# A year ago, no one would have thought... [hypothetical?]



## JungKim

A USA Today article has this:


> ...
> Americans saved $14 billion on gas in 2014, according to Michael Green a spokesperson for AAA.
> ...
> "It's extremely volatile and complex right now and no one knows where we are heading," Green says. "A year ago, no one would have thought Americans would pay below $2 a gallon. There is just so much uncertainty with crude oil and gasoline this year."



The sentence in question is this: 

(1) _A year ago, no one *would have thought* Americans would pay below $2 a gallon._

It seems to me that 'would have thought' here describes a hypothetical situation as opposed to a mere speculation about a real situation in the past.

But as far as I can tell, this hypothetical situation isn't any different from the real one, as described in the following:

(2) _A year ago, no one *thought *Americans would pay below $2 a gallon._

OR

(3) _A year ago, no one *had thought *Americans would pay below $2 a gallon._

*My questions:*

Are both (2) and (3) possible alternatives to (1) to be used in the article?

If so, how come (1), the hypothetical version, actually means the same thing as (2) and (3), the real versions?

And why would you use the hypothetical version when it isn't any different from the real one?


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## Greyfriar

No, 'would have thought' means 'couldn't have imagined' and is quite correct in your quote.


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## JungKim

Greyfriar said:


> No, 'would have thought' means 'couldn't have imagined' and is quite correct in your quote.


Your answer has three parts:
Part 1. "No" (I take it to be your answer to my first question. That is, neither (2) nor (3) are possible alternative to (1). Did I get it right?)
Part 2. 'would have thought' means 'could*n't* have imagined'. (Sorry, I really don't get this part.)
Part 3. (1) is quite correct. (But I didn't say (1) is incorrect or anything, did I?)


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## boozer

No, for me they do not mean the same.

The form 'would have thought' does _not_ need to describe a hypothetical situation. It also happens to be the standard form used for speculation in the past tense. Here is one example from the BNC (there are many, but finding them all takes time):

_The lance would have been used both to stab and as a weapon from throwing or as a lance on horseback._

Clearly, the speaker speculates about the various uses of the lance. No conditional implied, no hypothetical situation, no 'if'.

Your case is the same, for me. All it says is 'a year ago perhaps nobody thought that...' because the author has no way of knowing with certainty what eveyrone thought or did not think. 

This is why examples 2 and 3 are different:
Example 2 contains no doubt.
Example 3 means nobody thought that _before that point_.


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## Glasguensis

1 here is the usual idiomatic way of saying this. 2 could be used but it is weaker (nobody believed, as opposed to nobody imagined). 3 would not be used.

Greyfriar made a mistake - he meant "could", not "couldn't".


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## wandle

JungKim said:


> _A year ago, no one would have thought Americans would pay below $2 a gallon._


The simplest way to understand this is to see it as a closed past, or counterfactual, conditional (a 'third conditional'), but with the condition left out.

If we put a suitable condition in, the result could be, for example:

_A year ago, if people *had been predicting* future prices, no one *would have thought* Americans would pay below $2 a gallon._


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## JungKim

boozer said:


> The form 'would have thought' does _not_ need to describe a hypothetical situation. It also happens to be the standard form used for speculation in the past tense.


With this I do agree, but only if the context is there for speculation in the past tense as opposed to a hypothetical/unreal situation.
-----------------------------------------


boozer said:


> Here is one example from the BNC (there are many, but finding them all takes time):
> 
> _The lance would have been used both to stab and as a weapon from throwing or as a lance on horseback._
> 
> Clearly, the speaker speculates about the various uses of the lance. No conditional implied, no hypothetical situation, no 'if'.


Without further context, I don't see how your example is "clearly" speculation and not hypothetical. Am I missing something here?
------------------------------------------


boozer said:


> Your case is the same, for me. All it says is 'a year ago perhaps nobody thought that...' because the author has no way of knowing with certainty what eveyrone thought or did not think.


