# False conditional - abuse of if?



## Thomas Tompion

In a recent thread which was entitled _Conditonal sentence question_ we were presented with a sentence which made sense if one understood _if_ to mean _because_ or _granted that_, in a way which, I think, isn't covered in most grammar books, yet is familiar enough to natives. A problem is that despite the if-clause, such sentences are not true conditional sentences, though learners may be tempted to mistake them for conditionals.

Consider these sentences:

_If the boy steals the handbag, the police will deal with him_ - Type I conditional.
_If the boy stole the handbag, the police would deal with him_ - Type II conditional.
_If the boy had stolen the handbag, the police would have dealt with him_ - Type III conditional.

These forms are so familiar to us that we've got a standard expression for each of them. They introduce real conditions.

Consider now this sentence:

_If the boy stole the handbag, he's a little thief._

This can have two possible meanings:

a. _In the event that the boy stole the handbag, he's a little thief._
b. _Granted that the boy stole the handbag, he's a little thief._

The first seems to me a true conditional - _we can take him for a thief should the condition be met_, and the second not to be a conditional sentence at all - _because he stole the handbag we know him to be a thief_.

It's this second usage of _if_ which I want to ask about.

Here are two examples from the web: 

1. If he stole your property I suggest you call the Police.
2. if he stole from his own Brotherhood's charity, then I find it hard to imagine this is his only wrong doing in 22 years of service.

In neither case here are we being presented with conditions, I think. For me this is a very loose usage of _if _and something I regard as an error, as potentially misleading. What do people think?


----------



## Albionneur

TT, I've always thought that whenever there is "if" (unless it means "whether") the sentence is termed "conditional", since there is a condition. If you take almost any programming language, like c++ for example, any algorithm involving "if" implies a condition. For instance, 

if (x > 5 && m == 10){

f = f + 1;

}


----------



## Thomas Tompion

Albionneur said:


> TT, I've always thought that whenever there is "if" (unless it means "whether") the sentence is termed "conditional", since there is a condition. If you take almost any programming language, like c++ for example, any algorithm involving "if" implies a condition. For instance,
> 
> if (x > 5 && m == 10){
> 
> f = f + 1;
> 
> }


 Thanks Albionneur.  And this is my point.  People do think this, yet in some cases, as I've tried to show, there is no condition.  The if-clause is causal rather than conditional.


----------



## MilkyBarKid

1. If (you believe that ) he stole your property, I suggest you call the Police.

This seems more like expressing an opinion/giving advice, and more apparent in the next sentence.
.................
A man is _*convicted*_ of stealing from his Brotherhood's charity. Outside the court, one person says to another:

2. If he stole from his own Brotherhood's charity, then I find it hard to imagine this is his only wrong doing in 22 years of service.

As far as the law of the land is concerned, there is no longer any 'if' in a conditional sense; and here 'if' is used in expressing an opinion, as also seen with:
 "If you ask me, he's in love."
 "That's an awfully long walk, if you don't mind my saying so."


----------



## Albionneur

1. If (he stole your property) {

suggest they call the Police;

}

else {

do nothing;

}

2. if (he stole from his own Brotherhood's charity) {

find it hard to imagine this is his only wrongdoing in 22 years of service;

}

else if (he didn't steal) {

forget about it;

}

I know what you mean. The conditional-ness here is not wholesome.


----------



## Albionneur

MilkyBarKid said:


> "If you ask me, he's in love."
> "That's an awfully long walk, if you don't mind my saying so."


It seems to me specifically THESE are false conditionals.


----------



## pickarooney

'If' is used to denote an axiomatic truth in maths:

If x is 5 then what is 7x?


----------



## Albionneur

pickarooney said:


> 'If' is used to denote an axiomatic truth in maths:
> 
> If x is 5 then what is 7x?



35?


----------



## boozer

Hi, Thomas Tompion!

