# not as good as I thought they should've been.



## Annashin84

I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as *I thought they should’ve been.
*
In the sentence above, I'm not sure if I should say "*I though they should be*" or it's okay with the way above. 

Thank you so much!!


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## a little edgy

The entire sentence is in the past tense, so "... as I *thought* *they should have been*" is correct. If you were writing in the present tense ("I *am* so frustrated ... who *are *not ..."), then you would say "... as I *think they should be*." 

By the way, we generally say that we are frustrated *with *people, rather than *at* them.


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## Annashin84

Thank you sooooooooo much!! and for the extra tip as well!!!


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## boozer

I tend to partly disagree with A Little Edgy.  _Should_ is a timeless, tenseless modal verb that can be used without any remorse in the past tense. In fact, I would certainly have said "as I thought they should be" in this case and I find _should have been_ to be superfluous here, though heard quite often in such situations  I thought you *should* know...


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## a little edgy

boozer, I flirted with "should be" in the past-tense construction, and I do agree we could say it in most circumstances. So, annashin84, I will correct myself and say that "as I thought they *should be*" is OK in your example sentence. 

On the other hand, I am sorry to disagree with boozer's suggestion that "should have been" is superfluous; rather it contains an implied "by that time": "... who were not as good with PCs as I thought they *should have been by that time*." There are circumstances where such an implication makes a difference in meaning, so "should have been" is not superfluous, merely more detailed. That's my reasoning, and I'm sticking to it.


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## boozer

Let me think. Think... think...  Errrm, no matter how hard I try to see some difference, in this context _should be_ and _should have been_ mean the same to me, though the latter is a bit more complicated and... wordy  

It took me a long time to find the thread I had once posted on the very same subject (mostly because of the internet "speed" I enjoy in office  ). I don't suppose I could say it any better than Loob did:
http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=2154956


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## Thomas Tompion

I'm of the _should have been_ school.  This was in the past, and if it relates to their behaviour in the past - if, for instance, they are dead - then put _should have been_.  _Should be _ is possible, as long as they are still alive, but gives a different emphasis, relating their behaviour to the present.


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## Loob

Since my name was mentioned....

I agree with boozer that _should be_ would work in this sentence: I don't think there's a straightforward issue of "past" vs "non-past".

I suspect there's something here connected with the negative "were not".  What we seem to have is an echo of the positive sentence _They should have been better with computers than they were.  _In the positive sentence, the tense has to be _should have been_, not _should be ~ _and something of the flavour of that is carried over into the negative sentence.

It's still an intriguing question, boozer.


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## Thomas Tompion

Hi Loob,

Would you then put 'should be' even if they were deceased?


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## wandle

TT's point is valid. If the parents had died before the time of writing, then 'should have been' is necessary.
It is also necessary if the parents had taken a course and become computer literate before the time of writing.
It follows, therefore, that 'should have been' is necessary if there is any relevant point of time which intervenes before the time of writing.


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## Loob

Thomas Tompion said:


> Would you then put 'should be' even if they were deceased?


No, I don't think I would, TT.  If the parents were dead, then the association with _They should have been better_ becomes even stronger.

But I still don't think there's a straightforward "past" vs "non-past" issue here.  In boozer's _my parents [...] were not as good with PCs as I thought they should be, _'should be_' _relates, for me, to the past, not to the present.

EDIT: I think wandle may be on to something with his "relevant intervening point in time".  That would fit both your "parents deceased" point and edgy's "... they should have been *by that time*".


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## Thomas Tompion

Yes, I take that point.  Notice I did say that _should be_ was possible, but gives a different emphasis, perhaps that they continue to be not as good as she'd hoped.

 I think the fact that we won't accept _should be_ for a dead person does, however, tell us something about the link of the form with the past.


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## Hermione Golightly

Yes I think you as speaker have to decide if the parents are dead or not, and if they are alive, are they still not as good as you think they should be. This thread is a good example of 'aspect' - what information and what intentions are determining the speaker's choice of tense, when there is one. When the story is finished, I might ask about this 'aspect', wondering if the speaker helped/has helped his parents to become  more PC literate or if they ever did before they died. But I think that _they were not_ is better followed by _ should have been._ The_ have been_ is the aspect marker not the _should_. This would conform with the strict rules of reported speech and sequence of tenses. Now if they are alive they might be or might not not be good with computers, but at the time the story takes place they were not.