I can't explain but I don't understand why the author would say (1) if only to speculate what the author doesn't know for sure.


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## JungKim

wandle said:


> The simplest way to understand this is to see it as a closed past, or counterfactual, conditional (a 'third conditional'), but with the condition left out.
> 
> If we put a suitable condition in, the result could be, for example:
> 
> _A year ago, if people *had been predicting* future prices, no one *would have thought* Americans would pay below $2 a gallon._



Thanks, wandle.
I think that this make sense.
So you're saying that (1) is indeed the third conditional.

And I wonder if you see my confusion as to why (1) and (2) are basically in the same direction, if you know what I mean.


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## wandle

Yes. Saying 'no one thought' covers both of two cases: (a) where no one had predicted prices at all; (b) where people had predicted prices, but as a matter of fact no one had predicted they would fall below $2. This is a committal factual statement which requires that the writer knows whatever was actually said by whoever may have commented - a tall order.

'No one would have thought' is accepted as a way of expressing a reasonable supposition, where no one is going to criticise the writer on the ground that he could not have known everything that had actually been said.


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## Greyfriar

Glasguensis said:


> Greyfriar made a mistake - he meant "could", not "couldn't".



Oops!  Lack of concentration. Sorry.


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## boozer

JungKim said:


> With this I do agree, but only if the context is there for speculation in the past tense as opposed to a hypothetical/unreal situation.


Could you realistically describe the nature of that hypothetical situation? Wandle has proposed one but that is beside the point, I fear. The thing is, with time and imagination one could probably implant a hypothetical condition into any sentence containing 'would have been' since the form coincides with that of a regular 3rd conditional. Whether that condition was meant by the author is another story. 



JungKim said:


> Without further context, I don't see how your example is "clearly"  speculation and not hypothetical. Am I missing something here?


Nothing much, just the whole point.  'Would have' does not need to be conditional. Must I prove something as simple as that? Here is another example of speculation with 'would have' (from BNC) - something historians do all the time. It really takes imagination to attach a condition to this one, but we do have imaginative members here. 
_And the prominent prehistorian Professor R. J. C. Atkinson has clearly  demonstrated that the laying out of an accurate, straight landscape line  would have been well within the means of the megalithic builders._

And before you tell me that this, too, is hypothetical, check here to see that there is no condition attached or implied:
https://books.google.bg/books?id=uN...the means of the megalithic builders"&f=false


wandle said:


> 'No one would have thought' is accepted as a way of expressing a  reasonable supposition, where no one is going to criticise the writer on  the ground that he could not have known everything that had actually  been said.


Indeed.  This is exactly what I meant all along. We do not need to seek a condition or a hypothetical situation where there is none.


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## JungKim

boozer said:


> Here is another example of speculation with 'would have' (from BNC) - something historians do all the time. It really takes imagination to attach a condition to this one, but we do have imaginative members here.
> _And the prominent prehistorian Professor R. J. C. Atkinson has clearly  demonstrated that the laying out of an accurate, straight landscape line  would have been well within the means of the megalithic builders._
> 
> And before you tell me that this, too, is hypothetical, check here to see that there is no condition attached or implied:
> https://books.google.bg/books?id=uN...the means of the megalithic builders"&f=false


An excellent example, I must admit. Plenty of context.
But I'm not too concerned with whether I could implant an if-clause (open or remote) in there somewhere. All I'm concerned with is whether what the professor "has clearly demonstrated" is something hypothetical or something real.

And it's tricky! 

Please see if I'm on the right track.

Track 1. It's something hypothetical, with the form 'would have been' and all. But this hypothetical "form" is not counterfactual but factual in "content," if you will. This works as long as a hypothetical form can accommodate factual content. But can it?

Track 2. It's something real, despite the form 'would have been'. In fact, this form is sometimes used to represent a real situation as shown in this thread (..._if North Korea did commit the Sony hack, analysts say it *would have been* done by a shadowy unit of the government called the Reconnaissance General Bureau_...).  In other words, this 'would have been' is a different kind than is used in the third conditional, although it looks the same.

