand what this means.


What I tried to say is that (if what I deduced from  Bandama's explanations correct) you can't use the verb "ver" (or, more specifically, the phrase "ver si") with regard to something that hasn't happened or started to happen yet. 
In English, you can say "I am here to see if the plane will arrive on time."
In Spanish, you cannot use "para ver si" in the same fashion (again, if I understood Badama's posts correctly).
It will have to be either 
(a)  Estoy aquí para *ver* si el vuelo *llega* a su hora
or (if you want to use the future tense)
(b)  Estoy aquí para *saber* si el vuelo *llegará* a su hora.
But, aparently (and if I understood the Badama's posts correctly ) , you can't say 
(c) Estoy aquí para *ver* si el vuelo *llegará* a su hora.



elianecanspeak said:


> "Eso habrá por verlo"


That's a totally different construction. Actually, I've never encountered it before. Are you sure that your dictionary says "Eso habrá *por* verlo" and not "Eso habrá *que* verlo"?


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## Bandama

Valvs said:


> I've been thinking along similar, if not exactly the same, lines. While trying to wrap my mind around what Bandama said about the "finality" of the verb "ver" and the difference between "ir para ver si..." and "ir para saber si...", I finally concluded that in Spanish, "ver" in such constructions must preserve, to a certain degree, its literal meaning and that it implies actual observation of something that is taking place or has taken place (unlike in English, where "to see if", when used figuratively, means pretty much the same as "to find out if"). If my conclusion is correct, then it becomes easier to understand why all the native Spanish speakers who have posted in this thread object so strongly against using the conditional after "para ver si." Apparently, in Spanish you can't "see"  (_ver_) something that has not yet happened, but only _will_ happen.



This is an interesting conclusion, Valvs. I haven't had time to think of it in as many examples as possible, but it seems particularly relevant for the case we are discussing here. As I said in my messages (and, yes, you understood me well ) "para ver si" has a connotation of "purpose" which your observation clarifies.

It's true that I can't think of examples in which we use "para ver si + future" without it sounding awkward. However, it is true, too, that in Spanish we tend not to use the future as much as in English in these kind of constructions.

"Estoy aquí para saber si el vuelo llegará a su hora" sounds correct but infrequent. In fact, in normal circumstances we would say this in the present. This is also the case with verbs that describe a more precise action, such as "comprobar": the normal sentence being: "Estoy aquí para comprobar si el vuelo llega a su hora", and not "llegará".

In fact, some of the last messages have thrown new light on this topic, and I think Forero's contribution is a very interesting one. The conclusion of all this seems to be that there is a different use of the future and the conditional in English and Spanish, something which often causes problems to speakers of either language, and which has to be taken into consideration when translating these kind of senteces.


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## elianecanspeak

Valvs said:


> That's a totally different construction. Actually, I've never encountered it before. Are you sure that your dictionary says "Eso habrá *por* verlo" and not "Eso habrá *que* verlo"?



Sorry -- I conflated "Eso habrá que verlo" with "eso está por ver"


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## SevenDays

Forero said:


> Creo que ya veo la luz, pero todavía dudo un poquito. Por favor, háganme una crítica:
> 
> En inglés el infinitivo no tiene tiempo. Se usa el "futuro del pasado" porque la consolación o tendría lugar o no después de que yo fui al comedor:
> 
> _I went to the dining room to see whether my father would console me a little._



That’s precisely the point in Spanish. The only difference is that, to express this future in the past, English uses the modal would; Spanish uses the imperfect consolaba



> Pero en español el infinitivo tiene un tiempo "virtual" como el de un subjuntivo:
> 
> _Fui al comedor a ver si mi padre me consolaba un poco.
> _[cf. _Fui al comedor con mi hermana para que viéramos si nuestro padre nos consolaba._]
> 
> La consolación tuvo lugar, o no, simultáneamente con el ver. La vi ocurriendo.




The Spanish infinitive, like its English counterpart, doesn’t indicate tense by itself, and I wouldn’t say that that the Spanish infinitive has a virtual subjunctive temporal aspect.  I understand what you are saying, but wouldn’t your reasoning also apply to English too?  After all, “to see” and “to console” happen simultaneously—we don’t know _if_ the father *would* console Ramona until we see i_f_ the father *is* consoling Ramona, so the actions of “seeing” and “consoling” occur at the same time.  I hope I haven’t misunderstood your point.     

Cheers


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## SevenDays

Valvs said:


> I've been thinking along similar, if not exactly the same, lines. While trying to wrap my mind around what Bandama said about the "finality" of the verb "ver" and the difference between "ir para ver si..." and "ir para saber si...", I finally concluded that in Spanish, "ver" in such constructions must preserve, to a certain degree, its literal meaning and that it implies actual observation of something that is taking place or has taken place (unlike in English, where "to see if", when used figuratively, means pretty much the same as "to find out if"). If my conclusion is correct, then it becomes easier to understand why all the native Spanish speakers who have posted in this thread object so strongly against using the conditional after "para ver si." Apparently, in Spanish you can't "see"  (_ver_) something that has not yet happened, but only _will_ happen.



Hello

I’m not sure the confusion rests in the difference between “_para ver si_” and “_para saber si,_” and I doubt whether using “_para saber si”_ would put all doubts to rest (but I could be wrong).  Whatever nuances separate “_to see_” and “_to know”_ work just as well in Spanish and they do in English, but it is an interesting point you raise, and I may be missing something to this angle.  

I think the confusion may be in part that, in isolation, _*would console*_ is generally translated as _*consolaría*_; therefore, whenever *would console *appears in a sentence, some automatically assume the Spanish equivalent *must *be _*consolaría*_.  The Ramona example shows that’s just not the case.  The key in translation is understanding the overall meaning, not what certain words mean in isolation.

Cheers


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## L'Inconnu

Sköll said:


> I just point out that the use of SI in the original sentence of this thread is not similar to a conditional sentence.


 
I have been giving this quite a bit of thought. My current view is that the ‘if’ used in the Ramona example corresponds to the same ‘if’ in if-then statements. 
a)If her boss *had* the money, he *would* give her a raise.​Notice that the past tense (really the past subjunctive) is used in the if-clause and the conditional form of the verb is in the independent clause or conclusion or the phrase. In my view, a sentence like:
1) She asked her boss if he *would* give her a raise.​is just an abbreviation of the more complete thought: 
b) She asked her boss if he *had* the money and *would* give her a raise. 
​This simplification works, because we know that if she receives a raise, the condition or prerequisite in the if-clause must necessarily be true. Similarly, we often express the same thought as follows:
2) She asked her boss if he *could* give her a raise. ​In sentence (2), the indirect question is aimed at determining whether the prerequisite in the if-clause is true. If so, if her boss has the money, _presumably_ he would give her a raise. Notice that the past tense is used in sentence (2), just as it is used in the if-clauses of (a) and (b). This is because if the condition _were_ true, it would have been true BEFORE the question was posed. If we examine the following sentences, we can see that Spanish reasoning doesn’t match ours in the case of if-then statements. 
¿Si *tuvieras* dinero, te *comprabas* un coche viejo?​Notice that he uses the imperfecto of the verb comparar, where we expected him to use its conditional form. I now understand the sentence to mean:
¿If you *had* (the) money, *would* you buy an old car?