Hermione



Hermione


Hermione


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## boozer

It gladdens my heart (  ) to see everyone in agreement on a point that I also happily accept - I would not say 'should be' if the parents were dead either. Obviously there are situations where 'should have been' is necessary but I do not think ours is one of them. Notice that my comments were limited to this and other similar contexts...(This issue is so damn tricky  - I don't think I have ever been taught the difference between 'should be' and 'should have been' in such detail; I suspect I have just come to a point where I feel it in my stomach and am totally lost when I have to figure out why I would not say one or the other...  I am also happy that I will probably never have to teach something I myself do not fully understand  )


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## Loob

Hermione Golightly said:


> But I think that _they were not_ is better followed by _ should have been._ The_ have been_ is the aspect marker not the _should_. This would conform with the strict rules of reported speech and sequence of tenses.


Actually, I think the reported speech issue points the other way.

If we take out the "I thought", the sentence would almost certainly be _I was frustrated at/with my parents, who were not as good with PCs as *they should have been. 

*_But with the "I thought"_, _you have two options:
Present tense direct speech:"They are not as good as they should be."
Past tense reported speech:_ 
(1) I thought they were not as good as they should be.
(2) I thought they were not as good as they should have been.

_As we've been saying, other factors come into play in the choice between (1) and (2)_*....
*_


boozer said:


> I am also happy that I will probably never have to teach something I myself do not fully understand


I'm pretty glad I don't have to teach it either, boozer.


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## wandle

Boozer makes the point that 'should' in this modal usage is tenseless.
That is correct, but it does not decide the issue between 'should be' and 'should have been'.

'Should have been' refers to the past not because of 'should' but because of 'have been', which is the past form of the infinitive 'be'. In fact, it is because 'should' does not express past tense that the job needs to be done by the infinitive.
The same point applies when using 'ought' which is the older and more traditional verb of obligation: 'ought to be' refers to the present, 'ought to have been' to the past.

For example:
(a) 'The lesson has started. You ought to be there.' (present)
(b) 'The lesson started 15 minutes ago. You ought to have been there.' (past)
Putting these into indirect speech in the past:
(c) 'I have told him the lesson has started and he ought to be there.' (main verb: perfect)
(d) 'At quarter past, I told him the lesson had started 15 minutes earlier and he ought to have been there.' (main verb: simple past)

Let us apply the distinction to the original example:


> I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as I thought they should’ve been.


Here, 'should have been' is correct because the sentence refers to the past.
On the other hand, in the present tense we should say:
'I feel frustrated with my parents, who are not as good with PCs as I think they should be'.


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## boozer

wandle said:


> 'Should have been' refers to the past not because of 'should' but because of 'have been', which is the past form of the infinitive 'be'. In fact, it is because 'should' does not express past tense that the job needs to be done by the infinitive.


Actually, wandle, there never was any doubt that _should have been _is past. The point is that in this example it can be happily replaced by _should be_ without (I believe) any loss of meaning. Are you saying that _should be_ is wrong in the original post? 

Then would you say it is wrong in the following examples (from the BNC)? Or would you say it is in the present tense, rather than the past?
_Shiva thought he should be grateful for all this, though he was not.
The sergeant thought he should offer his boss some support in her battle to prise a little truth out of the woman they were interviewing._


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## Loob

Mmm ... I was quite intrigued by wandle's post 16 too, boozer.

I was with him up until:
(b) _{direct speech}_ 'The lesson started 15 minutes ago. You ought to have been there.' 
 > (d) _{indirect speech}_ At quarter past, I told him the lesson had started 15 minutes earlier and he ought to have been there.
(a) _{direct speech}_ 'The lesson has started. You ought to be there.' 
> (c) _{indirect speech}_ I have told him the lesson has started and he ought to be there.

But I don't understand why he then implied, in his conclusion about Annashin's sentence, that:
(c1) _{indirect speech}_ I told him the lesson had started and he ought to be there.
is not a possible 'translation' of (a).

Perhaps he'll come back and explain?


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## coolieinblue

Annashin84 said:


> I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as I *thought* they should’ve been*.*


boozer and Loob, I would prefer to use *think* to *thought*.