I don't know which is the right track, or whether it matters to determine which, or even whether they are two different tracks.


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## Glasguensis

Your track 2 IS a conditional : the "if" is a bit of a clue there.

For track 1, it is not a hypothetical, it is a presumption.


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## wandle

boozer said:


> It really takes imagination to attach a condition to this one, but we do have imaginative members here.
> _And the prominent prehistorian Professor R. J. C. Atkinson has clearly  demonstrated that the laying out of an accurate, straight landscape line  would have been well within the means of the megalithic builders._


Not too much imagination is needed. Just add on to the end of the sentence a conditional clause such as:
_... if they had chosen to do it; ... had the need arisen; ... if economic conditions had been favourable;_ etc. etc.

The point is not whether the writer intended any of these clauses, but simply that the possiblity of any of them is implied by the words 'would have been'.

I believe that is always the case, provided the words 'would have been' (or their equivalents) have been correctly used.
In the present case, I consider they have not been correctly used (see following post).


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## wandle

JungKim said:


> All I'm concerned with is whether what the professor "has clearly demonstrated" is something hypothetical or something real.


As regards the other thread, I observed there that the if-clause is open, which requires the main verb to be 'will have been done', not 'would have been done'. The writer of that sentence meant it to be an open conditional, but used the wrong verb-form in the main clause.

Dr. Morris' sentence about Prof. Atkinson presumably means that the professor had shown that the laying of a straight line was in fact within the capacity of the megalithic builders. That being the case, it seems Dr. Morris has made the same kind of error as the reporter in the other thread. Dr. Morris would better have said:

_And the prominent prehistorian Professor R. J. C. Atkinson has clearly demonstrated that the laying out of an accurate, straight landscape line *was* well within the means of the megalithic builders.

_This is the kind of thing which can be clearly demonstrated despite the great time gap. If they can be shown to have done something comparable, and of equal or greater technical complexity, then that demonstrates their capacity to lay straight landscape lines. That they had the capacity is thus a well-established fact.


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## JungKim

Is there any reason, wandle, you're treating these two conditional constructions differently?

The first one being:


wandle said:


> _A year ago, if people *had been predicting* future prices, no one *would have thought* Americans would pay below $2 a gallon._



And the second one being:
_And the prominent prehistorian Professor R. J. C. Atkinson has clearly demonstrated that the laying out of an accurate, straight landscape line *would have been* well within the means of the megalithic builders if they *had chosen* to do it.
_(Based on the following post of yours)


wandle said:


> Not too much imagination is needed. Just add on to the end of the sentence a conditional clause such as:
> _... if they had chosen to do it; ... had the need arisen; ... if economic conditions had been favourable;_ etc. etc.



That is, you consider the first one correct and the second one incorrect.

If the second one is incorrect, shouldn't the first one be incorrect as well?


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## boozer

wandle said:


> Not too much imagination is needed. Just add on to the end of the sentence a conditional clause such as:
> _... if they had chosen to do it; ... had the need arisen; ... if economic conditions had been favourable;_ etc. .


And you would be saying that they did not choose to do that, that the need never arose and that economic conditions were not favourable, while the author talks about the people who did build Stonehenge and other "henges".
More imagination...


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## boozer

Glasguensis said:


> For track 1, it is not a hypothetical, it is a presumption.


 I called it speculation but I am happy with presumption as well...


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## boozer

wandle said:


> That being the case, it seems Dr. Morris has made the same kind of error as the reporter in the other thread.


"Errors" of this kind are made by the million. Most of the "culprits" are historians speculating about what happened centuries ago, _without attaching any condition or describing a hypothetical situation that never took place_. Quite to the contrary, much of the time they are almost certain that the thing did happen. Here is another:
_Many of these men would have been individuals of vision and creativity as well as manual dexterity_.
https://books.google.bg/books?id=dU... have been individuals of vision and"&f=false

The author speculates about the background and qualifications of certain craftsmen who produced actual artefacts and, consequently, existed quite for sure.