As ever, I feel privileged to be able to share my opinion with you. In addition, I would like to present you with a good occasion to disagree 

In the thread you linked to, I took the _if_ to express the speaker's incredulous attitude towards what was being said. I have not changed my mind a lot since yesterday. If not incredulity, the _ifs _in your examples at least indicate reasonable doubt that the alleged crimes were committed. Indeed, in both cases those are the comments of strangers that have no way of knowing with certainty whether what's said reflects the actual state of affairs. In both cases the accused have not yet been convicted, so even legally they are entitled to a fair trial where their misdemeanours are proved beyond reasonable doubt. That same doubt the _ifs_ stand for...

In fact, the more I think of it, the more it seems like a mixture between conditionals:
_If he stole your property (actual past condition) = If he has stolen any of your property, you must report him to the policel (future possibility)._

unlike 
_If the boy stole the handbag (unlikely future/present condition), the police would deal with him_ - Type II conditional. 
_If the boy had stolen the handbag (unmaterialised past condition), the police would have dealt with him_ - Type III conditional.


----------



## Thomas Tompion

Hi Boozer,

It's great to have your opinion on this.

I think one necessary condition for _if_ to introduce a conditional sentence is that what follows is not taken as axiomatic. _If X_ can't be a true condition where not-X is out of the question.

Applying this principle to your sentence:

_If he has stolen any of your property, you must report him to the police._

Is it possible that he has not stolen any of your property? No, I don't think it is. For that possibility to be open, wouldn't we say_ If he steals any of your property, you must report him to the police_, or, in the past, _If he had stolen any of your property, you should have reported him to the police_?

This is why I don't think your sentence is a true conditional; it's saying _Because he has stolen some of your property you must report him to the police._

I hope you won't mind if I add that I think it's easier looking at these examples if we avoid _musts, mights, shoulds, mays, woulds_, etc. because they can easily hide what tense one is using. Also they have so many different possible meanings, deontic, epistemic, etc. that examples are clearer if we avoid them.


----------



## Outsider

Thomas Tompion said:


> I think one necessary condition for _if_ to introduce a conditional sentence is that what follows is not taken as axiomatic.


Where do you draw the line between axiomatic and non-axiomatic? Is a new piece of information that you've only just learnt axiomatic?

What about the conditions in a mathematical theorem? Are they too axiomatic to be true conditionals?

To me, all sentences presented so far have the same structure. They all express a logical necessity, the consequence of some premise. The degree of plausibility of the premise seems secondary to me.


----------



## Thomas Tompion

Outsider said:


> Where do you draw the line between axiomatic and non-axiomatic? Is a new piece of information that you've only just learnt axiomatic?
> 
> What about the conditions in a mathematical theorem? Are they too axiomatic to be true conditionals?
> [...]


Thanks for joining in, Outsider.

I tried to make that clear in my next sentence. In this context I take something as axiomatic where its negative is not possible.

I was worried about Pickarooney's point, because if x = 5, 7x = 35 seems to me the sort of condition we are talking about; we could go on to say if x = 6, 7x = 42.  We aren't saying, in the first case, that it's not possible for x to equal something other than 5.

The if-clauses I'm worried by carry the implication that it's not possible for the condition not to be met: I don't call that a condition.


----------



## boozer

Thomas Tompion said:


> _If he has stolen any of your property, you must report him to the police._
> 
> Is it possible that he has not stolen any of your property? No, I don't think it is. For that possibility to be open, wouldn't we say_ If he steals any of your property, you must report him to the police_, or, in the past, _If he had stolen any of your property, you should have reported him to the police_?.


I think this is where we differ, TT. My understanding:
_If he steals = if he does it from now on_
_If he had stolen = if he did it, but I know he didn't_

Yes, I think that it is possible that he did not steal anything, because here we are faced with a different set of circumstances:

A woman I don't even know tells me her husband stole her daughter's documents and is abusing them to get a tax rebate. And asks me what to do. I think to myself: poor thing, having to go through that! But then, what if the hysterical witch  simply lost her papers and the husband is innocent? So if I decided to get rid of her by giving her a perfunctory bit of advice, at the same time trying to stay unprejudiced as to what actually happened, I could easily say:

_If he stole any of your property, you will report him to the police._

And the _if_ would reflect my sincere doubt about something that happened in the past. You are, of course, born with English and therefore fully entitled to say I would be misusing the _if. _But this is how I would say it, rightly or wrongly...