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## Loob

coolieinblue said:


> boozer and Loob, I would prefer to use *think* to *thought*.


Coolieinblue, are you stating a preference or asking a question? (I sometimes think that when you make a statement you're really asking a question....)

If you're asking a question, then my answer is "Using 'I think' radically changes Annashin's sentence".
If you're stating a preference, then my answer is "Fine: that's your view, but it's not mine - because using 'I think' radically changes Annashin's sentence".


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## Thomas Tompion

Can there be anything in the idea that _they were not as good as they should be _is suggesting that there's a standard which one could expect such people to reach, and it's not been reached, whereas _they were not as good as they should have been _is more tailored to the individual, as if personal circumstances would lead one to expect this particular person to have reached a certain standard, and it wasn't reached?

Probably not?


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## coolieinblue

Loob, thank you for your reply. 
(I am wondering if Annashin's view on her parents' inefficiency on the particular subject has radically changed till now)


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## wandle

boozer said:


> Are you saying that _should be_ is wrong in the original post?


Yes, strictly speaking. 'Should be' is often used colloquially in that situation, but is not strictly correct.


> Then would you say it is wrong in the following examples (from the BNC)?
> Or would you say it is in the present tense, rather than the past?
> _Shiva thought he should be grateful for all this, though he was not.
> The sergeant thought he should offer his boss some support in her battle to prise a little truth out of the woman they were interviewing._


These sentences, on the other hand, are both correct.
They are cases of indirect statement and the tense of the main verb determines the time reference. 
'He should be', being in the present, refers to the same stage of time as the main verb. 
'He was' in this case is, or ought to be, subjunctive. 
'Shiva thought he should have been grateful for all this, though he had not been.' 
This sentence is also correct, but the meaning is different. The past tenses within the indirect statement shift the time reference of those verbs one stage further back in time than the main verb. 
The second example is similar.


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## wandle

Loob said:


> Mmm ... I was quite intrigued by wandle's post 16 too, boozer.
> I was with him up until:
> (b) _{direct speech}_ 'The lesson started 15 minutes ago. You ought to have been there.'
> > (d) _{indirect speech}_ At quarter past, I told him the lesson had started 15 minutes earlier and he ought to have been there.
> (a) _{direct speech}_ 'The lesson has started. You ought to be there.'
> > (c) _{indirect speech}_ I have told him the lesson has started and he ought to be there.
> 
> But I don't understand why he then implied, in his conclusion about Annashin's sentence, that:
> (c1) _{indirect speech}_ I told him the lesson had started and he ought to be there.
> is not a possible 'translation' of (a).
> Perhaps he'll come back and explain?


(c1) is not incorrect, but it changes the meaning. 
(b) and (d) were carefully chosen to refer to the point of time at which the lesson had started, and to say he ought to have been present then. 
(c1) states an obligation to be present at the time when the sentence is spoken.
Imagine a school rule which says that being more than five minutes late for a lesson is punishable by litter-picking for the rest of the period, and detention later to catch up the missed lesson. A teacher might say, ''At quarter past, I told him the lesson had started 15 minutes earlier and he ought to have been there, but as  things were it was too late, and he would have to start picking litter.' In this case, at quarter past, the obligation to be present at the lesson no longer exists. It would be illogical to say, 'I told him the lesson had started and he ought to be there'.


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## Thomas Tompion

_Shiva thought he should be grateful for all this, though he was not.
_


wandle said:


> [...]
> 'He was' in this case is, or ought to be, subjunctive.



But it clearly isn't, and not many verbs in English 'ought to be' in the subjunctive, and this is not one of them.


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## boozer

wandle said:


> Yes, strictly speaking. 'Should be' is often used colloquially in that situation, but is not strictly correct.


I expect this is the point on which we differ, wandle. Should be is perfectly correct and is, in fact, the better option in terms of 'grammar efficiency', i.e. in terms of expressing the same meaning with 'less grammar'  On top of that, _should_, being the past-tense form of _shall_, is intrinsically a past-tense verb form, even though it is used in non-past tenses as a modal verb.