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## JungKim

Boozer, when you say 'hypothetical' do you mean 'counterfactual' or something broader than that?


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## Glasguensis

I suppose the theoretical "condition" in this usage is pretty much always "If I am right". Clearly it would get pretty tiresome to keep repeating this in every sentence of a long description, which is why it is not stated. And use of this structure becomes habitual, and continues even when the speaker in fact has no doubt that they are right.


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## boozer

JungKim said:


> Boozer, when you say 'hypothetical' do you mean 'counterfactual' or something broader than that?


The hypothetical and counterfactual largely overlap in a standard 3rd conditional as the one some perceive here. 
_If I had eaten the cake, I would have died. - _the cake was not eaten (counterfactual) but, hypotheitically, If it had been, I would be dead. Incidentally, the term 'hypothetical' presupposes knowledge of what did or did not happen (I did not eat the cake, for sure), which is why I see it as wrongly applied to the example being discussed - the journalist did not know for sure what people thought a year ago. _He supposes it_.

This is not always the case with type 2 conditionals, where a clear distinction can be drawn between hypothetical and counterfactual, e.g.
_If I opened the window, you would catch a cold._ - hypotheitcal, not counterfactual (I still have the option to open the window)
_If I was in London, I would help you._ - counterfactual because I am not in London; 

I agree with Glasguensis (post 21). I think that explains how 'would have' came to be used as a standard tool in speculative reasoning, presumptions, suppositions, etc.


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## JungKim

boozer said:


> The hypothetical and counterfactual largely overlap in a standard 3rd conditional as the one some perceive here.
> _If I had eaten the cake, I would have died. - _the cake was not eaten (counterfactual) but, hypotheitically, If it had been, I would be dead. Incidentally, the term 'hypothetical' presupposes knowledge of what did or did not happen (I did not eat the cake, for sure), which is why I see it as wrongly applied to the example being discussed - the journalist did not know for sure what people thought a year ago. _He supposes it_.
> ...


So in type 3 conditional, the distinction between hypothetical/counterfactual on the one hand and speculation/presumption/supposition on the other is based on whether the speaker knows for a fact whether the action described to have transpired in the protasis actually did transpire, right?

If so, please let me know if the following type 3 conditional is either hypothetical/counterfactual or speculation/presumption:

The speaker does not know if "he" ate the cake, and says, "If he had eaten the cake, he would have died."


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## wandle

JungKim said:


> Is there any reason, wandle, you're treating these two conditional constructions differently?
> ....
> If the second one is incorrect, shouldn't the first one be incorrect as well?


Those two constructions are both closed past conditionals, also called third conditionals.
I have never described or treated them as anything else.

Please do not forget that the construction which a writer uses, and the meaning which he or she intends, may be at variance.
That variance is what has happened in *boozer's* example of Dr. Morris' sentence about Prof. Atkinson and in the case of the reporter commenting on the Sony hack.


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## Glasguensis

Even if it has been mentioned many times on this forum, I feel I have to say once more that 99% of native speakers have not studied grammar to any great extent and have no idea what a third conditional (for example) is, or what "rules" apply to it. You should not try to construct your understanding of grammar from what people actually use - you will always find things which don't fit.


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## wandle

boozer said:


> And you would be saying that they did not choose to do that, that the need never arose and that economic conditions were not favourable, while the author talks about the people who did build Stonehenge and other "henges".
> More imagination...



That is exactly what I am not saying. Like *Jungkim*, you seem, with respect, to have overlooked the difference between the construction which Dr. Morris used and the meaning which he intended.

Dr. Morris, as I  said above, presumably meant to convey that Prof. Atkinson had established the capacity of the megalithic builders as a real fact.
Unfortunately, by saying 'would have' (instead of 'will have' or 'was') he employed an implicit closed past conditional ('third conditional').