Now lets look at one of Bandama’s phrases:

Yo quería saber si mi hermano me *daría* un consejo 
​The sentence looks normal enough. He has put his verb in the dependent clause in its conditional mode, as we English speakers expected. However, he goes on to explain that the conditional form of the verb is really aimed at determining if his brother was _predisposed_ to give advice, rather than to determine whether the person asking the question would actually receive any. 
(Creo que esto es lo que buscas, aunque es una frase un poco extraña en español porque en este caso no significa que estabas buscando un consejo sino únicamente saber si tu hermano te lo daría o no).​In other words the question is aimed at the if-clause of an if-then statement. It is aimed at establishing whether his brother is capable of giving advice, rather than whether or not he will actually give it. 
If my brother *could*, he would give me advice. ​So now the _paradox_ is complete. Spaniards use their past tense where we use ‘would’, and they use ‘would’ where we use our past tense. 

"Yo quería saber si mi hermano me *daría *un consejo"
"I wanted to know if my brother _*could*_ give me advice." 

As, I have already explained, this distinction makes little difference to English speakers. However, Spaniards _insist_ that we use the preterit when the question is aimed at addressing the conclusion of an if-then phrase, rather than establishing whether or not some prerequisite is satisfied.

I found this paradox very puzzling. So, I asked French speakers how they would express the Ramona phrase in their language. They cast the deciding vote in our favor. Some French speakers chose ‘consolerait’ (consolaría, would console), others chose ‘pouvait consoler’ (podía consolar, could console), and still others chose ‘voulait bien consoler’ (quería consolar, were willing to console). Although it could be debated which expression sounds most natural and/or is most appropriate in a given context, the French equivalents of the following constructions may also be adopted: ‘podría consolar’ (would be able to console), ‘querría consolar (would like to console), ‘iba consolar’ (was going to console). 

The most important point is that the French equivalent of ‘consolaba’ (consolait) is ‘muy, muy resbucando’ (hard to find), apparently because it looks too much like ‘estaba consolando’, which is not what Spanish speakers intend to say.

So my overall conclusion is that Spanish usage is the unusual one in this case. That being said, I agree with manicha in that the construction SHOULD be included in a Spanish grammar book. If they had done so in the first place, we could have avoided this whole controversy.


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## Forero

_Will_/_would_ indica que la consolación sigue el ir (¿se dice?). En inglés no importa cuándo viera, sino que lo único que debe expresar el tiempo de _console_ es su relación con  el tiempo de _go_:
_
I went to the dining room to see whether my father would console me a little.
__I'm going to the dining room to see whether my father will console me a little._

"I'm going" es tiempo presente, y después debe ser "will console".
"I went" es tiempo pasado, y después debe ser "would console".

Me parece que los hispanohablantes están diciendo que no conviene _consolaría_ porque la consolación no puede seguir el ver, así como en inglés cuando es "see" que nos da el tiempo:

_I see that my father will console me._ 
_I see that my father consoles me. 

I saw that my father would console me. 
I saw that my father consoled me. 

I can believe my father will console me. 
__Fui al comedor para poder creer que mi padre me consolaría. _*¿*posible*?*


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## Forero

Re: _She asked her boss if he *had* the money and *would* give her a raise. 

_I see this _would_ as past tense of _will_ (as for "future tense") and _if_ = "whether":

Ella preguntó al jefe si él *tenía* el dinero y le *daría* un aumento.

_Little does Ramona know that her father will soon be needing to be consoled himself._ [present ... future]
_ Little did Ramona know that her father would soon be needing to be consoled himself._ [past ... future of the past]
_ She did not know if her father would soon be needing to be consoled himself._ [past ... future of the past]
_
She did not know if her father would console her, so she went to see._ [past ... future of the past]
No sabía si su padre la consolaría, y por eso fue a verlo. *¿*se dice así*?* _lo_ = "que si su padre la consola...".


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## elianecanspeak

Forero said:


> _I see that my father will console me._
> 
> I saw that my father would console me.
> 
> *¿*



But?:
*I see that my father will console m*e [after all. I just have to let him know how this really affects me.]

 [By his forgiving expression] *I saw that my father would console me*, [so I sat down by him and put my head on his shoulder]. 

I may just be missing the point.


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## Forero

elianecanspeak said:


> But?:
> *I see that my father will console m*e [after all. I just have to let him know how this really affects me.]
> 
> [By his forgiving expression] *I saw that my father would console me*, [so I sat down by him and put my head on his shoulder].
> 
> I may just be missing the point.


Entonces, ¿pueden decirse:

_Veo que mi padre me consolará.
_y
_Vi que mi padre me consolaría.

_?

(Maybe this is the point.)


----------



## Sköll

L'Inconnu said:


> I have been giving this quite a bit of thought. My current view is that the ‘if’ used in the Ramona example corresponds to the same ‘if’ in if-then statements.a)If her boss *had* the money, he *would* give her a raise.​Notice that the past tense (really the past subjunctive) is used in the if-clause and the conditional form of the verb is in the independent clause or conclusion or the phrase. In my view, a sentence like:1) She asked her boss if he *would* give her a raise.​is just an abbreviation of the more complete thought:b) She asked her boss if he *had* the money and *would* give her a raise.
> ​This simplification works, because we know that if she receives a raise, the condition or prerequisite in the if-clause must necessarily be true. Similarly, we often express the same thought as follows:2) She asked her boss if he *could* give her a raise. ​In sentence (2), the indirect question is aimed at determining whether the prerequisite in the if-clause is true. If so, if her boss has the money, _presumably_ he would give her a raise. Notice that the past tense is used in sentence (2), just as it is used in the if-clauses of (a) and (b). This is because if the condition _were_ true, it would have been true BEFORE the question was posed. If we examine the following sentences, we can see that Spanish reasoning doesn’t match ours in the case of if-then statements.¿Si *tuvieras* dinero, te *comprabas* un coche viejo?​Notice that he uses the imperfecto of the verb comparar, where we expected him to use its conditional form. I now understand the sentence to mean:¿If you *had* (the) money, *would* you buy an old car?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Now lets look at one of Bandama’s phrases:
> 
> Yo quería saber si mi hermano me *daría* un consejo
> ​The sentence looks normal enough. He has put his verb in the dependent clause in its conditional mode, as we English speakers expected. However, he goes on to explain that the conditional form of the verb is really aimed at determining if his brother was _predisposed_ to give advice, rather than to determine whether the person asking the question would actually receive any.(Creo que esto es lo que buscas, aunque es una frase un poco extraña en español porque en este caso no significa que estabas buscando un consejo sino únicamente saber si tu hermano te lo daría o no).​In other words the question is aimed at the if-clause of an if-then statement. It is aimed at establishing whether his brother is capable of giving advice, rather than whether or not he will actually give it.If my brother *could*, he would give me advice. ​So now the _paradox_ is complete. Spaniards use their past tense where we use ‘would’, and they use ‘would’ where we use our past tense.
> 
> "Yo quería saber si mi hermano me *daría *un consejo"
> "I wanted to know if my brother _*could*_ give me advice."
> 
> As, I have already explained, this distinction makes little difference to English speakers. However, Spaniards _insist_ that we use the preterit when the question is aimed at addressing the conclusion of an if-then phrase, rather than establishing whether or not some prerequisite is satisfied.
> 
> I found this paradox very puzzling. So, I asked French speakers how they would express the Ramona phrase in their language. They cast the deciding vote in our favor. Some French speakers chose ‘consolerait’ (consolaría, would console), others chose ‘pouvait consoler’ (podía consolar, could console), and still others chose ‘voulait bien consoler’ (quería consolar, were willing to console). Although it could be debated which expression sounds most natural and/or is most appropriate in a given context, the French equivalents of the following constructions may also be adopted: ‘podría consolar’ (would be able to console), ‘querría consolar (would like to console), ‘iba consolar’ (was going to console).
> 
> The most important point is that the French equivalent of ‘consolaba’ (consolait) is ‘muy, muy resbucando’ (hard to find), apparently because it looks too much like ‘estaba consolando’, which is not what Spanish speakers intend to say.
> 
> So my overall conclusion is that Spanish usage is the unusual one in this case. That being said, I agree with manicha in that the construction SHOULD be included in a Spanish grammar book. If they had done so in the first place, we could have avoided this whole controversy.