Thomas Tompion said:


> possible meanings, deontic, epistemic


One of the reasons I enjoy discussing stuff with you, TT - there's always something to learn from you


----------



## Thomas Tompion

_If he stole any of your property, you will report him to the police._

Hi Boozer,

We both know that if you have doubts the conventional formula is

_If he stole any of your property, you would report him to the police_, which applies to a possible event in the future.

I think in your case you are considering a possible event in the past, and the effect that it might have on someone's actions in the future. Then I'd say

_If he has stolen any of your property, you will report him to the police_.  This leaves open the question of whether or not he has stolen anything.

I'd can't see _If he stole any of your property, you will report him to the police _meaning anything other than _Because he stole some of your property, you will report him to the police_. I wouldn't call it good English, which is why I'm raising the issue, but it's something that people do say.


----------



## Albionneur

_If he stole any of your property, you will report him to the police.

If he stole any of your property, you would report him to the police, wouldn't you?
_
How different are these?

_If he has stolen any of your property, you will report him to the police_. 
I guess this is what Boozer has meant.


----------



## Albionneur

Americans do omit "has" or "had" in sentences of that kind, and that is something the Queen might look askance at.


----------



## boozer

Albionneur said:


> _If he has stolen any of your property, you will report him to the police_.
> I guess this is what Boozer has meant.


I meant exactly what I said. 
I think people sometimes use the example below to mean an almost certain event in the past that affects future action:

_If he stole any of your property, you will report him to the police._

Indeed, the meaning of _if_ is close to _because_, but leaves room for doubt, as I see it.

PS. Besides, I think I could say _If he has *stolen*_... in a way (stressed *stolen*) that would make it sound the same as _If he stole..._


----------



## Eli Vandis

Hello, 

  I find this discussion, as well as the thread that inspired it, very interesting.  

  As such, I would like to share my thoughts:  

  A clause with the form of “if… then…” is a conditional.  (The inclusion of ‘then’ is not obligatory, and often is substituted with a comma).  Such constructions present no argument, as they assert nothing.  That is, there is no claim of a truth-value assigned to either the antecedent or the consequent.  The only claim put forth by a conditional is ‘if’ the antecedent is true, ‘then’ the consequent is also true.  As such, Thomas Tompion’s interpretation b. of., “If the boy stole the handbag, he’s a little thief” is to assign an unknown truth-value, which as he acknowledges, removes the conditional status from the construction.  As such, I think it is a mistake to say that the conditional offered for consideration has the possible meaning of b.  I mean to say: it is *possible* that the conditional has that meaning, but it is* unknown *because the construction of a conditional does not allow for the truth-value of the antecedent to be known.  For example, the antecedent could equally be assigned a truth-value of false.  This is yet another possible meaning of the conditional that was not mentioned.  It would have a meaning something like this: the boy did not steal the handbag; therefore, he’s not a thief.  

  Regarding the examples from the web:  I find them both to be proper conditionals.  

  Regarding the thread that inspired this thread:  I find the conditional, “If the meeting finished earlier, we should have covered the main points” to be perfectly grammatical in certain contexts.


----------



## Thomas Tompion

Hello Eli, and welcome to the forum.

I'm a little surprised that you've not come across this _if _to mean _given that_ or _because_.

One feature of it, of course, is that the normal sequence of tenses in conditional constructions is not applied. Take the second of my examples from the web:

if he stole from his own Brotherhood's charity, then I find it hard to imagine this is his only wrong doing in 22 years of service.

If this was a true conditional, wouldn't it need to be

_if he *stole* from his own Brotherhood's charity, then I would find it hard etc._?

Wouldn't it be just a normal Type II conditional?

I think the writer puts the present indicative (_I find_) rather than the conditional (_I would find_) because the possibility that _he_ didn't steal from the charity is closed for him, which makes the if-clause no 'true conditional'.