With my examples, I was illustrating the implicit closed past condtional construction.
In doing so, I was not illustrating Dr. Morris' intended meaning: just the implication of his construction.

Dr. Morris has made a slip ('would have' instead of 'will have' or, better, 'was'). That is a common slip, but regrettable nonetheless.


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## wandle

boozer said:


> "Errors" of this kind are made by the million.


Of course: just like other language errors.


> _Many of these men would have been individuals of vision and creativity as well as manual dexterity_.


That is a similar example. The context makes plain that the author considers this conclusion to be a real fact.
However, by saying 'would have', he has created an implicit closed past conditional. He ought to have said 'will have'.


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## boozer

JungKim said:


> If so, please let me know if the following type 3 conditional is either hypothetical/counterfactual or speculation/presumption:
> 
> The speaker does not know if "he" ate the cake, and says, "If he had eaten the cake, he would have died."


A speaker who does _not_ know if the cake was actually eaten would _not _use that conditional, which clearly says the cake was not eaten. A speaker, myself for sure, who has no idea if the cake was eaten would say:
If he ate the cake (past open condition) he would have died (speculation based on the open condition).
Alternatively, if the event is recent enough, it would be:
If he has eaten the cake, he will have died.


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## boozer

wandle said:


> That is exactly what I am not saying. Like *Jungkim*, you seem, with respect, to have overlooked the difference between the construction which Dr. Morris used and the meaning which he intended.
> 
> Dr. Morris, as I  said above, presumably meant to convey that Prof. Atkinson had established the capacity of the megalithic builders as a real fact.
> Unfortunately, by saying 'would have' (instead of 'will have' or 'was') he employed an implicit closed past conditional ('third conditional').
> 
> With my examples, I was illustrating the implicit closed past condtional construction.
> In doing so, I was not illustrating Dr. Morris' intended meaning: just the implication of his construction.
> 
> Dr. Morris has made a slip ('would have' instead of 'will have' or, better, 'was'). That is a common slip, but regrettable nonetheless.


It seems that Greyfriar, Glasguensis and myself * do not share this view. With respect, for me this is normal standard English and I used inverted commas - "errors".

Edit: ... *and Loob, as it happens... Hi, Loob 
Edit: ... *and Thomas Thompion


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## Loob

wandle said:


> ...
> Dr. Morris has made a slip ('would have' instead of 'will have' or, better, 'was'). That is a common slip, but regrettable nonetheless.


As I said in the other thread, this usage does not seem like an error to me: I find it entirely normal and acceptable.

_(Cross-posted.  Boozer, you can add me to your list.)_


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## Thomas Tompion

JungKim said:


> So in type 3 conditional, the distinction between hypothetical/counterfactual on the one hand and speculation/presumption/supposition on the other is based on whether the speaker knows for a fact whether the action described to have transpired in the protasis actually did transpire, right?
> 
> If so, please let me know if the following type 3 conditional is either hypothetical/counterfactual or speculation/presumption:
> 
> The speaker does not know if "he" ate the cake, and says, "If he had eaten the cake, he would have died."


I'm not going to join in any game of names for an elementary type III conditional.  The words 'counterfactual' and 'open' and 'closed' conditional have been sufficiently abused.

"If he had eaten the cake, he would have died." means that he didn't eat the cake, and he didn't die.

But the strong supposition is that were he to have eaten the cake, the consequences would have been fatal.  This is not speculative but strongly predictive - the cake is seen as containing something deadly to 'him'.

Eating the cake is being presented as a sufficient condition for his dying.   So the fact that he is still alive means that the speaker can conclude that he didn't eat the cake.

You could not utter the sentence, if you were not confident that he was still alive, so I cannot accept that final condition of yours, JungKim.