I would have said the above on no authority whatsoever. Then, namely because I am acutely aware of all the authority I do not have, I decided to borrow some from a man who has inexhaustible supplies thereof  In his _Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language_, p. 1014, while discussing at some length the putative _should_, Mr. Randolph Quirk goes:

_quote
A past verb in the matrix clause does not necessarily affect the form of should in the subordinate clause, even though the subordinate clause refers to a past situation:
*I was surprised that he should feel lonely when he was in California.*
But it is also possible to use a perfective form:
*I was surprised that he should have felt lonely when he was in California.*
unquote
_
Just because it is possible to use a perfective form does not at all mean that this is, in any conceivable way, better to do so. (I would say - quite to the contrary, it is more wordy and less efficient, but that is my personal reaction)

Now, as has already been shown by TT, there are situations where we must use the perfective form, e.g. in the presence of an intervening event of some importance, as the death of the parents in the original question. I strongly suspect, however, that in such an eventuality we no longer have the putative _should_ but some of the other varieties of _should_.


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## Loob

wandle said:


> (c1) is not incorrect, but it changes the meaning.
> (b) and (d) were carefully chosen to refer to the point of time at which the lesson had started, and to say he ought to have been present then.
> (c1) states an obligation to be present at the time when the sentence is spoken.


No it doesn't.
As so often, wandle, we'll just have to agree to disagree.


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## Beryl from Northallerton

'I was disappointed by my parents, who were not as good with PCs as *I thought they should have been.'* - failure to achieve arbitrary standard.
'I was elated by my parents, who were as good with PCs as *I thought they should be.' *- success in attaining arbitrary standard.




'I was disappointed by my parents, who were not as good with PCs as *God decreed they should be.'* - failure to achieve absolute standard, or fulfil the prophecy.


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## boozer

PS. Oh, by the way, I wholeheartedly agree with TT that "he was" in that example I gave, is clearly not in the subjunctive mood...


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## Thomas Tompion

I'm not clear, Beryl.  Are you saying that there is no difference between these two?

_I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as _*I thought they should’ve been *
_I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as *I thought they should be.

*_This seems to follow from your post.


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## Beryl from Northallerton

Thomas Tompion said:


> I'm not clear, Beryl.  Are you saying that there is no difference between these two?
> 
> _I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as _*I thought they should’ve been *
> _I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as *I thought they should be.
> 
> *_This seems to follow from your post.



How so?


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## Thomas Tompion

You suggest that the one expresses success in achieving an arbitrary standard and that the negative of the other expresses failure in achieving an arbitrary standard.


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## Beryl from Northallerton

Thomas Tompion said:


> You suggest that the one expresses success in achieving an arbitrary standard and that the negative of the other expresses failure in achieving an arbitrary standard.


 I'm sorry, I don't follow; however...

Like you (post#7, unless you've changed your mind), 'I'm of the _should have been_ school'. It is entirely wrong to have been frustrated by a situation which is yet to occur, or has yet to be verified.


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## SuprunP

Might I not most respectfully pick up on this point?



Loob said:


> Present tense direct speech:"They are not as good as they should be."
> Past tense reported speech:_
> (1) I thought they were not as good as they should be.
> (2) I thought they were not as good as they should have been.
> _



1) I think my parents are not as good as they should be. 
_(1) I thought they were not as good as they should be._
1) Situation:
Paul, I met Suprun yesterday and he told me that his parents were not as good as they should be.

2) I think my parents were not as good as they should have been.
_(2) I thought they were not as good as they should have been._  (One would think (a grammar layman like me) that it should be '_I thought they *had not been* as good as they should have been.', _which, I reckon, is possible, but as the context (_should have been_) makes the relative time reference clear we usually choose a simple past in place of a past perfective.)
2) Situation:
Paul, I met Suprun yesterday and he told me that his parents were not as good as they should have been.

   I might get into some trouble if I tried to explain my feelings concerning these two situations, so, with apologies, I will refrain from doing it. But I do think they differ and differ significantly.



boozer said:


> In his _Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language_, p. 1014, while discussing at some length the putative _should_, Mr. Randolph Quirk goes:
> 
> _quote
> A past verb in the matrix clause does not necessarily affect the form of should in the subordinate clause, even though the subordinate clause refers to a past situation:
> *I was surprised that he should feel lonely when he was in California.*
> But it is also possible to use a perfective form:
> *I was surprised that he should have felt lonely when he was in California.*
> unquote
> _



 Although Quirk et al do not expand on it at great length I would also strongly suspect that it pertains to only putative _should_. From which the question of which _should_ exactly we are dealing with in this thread arises. I would rather tentatively go for 'tentative reference', where the speaker does not know if his statement is true, but tentatively concludes that it is true, on the basis of whatever he knows. _Well, you know... err... I think they should have been good (they buried themselves in books so that even our cat bit me showing his great indignation at their complete failure to feed him). 