Unfortunately, I don't follow what you are saying. An if-then statement is a logical statement: If A is true then B is true. It necessarily follows that if B is not true then A is not true.

She asked her boss if he *would* give her a raise.

For this to be an if-then statement, the meaning has to be (ignoring the tense): 
If he gives her a raise, then she asks her boss.

This statement is, of course, nonsense both semantically and syntactically.


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## manicha

L'inconnu, no estoy de acuerdo con tu asociación de que la frase 1) She asked her boss if he *would* give her a raise sea una abreviación de 2) She asked her boss if he *had* the money and *would* give her a raise. Ella puede saber perfectamente que el jefe tiene el dinero y, aún así, dudar si le dará el aumento de sueldo o no. Es condición "necesaria", pero no "suficiente". Lo mismo sucede en el otro ejemplo: el hermano puede perfectamente ser capaz de dar el consejo, pero simplemente no darlo, porque no le da la gana. Así que en la oración "Quería saber si mi hermano me daría un consejo", estamos simplemente verificando si nos lo daría, en caso de pedírselo (pero no se lo estamos pidiendo). Si lo que quisiéramos es saber si nos lo puede dar, usaríamos el verbo poder en la oración. 

Creo que Valvs y Bandama han hecho una aportación muy interesante con respecto a "para ver si". Efectivamente, si vas a ver algo, ese algo tiene que haber pasado, estar pasando o como mucho, estar a punto de pasar (de modo que empiece nada más tú "vayas a ver", y efectivamente puedas verlo). Así que creo que los no hispano-hablantes deberíais pensar en "check" y no en "find out".

Creo que nos estamos centrando mucho en la relación en el tiempo entre los dos tiempos verbales de la oración, y me parece que no es tan importante. Por ejemplo, es tan correcto: 
Fui a cajero para ver si tenía dinero en la cuenta (y tener el dinero es anterior a ir al cajero) como
Fui a casa de Juan para ver si tomaba un café conmigo (y tomar un café es posterior a ir a casa de Juan, de hecho hasta que vaya a su casa y se lo proponga, no sabré si viene o no).
En el primer caso, la acción es anterior, y en el segundo, inmediatamente posterior. Y en los dos casos, se utiliza el imperfecto. 

El uso del condicional sólo sería valido cuando nos referimos a un futuro aún lejano e hipotético, que puede producirse o no, según las circunstancias. 
Fui a casa de Juan para ver si tomaría un café conmigo . ¿El mes que viene, el año que viene? Desde luego, no lo estoy invitando a tomarlo en ese momento. Tal cual, la frase significaría, más o menos, que aún no sé si voy a ir a tomar café, pero quiero saber si Juan lo tomaría conmigo, en caso de que yo decidiese tomarlo. Es decir, estoy comprobando su predisposición, no su reacción, ya que de momento no le he invitado a ese café.  

Como ya he dicho en otro post, la frase es posible, pero muy rebuscada. Volviendo al ejemplo de Ramona, si su intención es ver si su padre la consuela, o no, en ese momento, hay que usar "consolaba". 
Por cierto, ¿cuáles serían las traducciones al inglés de las dos frases puestas como ejemplo?
Fui a cajero para ver si tenía dinero en la cuenta 
Fui a casa de Juan para ver si tomaba un café conmigo 

Espero vuestras respuestas.


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## elianecanspeak

Muchas gracias manicha por el respuesto tan claro y elegante.  Voy a copiarlo para poder consultarlo facilmente.

_
Por favor •	no dudes en corregir mis errores._


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## manicha

Gracias, Elianecanspeak. Por cierto, es respuesta clara, en femenino.


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## L'Inconnu

Sköll said:


> Unfortunately, I don't follow what you are saying. An if-then statement is a logical statement: If A is true then B is true. It necessarily follows that if B is not true then A is not true.
> 
> She asked her boss if he *would* give her a raise.
> 
> For this to be an if-then statement, the meaning has to be (ignoring the tense):
> If he gives her a raise, then she asks her boss.
> 
> This statement is, of course, nonsense both semantically and syntactically.


 
I am not saying that ‘whether or not’ phrases are _grammatically_ equivalent to if-then statements. I am saying that they are _logically_ equivalent to them. 
If he *can* do it, he *will* do it. ​The above if-then statement addresses the issue of _whether or not_ a person is *able* _and_ *willing* to do something. _If_ we know that both these conditions are met, we can expect him to do it. _If_ we don’t know if these conditions are met, we can ask a related question. 
Is he *able* and *willing* to do it?​We can ask this same question indirectly:
I wonder if he is *able* and *willing* to do it?​We can ask questions that address either aspect of the corresponding if-then statement. 
I wonder if he *can* do it?
I wonder if he *will* do it?​In either of the above two questions, if we know that one condition is met, and we assume that the other condition is also true, we can expect him to do it. If we expressed our thought in the past we would change 'can' to 'could' and 'will' to 'would'.
I _wondered_ if he *could* do it?
I _wondered_ if he *would* do it?​Given that the above two questions are _logically_ equivalent, the words *could* and *would* can be used interchangeably in the following sentence. 
Ramona _went_ to see if her father *could/would* console her.​It follows that we can expect that either or the following two sentences to be correct in Spanish. 
1) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *podía* _consolar_.
2) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *consolaría*. ​Not withstanding the fact that phrases (1) and (2) are _logically_ equivalent, many Spanish speakers insist that phrase (1) is the only correct one. Apparently, they believe that it is _grammatically_ necessary to observe temporal consistency between the independent and dependent clauses. That is, if the verb in the independent clause is in a past tense mode, the verb in the dependent clause _must_ also be in a past tense mode. Yet, according to our grammar texts and/or dictionaries, the preterit (or another past tense mode) of one verb can coexist with the conditional mode of another verb in the same phrase: 
No me *dijo* si *iría* o no a la fiesta.
Maria *decía* que *vendría* mañana.
*Creí* que a estas horas ya lo *habría* terminado​So, the question you had from the very beginning is now mine also. Is there some _logical_ or _grammatical_ distinction between the Ramona phrase and the above examples that allows the conditional to be used in one case but not the other?


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## Bandama

I think we've already discussed this. Apart from the Spanish preference for the imperfect tense and the scarce use of the conditional in these kind of senteces (it seems more restricted to expressing conditional than future in the past), there is the fact (I wrote extensively about it in previous messages) that "para ver si + imperfecto" conveys the idea of "purpose", and this sentence _demands_ purpose.