How can it be a 'proper conditional' if it doesn't follow the normal pattern of 'proper conditionals'?


----------



## Eli Vandis

Hi Thomas,

  First, I want to be very clear about something: I am not an expert on the English language – nor am I here to play one on the Internet.    Instead, I have joined the forum with the intention of learning from others.  

  Okay, I am approaching this from the perspective of logic.  I agree that ‘if’ may have, at times, the sense of ‘given that’ or ‘because’.  That is, it need not always introduce a conditional clause.  Therefore, when and *if this is the case then what follows in not a conditional.*  ‘If’ is not a premise indicator.  Both ‘given that’ and ‘because’ are premise indicators – they do not stand alone, whereas a conditional can.  This is not to say that a conditional cannot be a premise, it can.  

  Maybe what I’m trying to say will be a bit clearer by illustrating the connection conditionals have with truth-values.  ‘If’ is a complementizer – it introduces a clause.  Additionally, it has the force of an interrogative.  So when we look at your example from the web: 

  “If he stole from his own Brotherhood’s charity, then I find it hard to imagine this is his only wrongdoing in 22 years of service.”  

  We find that the consequent hinges on the truth-value of the antecedent.  Essentially, the question put forth is, “Did he steal from his Brotherhood’s charity?” If so, “then I find...” The speaker (writer) is refraining from assigning guilt.  She or he is not assigning a truth-value to the alleged theft.  Had he or she wanted to do so, ‘if’ and ‘then’ would have been excluded from the construction resulting in a declarative.  Perhaps, given the context of the story, you are assigning a truth-value?  Does it make a difference to you to invert the phrases within the clause?  Such as: 

  “I find it hard to imagine this is his only wrongdoing in 22 years of service, if he stole from his own Brotherhood’s charity.”  

  Does it not make sense that a present state can be influenced by an event that may or may not have happened in the past?

  Again, I may be (most likely) the one in error here.  Moreover, all this is to say nothing of necessary and sufficient conditions, which are also very important regarding conditionals.  Actually, I am somewhat surprised that no one has questioned the additional meaning I provided for “If the boy stole the handbag, he’s a little thief.”  That is, it does not necessarily follow that since the boy *did not* steal the handbag that he is *not* a thief.  He very well may be a thief; he just did not steal *that* handbag.  

  Maybe the issue is just a prescriptive vs. descriptive one, but the Type II conditional seems wrong to me:



> _If the boy stole the handbag, the police would deal with him_ - Type II conditional.




I would use ‘will’, not ‘would’.  I do not quite understand the proposed need to maintain tense throughout, given that I believe them to be (technically) independent clauses.


----------



## panjandrum

Definition #4 of *if *in the OED:
* a.   Even if, even though; though; granted that.*

Examples from 1340 

It strikes me as a somewhat rhetorical device.


----------



## Thomas Tompion

That's interesting, Panj.  Thank you.

 I think the message to learners is to beware of thinking that if-clauses in English always introduce conditional clauses. This is a whole class of if-clause which means something else and doesn't follow the rules of tense-sequencing usual in conditional sentences.

I'm also surprised that the OED lumps the four meanings together. _Granted that_ seem to carry much less concessive force than _even though_.


----------



## Thomas1

Thomas Tompion said:


> That's interesting, Panj.  Thank you.
> 
> I think the message to learners is to beware of thinking that if-clauses in English always introduce conditional clauses. This is a whole class of if-clause which means something else and doesn't follow the rules of tense-sequencing usual in conditional sentences.[...]


The samples you gave, Thomas, among them '_If the boy stole the handbag, he's a little  thief._' are of the same type of conditional sentences as '_If the boy steals the handbag, the police will  deal with him_.' These are open/real conditionals. 
The following:





> _If the boy stole the handbag, the police would  deal with him_ - Type II conditional.
> _If the boy had stolen the handbag, the police  would have dealt with him_


are hypothetical conditionals.

Their names reflect what the moods they use are employed for (though, they may not be so apparent in English). In fact, they are also called indicative, subjunctive conditionals respectively.