_(Disclaimer: as I have already indicated this post is written by a grammar layman.)


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## Thomas Tompion

_I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as _*I thought they should’ve been *
_I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as *I thought they should be.

*_I hope we are agreed that we are not concerned here with putative should's.

These should's are talking about what one might reasonably expect in the circumstances.  They are close to _ought to have been_ and _ought to be_.


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## wandle

boozer said:


> In his _Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language_, p. 1014, while discussing at some length the putative _should_, Mr. Randolph Quirk goes:





Thomas Tompion said:


> I hope we are agreed that we are not concerned here with putative should's.


A hope that I would certainly share.
A putative 'should' in a sentence like the original would have been, for example, 'I felt frustrated that my parents should have been less good at PCs than I thought they ought to have been'.


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## wandle

From post 27:


Loob said:


> No it doesn't. As so often, wandle, we'll just have to agree to disagree.



Sorry, Loob, I had misunderstood your  post 18.  
I stupidly thought your (c1) was referring to my (b) and (d) examples in post 16.
Your (c1) in fact takes my example (a) in post 16 and makes it an indirect statement in the simple past. 
Thus it is different from my example (c) which converts it into indirect statement in the perfect tense.
Your (cI) is, as I said, correct. 
It has the same factual meaning as (c). The difference between (c) and (c1) is just the normal difference between the past simple and the perfect tense.


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## wandle

boozer said:


> I expect this is the point on which we differ, wandle. Should be is perfectly correct and is, in fact, the better option in terms of 'grammar efficiency', i.e. in terms of expressing the same meaning with 'less grammar'...
> Just because it is possible to use a perfective form does not at all mean that this is, in any conceivable way, better to do so. (I would say - quite to the contrary, it is more wordy and less efficient, but that is my personal reaction)


Well I must disagree with the idea that the use of 'have' is less good either because it introduces more grammar or because it is more wordy.
It simply expresses a different meaning, as the perfect tense normally does.
In his election campaign against George Bush, John Kerry described himself as "reporting for duty". He was making play of the fact that he had served in Vietnam, while Bush with his family connections had secured himself a service post in the USA. 
We can describe this by saying that Kerry meant Bush should have served in Vietnam. 
We cannot describe it by saying that Kerry meant Bush should serve in Vietnam, since by then the Vietnam war was long over.


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## boozer

Ahhh, okay, maybe in the original example we do not have the putative 'should'. I take that point and I apologise for implying it (simply because I did not think of that).  However, I believe R. Quirk's words should be accepted to extend to our example as well as to all similar examples where both 'should be' and 'should have been' are clearly possible. Indeed, I realise that someone who wants to deny the validity of the example will surely deny it on the basis of our 'should' not being putative.  I think we should be able to use some abstract thinking... I do believe also that most of us have been able to grasp the concept despite the non-putative nature of our sentence.


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## Thomas Tompion

I worry that we've stopped giving Annashin much of an answer to her question.


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## wandle

I did offer what I hope was a clear answer in post 16, and have defended it since:


wandle said:


> Let us apply the distinction to the original example:
> 
> 
> 
> I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as I thought they should’ve been.
> 
> 
> 
> Here, 'should have been' is correct because the sentence refers to the past.
> On the other hand, in the present tense we should say:
> 'I feel frustrated with my parents, who are not as good with PCs as I think they should be'.
Click to expand...


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## Loob

boozer said:


> However, I believe R. Quirk's words should be accepted to extend to our example as well as to all similar examples where both 'should be' and 'should have been' are clearly possible.


Oh yes, the principle does extend beyond "putative should", boozer.  Here's a quote from Michael Swan's _Practical English Usage_:_Should _is used unchanged in past indirect speech if _should _was used in direct speech._...__... __
I thought 'I should write to Jane' -> I knew that I should write to Jane_.
​


Thomas Tompion said:


> I worry that we've stopped giving Annashin much of an answer to her question.