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## manicha

L'inconnu, no acabo de entender tu argumentación. Desde mi punto de vista -me gustaría saber lo que opinan los demás hispanohablantes- las frases 
1) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *podía* _consolar_.
2) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *consolaría.*
no son lógicamente equivalentes, sino que expresan conceptos distintos. 
Ahora seguiré con mi argumentación, pero antes déjame aclarar que la expresión debería ser "fue a ver" y no "fue para ver", a menos que indiques a dónde fue Ramona, en una frase del tipo "Ramona fue al salón para ver si su padre la podía consolar". 
Siguiendo con el tema, como mi dominio de inglés es menor que el tuyo, acepto que "Ramona went to see if her father could/would console her" significan exactamente lo mismo. Pero las traducciones al castellano señaladas con los números 1 y 2 expresan conceptos distintos. Está claro que no hay una correspondencia. En el primer caso, lo que quiere decir es que Ramona va a comprobar si su padre está en disposición de consolarla en ese momento (lo cual no quiere decir necesariamente que vaya a hacerlo, porque estamos hablando de la posibilidad, no de la realización de esa posibilidad), y en el segundo, si -en caso de que Ramona necesitase consuelo en el futuro- su padre estaría dispuesto a ofrecérselo. 
En cuanto a tus ejemplos finales, creo que es importante señalar que los dos primeros ejemplos son "reported speech", y no es el caso de nuestra querida Ramona, y el tercero tiene algo en común con los dos primeros. No estás narrando una secuencia de hechos en el pasado, sino expresando lo dicho, opinado o pensado por una persona en el pasado. Por supuesto que las frases que ofreces son correctas, pero son de tipo distinto a la que originó este tremendo post. Así que pienso que la diferencia gramatical que pedías puede ser esa, que en los casos que ofreces el primer verbo pertenece a ese grupo de verbos tipo decir, creer, opinar, pensar, etc, y por tanto, se pueden considerar estilo indirecto.


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## franmadrid

As a Spanish native speaker, I also agree on the point of view that´s been held by the native speakers.
"Ramona fue a ver si su padre la consolaba" - She needed to be consoled, so she went to see if her father would console her
"Ramona fue a ver si su padre la consolaría" - This sentence seems to be incompleted. She went to see if her father would console her in case she needed to be consoled some time in the future.
Excuse my English!!


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## L'Inconnu

manicha said:


> L'inconnu, no acabo de entender tu argumentación. Desde mi punto de vista -me gustaría saber lo que opinan los demás hispanohablantes- las frases
> 1) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *podía* _consolar_.
> 2) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *consolaría.*
> no son lógicamente equivalentes, sino que expresan conceptos distintos.


 
De acuerdo. Son conceptos semejantes pero, sin embargo, distintos. De punto de vista de un hablante de inglés:
_*Could* _= tener la capacidad, pero no por fuerza la voluntad que hacer.
*Would *=tener la capacidad y la voluntad, y por eso hará. ​De esto punto de vista ‘would’ va mas directamente al punto del asunto. En muchos casos, la distinción no tiene importancia. Pero, de vez en cuando el uso cambia dependiendo del contexto. Por ejemplo, ‘could’ podría ser menos molesto en el contexto siguiente:
I was wondering if you *could* loan me some money.​Ya, mi impresión es que los españoles prefieren paradójicamente la condicional para la misma razón.
¿Me preguntaba si me *dejaría* (podía dejar?) dinero? ​


manicha said:


> acepto que "Ramona went to see if her father could/would console her" significan exactamente lo mismo.


 
Prácticamente igual en esto caso. 



manicha said:


> En el primer caso, lo que quiere decir es que Ramona va a comprobar si su padre está en disposición de consolarla en ese momento (lo cual no quiere decir necesariamente que vaya a hacerlo, porque estamos hablando de la posibilidad, no de la realización de esa posibilidad).


 
Eso quiere decir lo mismo en inglés también




manicha said:


> en el segundo, si -en caso de que Ramona necesitase consuelo en el futuro- su padre estaría dispuesto a ofrecérselo.


 
¡Ya te comprendo! El futuro mas *lejano* en comparación con el momento cuando Ramona encuentra su padre. En inglés ‘would’ es usado en los dos casos. La distinción temporal es entendido enteramente de contexto. ¡Pero ‘could’ no es usado para el futuro léjano! 
What *would* happen if one day my mariage with José failed? *Would* my father console me then?
¿Qué pasaría si un día mi matrimonio con José fracasara? ¿Entonces, mi padre me *consolaría*?

Crying, Ramona went to see if her father *would*/*could* console her.
Lloranda, Ramona fue para ver si su padre la *consolaba*_._​


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## L'Inconnu

franmadrid said:


> As a Spanish native speaker, I also agree on the point of view that´s been held by the native speakers.
> "Ramona fue a ver si su padre la consolaba" - She needed to be consoled, so she went to see if her father would console her
> "Ramona fue a ver si su padre la consolaría" - This sentence seems to be incompleted. She went to see if her father would console her in case she needed to be consoled some time in the future.
> Excuse my English!!


 
1) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *consolaba*.
2) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *consolaría*. 

From the very beginning I confused sentence (1) with:
Ramona fue para ver si su padre la *estaba* *consolando*.​Much controversy would have been avoided if my grammar book had addressed a special application of the _imperfecto de indicativo_ para _el futuro en el pasado_. My current understanding is that sentence (1) is practically the equivalent of: 
Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *iba *_a_ _consolar_.
Ramona _went_ to see if her father *was going *_to console_ her. ​As I see it, ‘going to do’ is a close match for ‘hacía’ in many cases: 
Le pregunté si *venía* sólo y me contestó que *traía* a la novia.​If I understand the above sentence correctly, the person you asked was not already en route. That is, at the moment you asked the question, he still was making travel plans. If so, the following sentence would be a good translation:
I asked him if he *was* *going to/would* come alone. But he told me he *was going to/would* bring his fiancée.​Note: We can also use was coming/was bringing in the same context. We can also use was coming/was bringing if your friend was already en route. In such a case, however, we would not use was going to/would come/bring. 

Our ‘going to’ refers to an event that _may_ happen in the immediate future, but it is not used in if-then statements. Therefore, ‘would’ is a better match for the imperfecto in the following sentence:
¿Si tuvieras dinero te *comprabas* un coche?
Si you had money, *would* you buy a car?​"Going to’ may or may not apply to reported speech. If there is a greater than usual sense of immediacy, it does: 
Le pregunté a mi amigo si me *prestaba* plata.​If this is the first time you asked your friend for money, you would say:
I asked my friend if he *would* lend me some money.​If, on the other hand, you had asked him this same question on a previous occasion, and he told you that he needed to ask his wife for permission and, finally, some time later you asked him the same question again, you would say:
I asked my friend if _finally_ he *would/was going to* lend me some money.​As you can see, our ‘going to’ applies to some cases, but not all. Whereas our ‘would do’ applies to all the above examples. Moreover, no English speaker would tell you that the following sentence is incorrect:
Ramona _went _to see if her father *would* console her.​We assumed that Spanish speakers used their conditional mode in the same general manner that we use ‘would’. It follows that even though a Spanish speaker may have a preference for sentence (1), sentence (2) should still be acceptable. So, this is still a point of confusion.


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## Forero

I have another theory.

Apparently "para saber si" can be followed by any appropriate tense, à l'anglaise, but not "para ver si". What is the difference between them?

A. She went to the living room to find out whether her father would console her.
B. She went to the living room to see whether her father would console her.

I think we have our answer from the Spanish natives' point of view, and I believe I can see it now. "Para ver si" suggests purpose, but "para saber si" suggests finding out something rather concrete by comparison (whether he would, or whether he wouldn't).