I agree open conditionals are rarely covered in full by textbooks' authors. Usually you will find the classic forms with a present tense in the protasis and a future, and sometimes present, tense in the apodosis. Though I can see some pragmatic reasons for it, this is a pity, beause it leads many people to the conclusion that they are, if not wrong, at least somewhat less valid than those presented in books.

EDIT: have a look here for more information on open conditinal sentences.


----------



## Thomas Tompion

Thomas1 said:


> The samples you gave, Thomas, among them '_If the boy stole the handbag, he's a little thief._' are of the same type of conditional sentences as '_If the boy steals the handbag, the police will deal with him_.' These are open/real conditionals.
> 
> EDIT: have a look here for more information on open conditinal sentences.


Hi Thomas,

I've read the piece on open conditionals, and they are not what I'm talking about. I obviously didn't explain myself clearly enough:

You say that 1. _If the boy steals the handbag, the police will deal with him_ is the same sort of conditional as 2. _If the boy stole the handbag, he's a little thief. _

My point was that they are different, so I'd better say why:

_1. If the boy steals the handbag, the police will deal with him _is a familiar Type I conditional, and I labelled it as such in the OP. It is a conditional use of_ if_; it's saying _should the condition_ (that the boy steals the handbag)_ be met, the police will deal with him._

_2. If the boy stole the handbag, he's a little thief _on the other hand can, and it's this sense I'm considering, not be a conditional sentence at all. I'm not saying it couldn't mean anything else, but that it can mean, and would often be taken in the right circumstances by natives to mean,_ The boy stole the handbag, and this shows he's a little thief_. His being a thief is not conditional on anything, no condition has to be met for him to be shown to be a thief: he's stolen the handbag, so he's a thief.

_If_ effectively means _given that_ in this context, and I was interested that this non-conditional use should go back, as Panj's quote from the OED showed, to the fourteenth century.

I made a fuss about it because some learners think that an if-clause inevitably introduces a condition, and this is manifestly not the case, so it's best to disabuse them. _Granted that they think this, we must put them right_ can be translated _if they think this, we must put them right_.


----------



## MikeLynn

Thomas Tompion said:


> I made a fuss about it because some learners think that an if-clause inevitably introduces a condition, and this is manifestly not the case, so it's best to disabuse them. Granted that they think this, we must put them right can be translated if they think this, we must put them right.[/I][/COLOR].


Thanks for bringing this up Thomas Tompion as there are tons of questions on tests using sentences like: _I don't know if A) he comes / B) he will come to the party._ and a lot of them choose A) because they've been taught that every clause introduced by IF must be a conditional clause


----------



## Thomas1

Thomas Tompion said:


> [...]
> _If_ effectively means _given that_ in this context, and I was interested that this non-conditional use should go back, as Panj's quote from the OED showed, to the fourteenth century.
> 
> I made a fuss about it because some learners think that an if-clause inevitably introduces a condition, and this is manifestly not the case, so it's best to disabuse them. _Granted that they think this, we must put them right_ can be translated _if they think this, we must put them right_.


I see your point, Thomas. I'm afraid I didn't express myself clearly. I assumed that, since this particular use of 'if' comes from its conditional use, the tense-usage for open conditionals applied to 'if' with the meaning 'even though; granted that' as well (regardless of whether there are some echoes of condition in such sentences or not). So, in brief, I took them to be similar in terms of tense application, not in terms of modality. Please, tell if that makes sense now.


----------



## Thomas Tompion

Thomas1 said:


> I see your point, Thomas. I'm afraid I didn't express myself clearly. I assumed that, since this particular use of 'if' comes from its conditional use, the tense-usage for open conditionals applied to 'if' with the meaning 'even though; granted that' as well (regardless of whether there are some echoes of condition in such sentences or not). So, in brief, I took them to be similar in terms of tense application, not in terms of modality. Please, tell if that makes sense now.