I think the answer is that both "I thought they should be" and "I thought they should have been" are possible.


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## boozer

wandle said:


> Well I must disagree with the idea that the use of 'have' is less good either because it introduces more grammar or because it is more wordy.
> It simply expresses a different meaning, as the perfect tense normally does.
> In his election campaign against George Bush, John Kerry described himself as "reporting for duty". He was making play of the fact that he had served in Vietnam, while Bush with his family connections had secured himself a service post in the USA.
> We can describe this by saying that Kerry meant Bush should have served in Vietnam.
> We cannot describe it by saying that Kerry meant Bush should serve in Vietnam, since by then the Vietnam war was long over.


This example is clearly different from the one we are discussing in this thread, wandle. Clearly, this is a mandatory counterfactual use of _should_, not dissimilar to 'I should have known' which implies that I did not know. Bush should have served but he did not and the relevant intervening even that necessitates this use is that the Vietnam War is over and has been for quite some time.  In this way your example is totally different from the one in post #1.


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## Thomas Tompion

wandle said:


> I did offer what I hope was a clear answer in post 16, and have defended it since:


This was precisely my point.  Your answer doesn't take into account what other people have said.


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## Thomas Tompion

Loob said:


> [...]I think the answer is that both "I thought they should be" and "I thought they should have been" are possible.


I'll happily assent to that.  I only said I was of the 'should-have-been' school because some people seemed to be outlawing that formula.


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## wandle

Loob said:


> Here's a quote from Michael Swan's _Practical English Usage_:
> _Should _is used unchanged in past indirect speech if _should _was used in direct speech.
> I thought 'I should write to Jane' -> I knew that I should write to Jane[/I].


This example expresses an obligation to perform an action (to write) which is future compared to the time when the obligation was felt ('I thought I should...).
The original sentence, on the other hand:


> I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as I thought they should’ve been.


 refers to an obligation which was already _in the past_ at the time when the speaker felt frustrated.
Even the most demanding child would not expect the parents to acquire computer literacy in a single moment. The sentence implies an obligation on their part _to have acquired_ PC literacy before the point at which the frustration was felt.


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## wandle

boozer said:


> your example is totally different from the one in post #1.


It is not totally different. The common factor is that the obligation is in the past: prior to a relevant intervening point of time (as mentioned in post 10).


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## Thomas Tompion

Just in case anyone may have been misled into thinking that_ it was as it should be _is in any way incorrect grammatically, I present one of many examples to be found in books by authors famous for their good style:

_No objection was raised on the father's side; the young man was treated liberally; *it was all as it should be*: and as Emma became acquainted with Robert Martin, who was now introduced at Hartfield, she fully acknowledged in him all the appearance of sense and worth which could bid fairest for her little friend.

_Austen, Emma, Chapter 19.

There was absolutely no obligation for Jane Austen to write* it was all as it should have been*.


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## wandle

Thomas Tompion said:


> *it was all as it should be*
> There was absolutely no obligation for Jane Austen to write* it was all as it should have been*.


The obligation JA expresses here is not one which existed prior to a certain point of time: it is a general 'should', expressing an idea of the way things ought properly to be done, like the French _comme il faut_, of which it may well be a translation.


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## Thomas Tompion

I'm glad you agree.


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## boozer

wandle said:


> It is not totally different. The common factor is that the obligation is in the past: prior to a relevant intervening point of time (as mentioned in post 10).


And the "uncommon"  factor (i.e. the difference) is that in our case there simply is no relevant intervening point of time (dead parents) that necessitates the use of the perfective form...  Just as TT "foresaw" earlier in this already longish thread...


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## wandle

boozer said:


> in our case there simply is no relevant intervening point of time (dead parents) that necessitates the use of the perfective form...


If I may recur to post 46


wandle said:


> The original sentence... refers to an obligation which was already _in the past_ at the time when the speaker felt frustrated.
> Even the most demanding child would not expect the parents to acquire computer literacy in a single moment. The sentence implies an obligation on their part _to have acquired_ PC literacy before the point at which the frustration was felt.



Would you not agree that the obligation also had to be prior, let us say, to the point when the daughter was faced with her parents' lack of skill?