Consider the word "might", as in "Open mine eyes that I might see", the "might" that corresponds to the subjunctive after "para que". To me, changing "would" to "might" fits sentence B better than sentence A, because, whereas one can go see about something hypothetical, one can only know or go find out something that is real.

If that makes sense, we can look at the next part of my theory ...

A subordinate clause, for example an "if", "whenever", or "whether" clause, often contains a simplified tense:

I will see you when (that) you will have arrived. [Older English/French version]
I will see you when you arrive. [Spanish or most common modern English version]

This applies especially to modern Spanish subjunctive clauses, in which there is no distinction between present and future or between past (imperfect or preterite) and "future in the past".

Thus, as has been suggested, we English speakers might expect an imperfect subjunctive in this context. But there is another "rule" that applies here: A clause subordinate to a subjunctive clause does not normally "inherit" the subjunctive in Spanish. For example:

Fue al comedor con su hermano para que vieran los dos si su padre la consolara consolaba.

Imperfect subjunctive in the clause subordinate to the subjunctive clause reverts to indicative, but retains the simplified tense.

The last "rule", the one that gives us our problem sentence, is that when the subject is the same person, the infinitive is used instead of the subjunctive. But the rest of the structure remains the same.

I hope this makes sense.


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## VivaReggaeton88

1.) *Yo voy al comedor para ver si mi madre me consuela.* 
(también puedo usar 'consuele' si realmente dudo que mi madre me pueda consolar.)

Vale, creo que todos estamos de acuerdo de que la 1ra es correcta.

2.) *Yo fui al comedor para ver si mi madre me consolaría.*

Para mí, ésta no es correcta porque el uso del condicional implica una duda futurosa, y esta frase no la queremos en el futuro.

3.) *Yo fui al comedor para ver si mi madre me consolaba.*

La 3ra no me gusta porque el uso de "consolaba" y no "podía consolar" puede decir que mi madre me estaba consolando, y esto no puede ser porque todavía no había entrado al comedor.

4.) *Yo fui al comedor para ver si mi madre me podía conselar.*

Para mí, es ésta la que me parece mejor que todas porque tiene un signifcado bien claro.

Espero que yo haya contribuido algo.


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## L'Inconnu

manicha said:


> En cuanto a tus ejemplos finales, creo que es importante señalar que los dos primeros ejemplos son "reported speech", y no es el caso de nuestra querida Ramona, y el tercero tiene algo en común con los dos primeros. No estás narrando una secuencia de hechos en el pasado, sino expresando lo dicho, opinado o pensado por una persona en el pasado. Por supuesto que las frases que ofreces son correctas, pero son de tipo distinto a la que originó este tremendo post. Así que pienso que la diferencia gramatical que pedías puede ser esa, que en los casos que ofreces el primer verbo pertenece a ese grupo de verbos tipo decir, creer, opinar, pensar, etc, y por tanto, se pueden considerar estilo indirecto.


No me *dijo* si *iría* o no a la fiesta.
Maria *decía* que *vendría* mañana.
*Creí* que a estas horas ya lo *habría* terminado​Está claro que las circunstancias no son iguales al ejemplo de Ramona. Sin embargo, también es claro que es possible de poner un verbo en el modo condicional en la oración dependiente cuando el verbo en el oración independiente es en el preterito (u otro tiempo pasado). En inglés, eso es exactamente para que sirve la 'conditional', es decir, expresar el futuro en el contexto del pasado. 
I asked my friend if he *would* _lend_ me some money. He told me that first of all he *would* _have_ to ask his wife. Later that week, I asked him _again_ if *was* *going to* _give_ me the money.​Le pregunté a mi amigo si me *prestaría* plata. Me dijo que en primero lugar *debía* preguntar a su mujer. Más tarde aquella semana, le pregunté _de neuvo_ si me *dejaba* el dinero. ​Está claro que en la última frase, hay un más gran sentido del apremiante, y por eso ‘was going to’ se usa en lugar de ‘would’. Ya comprendo que los españoles usan el imperfecto para la misma razón. Pero, en inglés, ‘would’ es aceptable en la última frase de todas maneras. En cuanto al futuro en el pasado ‘would’ es correcto siempre.


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## flljob

Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaría dinero [cuando yo fuera a visitarlo]. (Se sobreentiende que el prestar es una acción posterior).
Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaba dinero. (Se sobreentiende que la acción es simultánea).
La primera suena incompleta. Solo en un contexto adecuado sería correcta. La segunda está completa. No necesitas contexto.

Saludos


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## manicha

Pues enlazando mi comentario sobre "reported speech" y la última aportación de flljob creo que queda claro que si la acción del segundo verbo es anterior, simultánea o sólo ligeramente posterior a la del primero, la opción que los hispanohablantes entendemos como correcta es usar el imperfecto en la segunda parte de la oración. Cuanto más lejano e hipotético es el futuro, mejor queda el condicional. Pero creo que lo de hipotético es importante. 
Si pensamos en el condicional como la "traducción" del futuro cuando hablamos en pasado, hay que tener en cuenta que en español el futuro no se utiliza mucho para hablar sobre acciones que, aunque se vayan a desarrollar en el futuro, ya están decididas. 
Por ejemplo, si acabo de terminar el bachillerato y quiero saber si mi amiga va a seguir estudiando, lo habitual es preguntar: ¿Vas a ir a la universidad?, antes que ¿Irás a la universidad?. Y al cambiar al pasado, diría: Le pregunté a xxx si iba a ir a la Universidad; la opción "Le pregunté a xxx si iría a la Universidad" resulta muy forzada, a menos que la frase sea del tipo "Le pregunté a xx si iría a la Universidad, en caso de que tuviese el dinero necesario". 
Por lo tanto sí es correcto poner el verbo de la segunda parte de la oración en condicional para hablar del futuro en el pasado, pero sólo en aquellos casos en que este futuro tenga un fuerte matiz de incertidumbre y su realización no sea segura, sino hipotética.


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## L'Inconnu

flljob said:


> Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaría dinero [cuando yo fuera a visitarlo]. (Se sobreentiende que el prestar es una acción posterior). Solo en un contexto adecuado sería correcta.


Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaría dinero *mañana* cuando le haré una visita. ​


flljob said:


> Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaba dinero. (Se sobreentiende que la acción es simultánea).


 
Tu amigo estaba poniendo plata en tu mano, y le preguntas si se trata de un préstamo. ¿te comprendo bien?



1) I asked him if he *would* _do_ it. Se usa en casi todas circunstancias.
2) I asked him if _*was*_ _*going to *do_ it. Se sobreentiende que la acción se pasa dentro de poco.

La segunda frase es la que suena incompleta. Más exacto es:

I asked him *one more time* if _was_ _going to do_ it.

Haz caso de que en la frase (2) ‘was’ es el pasado del verbo ‘to be’. La clave es que tu amigo ya había hecho su decisión *antes* de tu pregunta, aunque todavía no actuó. Tu pregunta fue dirigida a determinar su intención sólo, no lo que estaba haciendo o ha hecho a aquel momento. Eso es el contexto exacto cuando se aplica el pasado del verbo. La pregunta fue dirigida a determinar que si o no una condición previa había hecho establecida, es decir el prótasis de una declaración hipotética con ‘si’. En contradistinción, en frase (1) esta condición todavía no ha establecida al momento de que tu preguntaste a tu amigo.Es decir, tu amigo todavía no hizo una decisión, y por eso no se aplica el pasado del verbo en la oración dependiente. "Would’es necasario ahí.