It's an interesting question, Thomas, and one I'd be inclined to answer in the negative, but I'm not entirely sure about open conditionals. As I understand it, the tenses in the clauses mirror each other because _if_ means _when_, and so inevitably the time periods are the same.

_If she read me bedroom stories, I always slept soundly_ - i.e. I did so when she did.
_If she comes alone, I always make a fuss of her_ - i.e. I do so when she does.

When_ if_ means _granted that_, however, tenses are much more free to express ideas of time in conventional ways:

_If he stole the handbag, he's a little thief_ - the fact that he stole it shows this.
_If he stole the handbag, he was without principles_ - the fact that he stole the handbag shows this.
_If he stole the handbag, we will have to watch our spoons_ - the fact that he stole the handbag shows this.

This freedom of tenses makes a mockery of questions about tense sequencing when_ if_ has this sense of _granted that_.

This last example, _If he stole the handbag, we will have to watch our spoons,_ is different from the type II conditional, and if we change the tense in the second clause to conform to the pattern of the type II conditional, we immediately sense the change to the hypothetical: _If he stole the handbag, we would have to watch our spoons._


----------



## Einstein

On the way home from work I do some shopping at the supermarket. I think of buying some bread, but then decide not to. I get home and find that my wife is going to the baker's shop, where the bread is better. I say:
_If you're going to buy bread at the baker's, I would have been foolish to buy it at the supermarket._

This is not a standard conditional sentence; _if you're going to the baker's_ is a simple observation of fact.

Here's a standard conditional (Type 3):
_If he had been there, he would have seen the bears._
(There were some bears, but he didn't see them because he wasn't there).

Here's a non-standard sentence:
_If he was there, he would have seen the bears._
This means that there were no bears because if there had been any, he, being there, would have seen them.
We can re-write it as:
_He was there, so if there had been any bears he would have seen them._ The part underlined is a genuine conditional clause, taken as understood in the original sentence.

The existence of the three types of conditional is something worth studying as they cover a lot of situations and illustrate the function of these grammatical forms, but it would be sad if all our thought processes were forced into this strait-jacket.

A further non-standard sentence:
_If you knew, why didn't you tell me?_
The reply is a standard 3rd conditional:
_But I didn't know. If I had known, I would certainly have told you!_


----------



## Thomas Tompion

_If you're going to buy bread at the baker's, I would have been foolish to buy it at the supermarket_ and

_If you knew, why didn't you tell me?_

are the ones I'm asking about in this thread -_ if_ means _granted that_. 

_If he was there, he would have seen the bears _isn't an example of this. It's an example of a form which comes up quite often in the forum, and there are people who think it should be either_ If he was there, he would see the bears_ or_ If he had been there, he would have seen the bears_.

The bastard form is a sort of ambiguous halfway house. I'm not sure what it means.


----------



## Einstein

Thomas Tompion said:


> If he was there, he would have seen the bears[/COLOR] [/I]isn't an example of this. It's an example of a form which comes up quite often in the forum, and there are people who think it should be either_ If he was there, he would see the bears_ or_ If he had been there, he would have seen the bears_.
> 
> The bastard form is a sort of ambiguous halfway house. I'm not sure what it means.


I don't think you've quite understood my explanation. For your first sentence _I'd say If he were there, he would see the bears_. It means that there are some bears but he can't see them because he isn't there.
Your second sentence is the past version: there were some bears but he didn't see them because he wasn't there.
I agree that these two forms can't be mixed, although there are cases where we can mix second and third conditional forms: _If I hadn't robbed the bank (3rd) I wouldn't be in prison now (2nd)._

My sentence, _If he was there, he would have seen the bears_, had a different meaning; note the "was" (not "were"), representing a real past, not a hypothetical present.
We could rephrase it as: _If he was there, why didn't he see the bears? Because there weren't any! Had there been any, he would have seen them._
Is that clear now?


----------



## Thomas1

Thomas Tompion said:


> It's an interesting question, Thomas, and one I'd be inclined to answer in the negative, but I'm not entirely sure about open conditionals. As I understand it, the tenses in the clauses mirror each other because _if_ means _when_, and so inevitably the time periods are the same.