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## Thomas Tompion

You can have expectations of people based on who they are, rather than on what they may have done in the past.

People correctly say things like _they were not as good with PCs as _*I thought they should be.  *The statement might have nothing to do with obligation, or with how 'they' have been spending the time recently, but might be based on what one might reasonably expect from knowing them.


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## wandle

Thomas Tompion said:


> You can have expectations of people based on who they are, rather than on what they may have done in the past.
> People correctly say things like _they were not as good with PCs as _*I thought they should be.  *The statement can have nothing to do with obligation, or with how 'they' have been spending the time recently, but might be based on what one might reasonably expect from knowing them.


This does not render the original sentence incorrect. 
The frustration that was felt implies a sense of obligation, rather than a general expectation.


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## Thomas Tompion

wandle said:


> This does not render the original sentence incorrect.


No, indeed.  I was arguing that it was correct.



wandle said:


> The frustration that was felt implies a sense of obligation, rather than a general expectation.


Pretty strange sense of obligation!  Who is obliged to do what?  What can you mean by 'a general expectation'?  We are talking about someone's expectations of their parents.


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## wandle

Thomas Tompion said:


> Pretty strange sense of obligation!  Who is obliged to do what?


It may be a strange sense of obligation, but the fact that the daughter expressed frustration implies she had such a sense. 
However, that is not directly relevant to the original question, which is about whether 'should' could replace 'should have' here.  A sentence could of course be written with 'should' and not 'should have', but it would be a different sentence with a different meaning.
For the original sentence, 'should have' is needed, in order to express the sense of _a prior obligation_: see post 46.


> What can you mean by 'a general expectation'?  We are talking about someone's expectations of their parents.


Post 54 says it was not a general expectation: in other words, this is not a case for 'should' in the sense used by Jane Austen, quoted in post 48.


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## Thomas Tompion

wandle said:


> It may be a strange sense of obligation, but the fact that the daughter expressed frustration implies she had such a sense.
> [...]


I asked you before: who feels obliged to do what?  Still no answer.  I think you've got caught in your own words here.

I think that as a result what you say is just false: the daughter has no sense of obligation here.  I'd say she may be frustrated and irritated.

What's this got to do with whether it can be either _should be_ or _should have been_?  I think were moving away from giving Anashin a clear answer again.


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## wandle

The daughter has the sense of an obligation on the part of her parents to keep up to date with modern devices. 
She feels frustrated that, _prior to the point_ when she realised this, they _had not done_ so; though, in her view, they _should have_.


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## Thomas Tompion

wandle said:


> The daughter has the sense of an obligation on the part of her parents to keep up to date with modern devices.
> [...]


But this just isn't what _should_ means here.  And I notice that the sense of obligation has shifted from the daughter to the parents.  You can't mean that she felt the parents were obliged to have been better, can you?  The daughter isn't saying that they were obliged to have been better; she was frustrated that they should happen to be so bad.  

She was disappointed that people such as her parents were not better.  There's no need to scrape any sort of barrel of obligation here.  Whatever sort of obligation do old people have to keep up to date with modern devices?  I can hear a few hollow laughs around the house if I were to suggest such an idea.

The point is that, at the point when she felt frustrated, they were worse than she expected them to be, or hoped that they should be.  There's no necessary sense of failure at something that they haven't done; there might be just a sense of disappointment at what they were.

I think you've got it into your head that this _should_ is expressing obligation, and I can see that this might cloud your understanding of the sentences.  I'm caused to wonder if you are really a native speaker.


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## boozer

wandle said:


> The daughter has the sense of an obligation on the part of her parents to keep up to date with modern devices.
> She feels frustrated that, _prior to the point_ when she realised this, they _had not done_ so; though, in her view, they _should have_.


I think I see your point, Wandle. I think you are suggesting that they should have been good with PCs _prior to the point of realisation that they were not_. 

Okay, now I will colour in blue all the instances of simple past tense and then - in red what you believe precedes the blue part.

_I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as I thought they should’ve been__._

I think we all agree that the blue verbs express actions taking place roughly at the same time. And then, all of a sudden, we are faced with _have been_ that is supposed to precede everything else? Then, if they actually _were_ good before that blue past moment, we should be able to say, according to your interpretation:

_I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as I thought they had been__._

and that instead of 

_I was frustrated at my parents, who were not as good with PCs as I thought they were.
_
I mean, there should be some parallelism - _I thought they were and they were_ or _I thought they were but they weren't_, not _they had been_.