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## manicha

L'inconnu, la frase correcta es: Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaría dinero al día siguiente, cuando le hiciera/hiciese una visita. Al ser estilo indirecto, tienes que cambiar "mañana" por "al día siguiente", y necesitas poner en subjuntivo el verbo hacer. Tienes que pensar que, si la frase fuese en presente y en estilo directo, también necesitarías un subjuntivo: "¿Me prestarás dinero mañana, cuando te haga una visita?".

En cuanto a "Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaba dinero", no significa que te esté dando el dinero y tu le preguntes si es un préstamo. Eso sería "Le pregunté a mi amigo si me estaba prestando dinero", o mejor aún, "Le pregunté a mi amigo si me estaba haciendo un préstamo". "Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaba dinero" es la transformación correspondiente a ir a junto de tu amigo y decirle "¿Me prestas dinero?". Si lo pasas a estilo indirecto en presente sería "Le pregunto a mi amigo si me presta dinero", y en pasado "Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaba dinero".

Ahora creo que entiendo parte del motivo de tus dificultades con esta cuestión. Porque en inglés nunca dirías "Do you lend me some money?", sino tal vez "Will/Would you lend me some money". Pero en español si realmente se lo estamos pidiendo prestado la frase va en presente; iría en condicional si lo planteásemos como una hipótesis. 

Espero haberte aclarado las cosas


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## Forero

I think I have run across this difference before. Spanish present tense has a wider applicability than English present tense:

La conozco desde el 2000.
_ I have known her since the year 2000.
_ 
¿Me prestas algunos dólares?
_ Will you lend me a few dollars?
_ 
Le pregunto a mi amigo si me presta dinero.
_ I ask my friend if he will lend me some money.
I am asking my friend if he will lend me some money.
_ 
Nos vemos mañana.
_ I will see you tomorrow.
_ (_See you tomorrow._)

Ahorita vuelvo.
_ I will be right back.
_ (I am coming right back.)

I don’t know whether one would ever say “Nos veremos mañana”, but when I said “Pronto volveré”, I was told that Gen. McArthur could say it but everyday people don’t.

Just as we sometimes use "historical present" to "bring the past to life", present tense in a Spanish conditional statement can replace practically any tense, depending on context, so for example “*Si me ve, me pide dinero*” may translate any of the following:
_
If he sees me, he asks for money.
If he sees me, he will ask for money.
If he should see me, he will be asking for money.
If he saw me, he would ask for money.
If he had seen me, he would have asked for money.
_
[Compare with: _I saw Bob yesterday, and he says ..., and all of a sudden he hits me, and ...._]

  Any of these “universal” present tenses can become imperfect tenses in a past tense context:

La conocía desde el 2000.
¿Me prestaba algunos dólares?
Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaba dinero.
Nos veíamos el día siguiente.
Ahorita volvía.
Si me veía, me pedía dinero.


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## L'Inconnu

This is basically a summary of my current understanding.
1a) Ramona fue para ver si su padre la _consolaba_
1b) Ramona went to see if her father _was going to_ console her​2a) Ramona fue para ver si su padre la _consolaría_
2b) Ramona went to see if her father _would_ console her.​The two sentences appear to have equivalent meaning. That is to say, in both cases Ramona’s inquiry is aimed at determining whether or not her father is capable and willing to console her. However, the Spanish speakers among us have stated their preference for sentence (1). Judging from their own conventions, English and Spanish speakers seem to agree that using the past tense of the verb in the dependent clause is most appropriate when there is reason to believe that the event in question will occur in the immediate future. 

Spanish speakers argue that this is indeed the case under these circumstances and, therefore, the first sentence is unequivocally correct. After all, if we _assume_ that Ramona’s father will indeed console her, he will undoubtably do so soon after she sees him. English speakers might argue that, in this case, the assumption of immediacy made my Spanish speakers is just that, an _assumption_. At the time Ramona makes her inquiry it is not yet an established _fact_ that her father is able and willing to console her. 

When dealing with cases of describing the future in the past, it appears that Spanish speakers have a strong prefence for the imperfect tense. According to what I have been told, they will use the conditional tense only if it is clear that the event in question will occur (assuming it does) in the more distant future. Whereas, English speakers use the conditional tense more generally. When we adopt the past tense in the dependent clause, this usage often corresponds to a case where we made our inquiry _after_ a fact had already been established, but was still unknown to us since its consequences had not yet occurred. 

English speakers learning Spanish must realize that using the conditional tense without any temporal context may confuse a Spanish speaker. That is to say, a Spanish speaker may _expect_ you to use the conditional tense in a _deliberate_ manner to alert him that the event in question will occur in the far future and not in the immediate future as he/she would have otherwise expected. If you don’t follow this convention, he/she may be confused.


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## elianecanspeak

Just for the record : As a native English speaker, I prefer version 1:"Ramona fue para ver si su padre la consolaba".

The other one sounds awkward to me.


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## roanheads

To tell you how we were taught by Spanish teachers in class. ( a long time ago ! )
In a subordinate " if " clause, apart from familiar or coloquial speech, the Imperfect Indicative is correct only in " estilo indirecto " or " reported speech.
Ramona did not tell us herself about what she went to see her father. " Fulano " or the author or " somebody" reported this incident to us, therefore at the very least " reported speech or contact is implied.
Thus , in this example, as the " hispanohablantes " agree, the use of the Imperfect is correct, but obviously it is a controversial point.
Chao.
Si alguien lo quiere en castellano, dímelo.


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## chajadan

L'Inconnu said:


> [...]
> 1a) Ramona fue para ver si su padre la _consolaba_
> 1b) Ramona went to see if her father _was going to_ console her​2a) Ramona fue para ver si su padre la _consolaría_
> 2b) Ramona went to see if her father _would_ console her.​[...]
> When dealing with cases of describing the future in the past, it appears that Spanish speakers have a strong prefence for the imperfect tense.
> [...]



I would say that 1b sounds best as "Ramona went to see if her father would console her", the same as 2b. If our intent was to determine his willingness for a future consolation, we would need to explicitly add a time reference.

Also, I believe that Spanish has a strong preference for using the conditional tense to describe the future from the past. It's what I've seen and been comfortable with, which is why this sentence threw me and I posted it. From what I have gathered, it is the purpose/finality and the immediate nature of the response that dictate the use of the imperfect here. I would hazard to guess that most descriptions of the future from the past will not be of that type.


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## chajadan

roanheads said:


> [...]
> the Imperfect Indicative is correct only in " estilo indirecto " or " reported speech.
> [...]



I don't think this is the case. Even if Ramona was standing there telling us this directly herself, she would still say:

"Fui al comedor para ver si mi padre me consolaba."


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## roanheads

I have found a tattered old Grammar by John Butt, pages 40 and 41,which confirm quite closely my remarks.
Thanks for correcting my " indirecto ".---- always in a hurry !
Chao.
Ps. In your example of direct speech by Ramona , I would use the subjunctive " consolara "


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## chajadan

If I've extrapolated what I've learned from all the natives here correctly, they will disagree with you.

I have a Grammar by Butt, but I think the versions are different. What is the section number, maybe those still match...


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## L'Inconnu

manicha said:


> L'inconnu, la frase correcta es: Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaría dinero al día siguiente, cuando le hiciera/hiciese una visita.


 
Entendido. Eso es simplemente un cuestión de precisión. 

When I see you (and I presume I will) will you lend me some money?