If you don't know whether or not 'he' is still alive, the most you can say is 'If he has eaten the cake, he will have died'.

ps. I'd like to be on the Boozer's Roll of Honour too, please.


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## boozer

Thomas Tompion said:


> ps. I'd like to be on the Boozer's Roll of Honour too, please.


Your wish is my command, dear friend.


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## wandle

It does seem a little inflated, if I may say so.

Neither of *Greyfriar's* posts has expressed or implied any disagreement with mine.

*Glasguensis'* post 13 expresses no disagreement either.
As for his post 21, I am not sure exactly what it is saying, but the expression 'theoretical condition' chimes with my point of view. 
His post 25 also strikes a welcome note, as it defends grammatical rules in distinction from common usage.


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## boozer

Well, Greyfriar and Glasguensis will correct me if I misunderstood them, but I think they are saying that the original example is correct English and I assume they would also accept the several similar examples I quoted from the BNC as correct English, too.


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## wandle

(1) We are all saying that the original example is correct English: _'A year ago, no one would have thought Americans would pay below $2 a gallon'.
_
(2) In addition, I am proposing that the easiest way to understand that sentence is as an implied closed conditional sentence.
(3) Then, generalising that, I have said that I believe the same analysis applies whenever this usage of 'would' is correctly employed.

Of these, I gather, only point (3) is disputed.
Two of the examples have been given with links to their context, and I have explained why I consider 'would' incorrect in each case.
Of course, this generalisation may be falsified by valid counter-examples, but I have not seen any so far (subject to the lack of context in the lance example, for which I have not been able to find the source, and which seems poor English anyway).


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## JungKim

Thomas Tompion said:


> ...
> You could not utter the sentence, if you were not confident that he was still alive, so I cannot accept that final condition of yours, JungKim.
> ...


Thanks for commenting on my own 'cake' example, Thomas Tompion. I understood what you said except for the portion quoted above. 

What do you mean you cannot accept that final conditional of mine?

Just so you know, I've never said that the speaker does not know that 'he' is still alive.


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## JungKim

boozer said:


> A speaker who does _not_ know if the cake was actually eaten would _not _use that conditional, which clearly says the cake was not eaten.
> ...



Are you sure?

Before you jump to the conclusion that my 'cake' example is impossible English, let me say that the speaker in my example added the following: "But he's still alive."

If you'll agree now that my 'cake' example is possible English, please let me know if the type 3 conditional is either hypothetical/counterfactual or speculation/presumption based on your analysis.


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## boozer

JungKim said:


> Are you sure?


Yes, I am dead positive. 'If he had eaten the cake' means, emphatically, that he did not eat the cake. And is, therefore, still alive.

I have no idea why your speaker used that construction...


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## Thomas Tompion

JungKim said:


> Thanks for commenting on my own 'cake' example, Thomas Tompion. I understood what you said except for the portion quoted above.
> 
> What do you mean you cannot accept that final conditional of mine?
> 
> Just so you know, I've never said that the speaker does not know that 'he' is still alive.


What you said was





JungKim said:


> [...]The speaker does not know if "he" ate the  cake, and says, "If he had eaten the cake, he would have died."


I said, rightly I still think, that his utterance implies that he did not eat the cake, and, you've made eating the cake a sufficient condition for his being dead, so, in the absence of other reasons for thinking he has expired, we can take it that he's still alive.

If you don't know whether or not he has eaten the cake, you can't say 'If he had eaten the cake, he would have died'.

Your last condition disqualifies the statement you want your individual to make, in my view.


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## JungKim

boozer said:


> Yes, I am dead positive. 'If he had eaten the cake' means, emphatically, that he did not eat the cake. And is, therefore, still alive.
> 
> I have no idea why your speaker used that construction...



As I said, the speaker in my example does not know for a fact whether 'he' did eat the cake or not.
What the speaker knows for a fact is whether 'he' is still alive at the time of speaking.

So the speaker says in my own example: 
"If he had eaten the cake, he would have died. But he's still alive, so he must not have eaten the cake." 