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## Loob

I think this thread has missed an important opportunity to attempt to  pinpoint the difference between two grammatically-correct options:_
They were not as good with PCs as _*I thought they should be.  *
_They were not as good with PCs as _*I thought they should have been. *

Several people have made valiant efforts to suggest what that difference might be, including edgy in post 5 and TT in post 21.  I think it's probably too late, in this thread, to try to get to the bottom of it.  

Let's hope there will be another opportunity.


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## wandle

There are clearly ways in which 'should' could be used without 'have' in relation to the situation of the original post. 
One was mentioned in post 16:





> in the present tense we should say:
> 'I feel frustrated with my parents, who are not as good with PCs as I think they should be'.


This makes the same point in expressing the daughter's sense that the parents fall short of her expectation, but since it is in a different tense it cannot be a replacement for the original sentence.

Another way to use 'should' without 'have' is to make it express a general expectation about people's competence:
'I felt frustrated with my parents, who were not as good with PCs as I thought people should be'.
This states that the parents did not meet a general standard of competence one could expect people to have, but since it does not express the particular expectation about the parents contained in the original sentence, this option too cannot be a replacement for the original.

Conclusion: a valid sentence using 'should' without 'have' can indeed be composed, but it cannot take the place of the original as it would change the meaning.


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## Thomas Tompion

I think we agree that the two forms mean different things.  We were trying to point the differences between them.

Someone suggested somewhere that

_They were not as good with PCs as _*I thought they should be *is saying they didn't come up to the standard one would expect of most people with their cultural background, age, etc.  It's comparing them with a cultural norm of some kind.  Whereas

_They were not as good with PCs as _*I thought they should have been *is saying they didn't come up to the standard one would expect of them in particular.  It's comparing them with a personal norm.

I think there's a little in that, but that it's not the whole story.  People use the different forms with other different emphases.

A Little Edgy, if I understood him correctly, suggested that the difference was temporal, that the s_hould have been _form carried with it a hint of 'at that stage', which implies that the _should be_ form is relatively free of temporal considerations.  I'd like to know a bit more about what being _free of temporal considerations _might mean in this context, but I think there may be something in A Little Edgy's theory too.


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## wandle

On the question of obligation, there is no doubt that human beings can feel that an obligation rests upon others (if not, there could be no law or morality). 
The sentence originally posted is just one example.
The expectation that forum discussions should be conducted without resorting to personalities is another.


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## Thomas Tompion

Perhaps A Little Edgy's theory is suggesting that we may be more likely to use the _'should have been' _formula when something in the personal history of the character we are talking about has affected our expectations of them.  I think there may be something in that too.


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## a little edgy

No, TT, although I'm flattered that you think my reasoning was so deep, in fact my distinction was indeed purely temporal. My thinking was as follows:

_*[At a point in the past]* I *was* frustrated with my parents because they *were* not as good with PCs as I_ _*thought* they_ ....

... OK, now what tense do we fill in here? We are talking about a feeling I had *in the past* about a lack of skills that my parents had *at a point in the past*. Both actions are completed. (Maybe they're PC experts today, for all we know.) To me, that calls for *should have been* because we're discussing an action completed in the past from a point of view in the past. 

If the present tense had been used throughout the sentence - I *am* frustrated; they *are* not as good; I *think* - then I would use *should be*. 

Having read this lengthy and informative discussion (and repeated the phrase to myself many, many times), I think it's possible that I might say "should be" in the original sentence if I wanted to imply that the lack of skills continued today. That is, I was frustrated at a point in the past because of the lack of skills, and the parental PC skills are still lacking, so I say "should be."  (I might or might not still be frustrated about it; the sentence doesn't tell us.) I also think it makes a difference when the frustration and lack of skills happened. If it was, say, five years ago, I stand by "should have been." If it was last week, "should be" is possible, or even preferred. 

Finally, given the variety of opinion and the excellent language skills of the many who would say "should be," I have concluded that this is not purely a matter of correct vs. incorrect but rather one of usage and preference. It always cheers me up to see that there are others who are as bizarrely interested in such things as I am.


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