Eres bastante seguro que verás tu amigo, pero aquel momento todavá no ha pasado, y por eso no puedes categóricamente decir que aquel acontecimiento se pasará. 



manicha said:


> En cuanto a "Le pregunté a mi amigo si me prestaba dinero", no significa que te esté dando el dinero y tu le preguntes si es un préstamo. Eso sería "Le pregunté a mi amigo si me estaba prestando dinero", o mejor aún, "Le pregunté a mi amigo si me estaba haciendo un préstamo".


 
Al principio, no conseguí darme cuenta de que _prestaba_ quiere decir algo como _iba a prestar, _y no_ estaba prestando_. Ya mi problema es de comprender el bueno contexto de usar _prestaría_ en lugar de _prestaba_. Mi impreción es que hablantes de Español prefieren generalmente el imperfecto, pero de vez en cuando usan la conditional para acontecimientos que se pasan más lejano en el futuro. 

¿Si tuvieras dinero, te *compraría* un coche?

Claro es correcto de usar el condicónal en este caso, aunque algunos hablantes de español usen el imperfecto, porque es ententido que tu comprarás el coche en el futuro (si el acontecimiento se pase). Asimismo en inglés:

Ramona went to see if her father *was going to* _console_ her.

El pasado del verbo es aceptable, por que es entendido que su padre la va consolar inmédiatamente después de encontrar con ella. 

1) Le pregunté a él si me *prestaba* dinero.
2) Le pregunté a él si me *prestaría* dinero. 

Si comprendo bien, las dos frases no son realmente iguales. En el primera, quieres que te deje el dinero dentro de poco. En la segunda, le pides un préstamo en el futuro. ¿Es la segunda más cortés? ¿Dices algo como "No hay prisa. Déjemelo un día en el futuro cuando lo tengas", aunque esperas que lo deje más pronto?


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## L'Inconnu

elianecanspeak said:


> Just for the record : As a native English speaker, I prefer version 1:"Ramona fue para ver si su padre la consolaba".
> 
> The other one sounds awkward to me.


 
I'm more of a "pick your favorite flavor of ice cream'' kind of guy. I'm comfortable with: 

could console her - la podía consolar
wanted to console her - la quería consolar
was going to console her - la iba a consolar
might console her - la consolara
would be able to console her - la podría consolar
would be willing to console her - la querría consolar

They all work fine for me in English, including plain old vanilla:

would console her - la consolaría (consolaba)

But, then again, I'm not a Spanish speaker. They're the ones with fussy taste. I suppose the question is not which phrase is grammatically correct, but rather which one will most likely be understood by a Spanish speaker.


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## L'Inconnu

chajadan said:


> I would say that 1b sounds best as "Ramona went to see if her father would console her", the same as 2b.


 
Or in other words you think: "Ramona went to see if her father _would_ console her." is a better translation for "Ramona fue para ver si su padre la _consolaba." _I agree that ‘_was_ going to console’ is somewhat like trying to put an oval shaped peg into a round hole. It doesn’t quite fit, but it’s a close a match.

It uses the _past_ tense of the verb ‘to be’, and their imperfecto is a past tense.
Unlike ‘could console’, which is also a past tense, it takes into account that her father may be both able and willing.
It’s used in similar circumstances. That is, when you expect the event to occur ‘dentro de poco.’



chajadan said:


> Also, I believe that Spanish has a strong preference for using the conditional tense to describe the future from the past. It's what I've seen and been comfortable with, which is why this sentence threw me and I posted it. From what I have gathered, it is the purpose/finality and the immediate nature of the response that dictate the use of the imperfect here. I would hazard to guess that most descriptions of the future from the past will not be of that type.


 
I’m still calling it colloquial usage myself. I had a devil of time even finding a single reference to it. The page I found was supposed to be a comprehensive treatment of their preterit and imperfect tenses; one that accounted for every known case and/or situation where these two past tense modes are employed. I couldn’t help but notice that this particular usage was #25 on a list of 30. Its low priority position near the bottom of the page doesn’t suggest that it plays a very important role in college level thought and expression.

Still, you can’t ignore what the native speakers have been trying to tell us. I think the key point is to leave the issue of what is or isn’t grammatically correct aside, and focus instead on what will or will not be understood and/or confused by native speakers. Trying to understand the context or reasoning for which they use it comes into consideration.


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## chajadan

L'Inconnu said:


> [...]
> I’m still calling it colloquial usage myself. I had a devil of time even finding a single reference to it. [...] I couldn’t help but notice that this particular usage was #25 on a list of 30.
> [...]



I don't actually believe that point 25 applies to the originally posted sentence. Point 25 applies to indirect style following a verb of communication, or verb dicendi. Neither applies to "Ramona fue..."


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## roanheads

chajadan said:


> If I've extrapolated what I've learned from all the natives here correctly, they will disagree with you.
> 
> I have a Grammar by Butt, but I think the versions are different. What is the section number, maybe those still match...


 
This Grammar is by John Butt ( not Butt and Benjamin, which I understand is an American version ),published 1996 by Oxford Universtity Press, and the article in question is listed in the Contents information as " Conditions " starting page 40..which describe conditions in which  the " if " clause  do not require the subjunctive.-- " The Imperfect Indicative is used if these conditions are reported by someone, but the Imperfect Indicative is not used in any other kind of conditional sentence.
A footnote states,---  "except in familiar speech as an occasional alternative for the Conditional tense, although students should avoid this."
Chao -- ( de prisa )


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## L'Inconnu

chajadan said:


> I don't actually believe that point 25 applies to the originally posted sentence. Point 25 applies to indirect style following a verb of communication, or verb dicendi. Neither applies to "Ramona fue..."


 
Much like we use our continuous past tense with verbs like ‘to come’ and ‘to go’. Such as:
I asked him if he _was _coming/_had _decided to come.
Le pregunté a él si _venía_/_había _decidido venir. ​But, of course, in this case the question was posed ‘después el hecho’. Moreover, we can still use ‘would’/_vendría_ if we choose. The key point is that a Spanish speaker has more flexibility than we do, because he has more than one way to say ‘venía’. He can also say ‘estaba viniendo’ and ‘estuvo viniendo’. So, if he needed to clarify that the person was already en route. He could say:
Le pregunté a él si ya estaba viniendo. ​If we wanted to make this distinction in English, we would have to use a different sentence.
I asked him if he was already on his way.​Since he will not likely confuse ‘hacía’ with ‘estaba haciendo’, he can use his imperfecto in a wider variety of contexts than we can. I am certainly not recommending that anyone say:
¿Si tuvieras dinero, te comprabas un coche? ​But, apparently, he can.


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## javier8907

I think what you find difficult to understand grammatically is that in the sentence "Voy al comedor a ver si mi padre me consuela", where "si mi padre me consuela" is something like a virtual present. Another example of this could be "Cuando vengan tus padres, estate atento a si aparcan bien", which I think could be translated into English in a present tense: "When your parents come, check whether they are parking the car well".

I think it has mainly to do with verbs meaning "make sure" or something similar.