Now, you say that the speaker should have used some other conditional construction instead and said:
 "If he ate the cake, he would have died. But he's still alive, so he must not have eaten the cake."
Or 
"If he has eaten the cake, he will have died. But he's still alive, so he must not have eaten the cake."

But I don't really see why the first example is impossible.


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## boozer

JungKim said:


> "If he had eaten the cake, he would have died. But he's still alive, so he must not have eaten the cake." .


It all makes perfect sense now. Just as TT and I have been telling you, the speaker knew full well, all along, that the cake was not eaten...


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## JungKim

boozer said:


> It all makes perfect sense now. Just as TT and I have been telling you, the speaker knew full well, all along, that the cake was not eaten...



It's one thing that you know something for a fact, and it's another that you make a logical deduction, 'cause you wouldn't be making a deduction about what you know for a fact, I think.

So the fact that it makes sense for the speaker to say "he must not have eaten the cake" proves that the speaker doesn't know for a fact whether he ate it or not.

For example, when the speaker knows for a fact that 'he' is still alive, the speaker wouldn't be able to say "he must still be alive", would he?

But it works to say it the other way around. You can make a factual statement without knowing something for a fact. That is, it's possible for the speaker to say "He didn't eat the cake" even though it's just a deduction.


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## Thomas Tompion

JungKim said:


> [...]The speaker does not know if "he" ate the cake, and says, "If he had eaten the cake, he would have died."





JungKim said:


> [...]As I said, the speaker in my example does not know for a fact whether 'he' did eat the cake or not.
> What the speaker knows for a fact is whether 'he' is still alive at the time of speaking.


It doesn't help us when you alter the conditions in the middle of the example.

If you'd make up your mind what you want to discuss and stick to it, we'd be able to discuss it.

Also, it might be worth adding that knowing whether someone is alive is not the same as knowing that he is alive.  That kind of ambiguity doesn't help at all.


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## JungKim

Thomas Tompion said:


> It doesn't help us when you alter the conditions in the middle of the example.
> 
> If you'd make up your mind what you want to discuss and stick to it, we'd be able to discuss it.
> 
> Also, it might be worth adding that knowing whether someone is alive is not the same as knowing that he is alive.  That kind of ambiguity doesn't help at all.



Sorry, I'm not following you.
As far as I know, I have not alter any condition.
The only condition that I had in my 'cake' example was that the speaker does not *know* if 'he' ate the cake or not, and that condition remains unchanged.

Also, I don't know why you added the last sentence or what kind of ambiguity you are talking about.


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## Thomas Tompion

JungKim said:


> Sorry, I'm not following you.
> As far as I know, I have not alter any condition.
> The only condition that I had in my 'cake' example was that the speaker does not *know* if 'he' ate the cake or not, and that condition remains unchanged.
> 
> Also, I don't know why you added the last sentence or what kind of ambiguity you are talking about.


I put two different sets of conditions from your different posts alongside each other, yet you say, despite the differences, that the conditions remain unchanged.  I wonder if you are now distinguishing between altering conditions and adding them.  In my view when you add a further condition, you alter the conditions.  I don't think this is a heterodox view.

You are also now implying that you don't know the difference between knowing whether someone is alive and knowing that he is alive.  That's something else which may have led to misunderstanding and confusion.

I'm quite happy to start again on this, JungKim, and look at a set of conditions clearly defined by you, which you do not alter, or subsequently add to in any way.  I don't think we will make progress which is helpful to you by discussing whether or not you have altered the conditions in the past, so I will not not go on about that unless you demand further clarification.

You must know that the sentence you want your character to say is an entirely standard 3rd conditional, the nature of which is described in most of the decent books and websites.

  It is a feature of such sentences that the speaker in uttering the sentence implies that the condition in the if-clause has not been met.

  Boozer and I and others have been telling you this for some time now, and you will find a chorus of agreement on the point in the books.


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