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## L'Inconnu

VivaReggaeton88 said:


> 1.) *Yo voy al comedor para ver si mi madre me consuela.*
> (también puedo usar 'consuele' si realmente dudo que mi madre me pueda consolar.)
> 
> Vale, creo que todos estamos de acuerdo de que la 1ra es correcta.
> 
> 2.) *Yo fui al comedor para ver si mi madre me consolaría.*
> 
> Para mí, ésta no es correcta porque el uso del condicional implica una duda futurosa, y esta frase no la queremos en el futuro.
> 
> 3.) *Yo fui al comedor para ver si mi madre me consolaba.*
> 
> La 3ra no me gusta porque el uso de "consolaba" y no "podía consolar" puede decir que mi madre me estaba consolando, y esto no puede ser porque todavía no había entrado al comedor.
> 
> 4.) *Yo fui al comedor para ver si mi madre me podía conselar.*
> 
> Para mí, es ésta la que me parece mejor que todas porque tiene un signifcado bien claro.
> 
> Espero que yo haya contribuido algo.


 
You said it yourself, ‘estaba consolando’ can't possibly apply. If anything, the take home message of this thread is that _context_ has a profound influence on the meaning of a sentence. For example:
Le pregunté a ella si su criatura _lloraba_.​Depending on the _context_, the sentence could mean:
I asked her if her baby _used to_ _cry/was crying_.​Therefore, in some instances a Spanish speaker may have to say:
Le pregunté a ella si su criatura _iba a llorar_​Or 
Le pregunté a ella si su criatura _estaba lloranda_​In an analogous way, our ‘would do’ could mean ‘used to do’ or ‘was going to do’ under different circumstances. It’s _context_ that tells us that ‘_consolaba_’ _must_ translate as ‘would console’ or something similar in meaning. For someone learning Spanish, it’s a lot easier to use ‘consolaría’, because under no circumstances can it be confused with ‘consolaba por costumbre’ or ‘estaba consolando’. Therefore, I don’t think it’s fair to say that the conditional is simply wrong here. On the other hand, one can argue that the following two sentences don’t quite have the same meaning. 
Le pregunté a Juan si _iba a jugar_ al tenis (conmigo esta tarde).
Le pregunté a Juan si _jugaría_ al tenis (para el equipo el año que viene).​So, that leaves us with the dodgy question of when to choose between ‘haría’ and ‘hacía’ or some other construction with two verbs.


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## manicha

Creo que esta va a ser mi última aportación en este hilo, porque tengo poco que decir aparte de lo que ya he señalado en mis aportaciones anteriores. Pero como he leído en los últimos comentarios que el uso de consolara os parece coloquial a algunos, me gustaría insistir en que es perfectamente correcto, gramatical y estándar, no coloquial. Aunque a los que no sois hablantes nativos os cueste creerlo -y lamentablemente, no dispongo de ninguna gramática para respaldar mi afirmación- no sólo es que el tiempo sea el apropiado, es que la opción "consolaría" es incorrecta, en este contexto, con el significado de que "Ramona va a comprobar si su padre la va a consolar, en ese momento". Creo que ni un solo hablante nativo ha apoyado esa alternativa, y que todos hemos optado por la versión "consolaba". Pienso que los ingredientes de "inmediatez" y "propósito de la acción" son fundamentales para optar en este caso por el imperfecto, y que un hablante nativo sólo utilizaría el condicional en este caso para referirse a un futuro hipotético. 
Como ejemplo de una frase muy parecida, he encontrado esta, en internet, del ex-presidente del Gobierno de España, Felipe González: "Entré en google para ver si encontraba la factura de la ropa que usa". No es más que un ejemplo, pero hay cientos. 
Un saludo.


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## VivaReggaeton88

L'Inconnu said:


> You said it yourself, ‘estaba consolando’ can't possibly apply. If anything, the take home message of this thread is that _context_ has a profound influence on the meaning of a sentence. For example:
> Le pregunté a ella si su criatura _lloraba_.​Depending on the _context_, the sentence could mean:
> I asked her if her baby _used to_ _cry/was crying_.​Therefore, in some instances a Spanish speaker may have to say:
> Le pregunté a ella si su criatura _iba a llorar_​Or
> Le pregunté a ella si su criatura _estaba lloranda_​In an analogous way, our ‘would do’ could mean ‘used to do’ or ‘was going to do’ under different circumstances. It’s _context_ that tells us that ‘_consolaba_’ _must_ translate as ‘would console’ or something similar in meaning. For someone learning Spanish, it’s a lot easier to use ‘consolaría’, because under no circumstances can it be confused with ‘consolaba por costumbre’ or ‘estaba consolando’. Therefore, I don’t think it’s fair to say that the conditional is simply wrong here. On the other hand, one can argue that the following two sentences don’t quite have the same meaning.
> Le pregunté a Juan si _iba a jugar_ al tenis (conmigo esta tarde).
> Le pregunté a Juan si _jugaría_ al tenis (para el equipo el año que viene).​So, that leaves us with the dodgy question of when to choose between ‘haría’ and ‘hacía’ or some other construction with two verbs.



Exactly. Thats why I think the best option is "podía consolar".


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## Peterrobertini7

L'Inconnu said:


> I am not saying that ‘whether or not’ phrases are _grammatically_ equivalent to if-then statements. I am saying that they are _logically_ equivalent to them. If he *can* do it, he *will* do it. ​The above if-then statement addresses the issue of _whether or not_ a person is *able* _and_ *willing* to do something. _If_ we know that both these conditions are met, we can expect him to do it. _If_ we don’t know if these conditions are met, we can ask a related question. Is he *able* and *willing* to do it?​We can ask this same question indirectly:I wonder if he is *able* and *willing* to do it?​We can ask questions that address either aspect of the corresponding if-then statement. I wonder if he *can* do it?
> I wonder if he *will* do it?​In either of the above two questions, if we know that one condition is met, and we assume that the other condition is also true, we can expect him to do it. If we expressed our thought in the past we would change 'can' to 'could' and 'will' to 'would'.I _wondered_ if he *could* do it?
> I _wondered_ if he *would* do it?​Given that the above two questions are _logically_ equivalent, the words *could* and *would* can be used interchangeably in the following sentence. Ramona _went_ to see if her father *could/would* console her.​It follows that we can expect that either or the following two sentences to be correct in Spanish. 1) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *podía* _consolar_.
> 2) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *consolaría*. ​Not withstanding the fact that phrases (1) and (2) are _logically_ equivalent, many Spanish speakers insist that phrase (1) is the only correct one. Apparently, they believe that it is _grammatically_ necessary to observe temporal consistency between the independent and dependent clauses. That is, if the verb in the independent clause is in a past tense mode, the verb in the dependent clause _must_ also be in a past tense mode. Yet, according to our grammar texts and/or dictionaries, the preterit (or another past tense mode) of one verb can coexist with the conditional mode of another verb in the same phrase: No me *dijo* si *iría* o no a la fiesta.
> Maria *decía* que *vendría* mañana.
> *Creí* que a estas horas ya lo *habría* terminado​So, the question you had from the very beginning is now mine also. Is there some _logical_ or _grammatical_ distinction between the Ramona phrase and the above examples that allows the conditional to be used in one case but not the other?



""""1) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *podía* _consolar_.
2) Ramona _fue_ para ver si su padre la *consolaría*. """

The Spanish MODAL 'podía' can be put in :
1.- Ramona... si su padre puede consolarla ( at the moment) 
Ramona ...   si su padre podrá consolarla ( future)
Ramona... si su padre pudiera consolarla (subjunctive) future usage
Ramona ... si su padre podría consolarla.
The line of timing comes from the past into the prsent, future, conditional (hypothetical future) and imperfect subjunctive pudiera with future connotations.

Ramona fue para ver si su padre la consolaba/consolaría/ consuela/consolará/consolara.


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