This is not how I understand it. The tenses may but need not mirror each other in these conditionals. The website says that the tenses in open conditionals depend on what time frame you refer to, i.e. past, present or future._ I really don't think this means they have to mirror each other.

In the sentence: _


> The example from the reading on Consumer Law -
> 
> "_If the item was purchased on line then you should be able to  send it back without a reason.... "- _


I understand 'if' to me 'granted that'. The sentence is also an indicator to me that the clause in the apodosis can refer to the present as well or to the future:
A client who's reading the sentence after buying an item on-line will take it to refer to his present right to send it back without a reason.
A client who's reading the sentence before buying an item on-line will take it to refer to his future right to send it back without a reason.
Another thing is that, even if 'if' means 'when', the tenses need not mirror each other too.
_If she read me bedroom stories, I had always prepared a cup of tea for her_.
_If she read me bedroom stories, I would dream about adventures. [I mean future by would.--so it's the first conditional in the past]_ 
On the other hand, I think that 'if' in the sentence above can also be interpreted as 'granted that', Thomas.


----------



## Magnalp

If something happens to be true, [then] *~*. [Reality]
—If it is/was/will be/has been like that, something is/was/will/would happen.
_____[If something is true].

If something happened to be true, [then] *~*. [Unreality]
—_If it were like that, something would happen._
—_If it had been like that, something would have happened.
______[If something were true].

What do you think, gentlemen, about this? It is the way in which conditions work in Spanish; it is based on what the _'prótasis'_ (the if part of the condition, the first part) expresses, on whether it shows an uncertain or certain correlation to time; with the first one we would use the subjunctive, the same—in a minor way—happens in English; the indicative would be used in those conditions that were close to reality.


----------



## Thomas Tompion

Thomas1 said:


> This is not how I understand it. The tenses may but need not mirror each other in these conditionals. The website says that the tenses in open conditionals depend on what time frame you refer to, i.e. past, present or future._ I really don't think this means they have to mirror each other._


Thank you for this correction, Thomas. I agree entirely. _If_ effectively means _when_ in these sentences, as I understand it, and this means the sentences follow tense sequencing appropriate to when-clauses.

"_If the item was purchased on line then you should be able to send it back without a reason.... "_


Thomas1 said:


> _In the sentence: _I understand 'if' to mean 'granted that'. The sentence is also an indicator to me that the clause in the apodosis can refer to the present as well or to the future:
> A client who's reading the sentence after buying an item on-line will take it to refer to his present right to send it back without a reason.
> A client who's reading the sentence before buying an item on-line will take it to refer to his future right to send it back without a reason.
> [...]


I'm not sure I agree here and the sentence is complicated by the 'should' which can be several tenses, and so introduces ambiguities. Let's change the form to show what's happening here:

_1. If the item is bought online, you will be able to send it back without giving a reason_ - this is the true conditional: tense sequencing is that of a type I conditional sentence. The hypothetical sense is very apparent.

_2. If the item was bought online, you will be able to send it back without giving a reason_ - this is the false conditional: _if_ means _given that_. Tense sequencing is unconventional. There is no hypothetical sense.

_3. If the item was bought online, you would be able to send it back without giving a reason_ - this is the true conditional: tense sequencing is that of a type II conditional sentence. The hypothetical sense is very apparent.

_4. If the item was bought online, you are able to send it back without giving a reason_ - this is the false conditional: _if_ means given _given that_. Tense sequencing is unconventional. There is no hypothetical sense.

Granted the wide range of tenses which can be conveyed by that _should_ in "_If the item was purchased on line then you should be able to send it back without a reason.... " _I'd be very unsure which of the four meanings was being suggested (with the addition of a sense of entitlement, of course). On the lips of the customer, I'd take it to mean 4. I can't really see how it can refer to a prospective purchase.


----------



## boozer

Thomas Tompion said:


> _ If the item was bought online, you will be able to send it back without giving a reason_ - this is the false conditional: _if_ means _given that_. Tense sequencing is unconventional. There is no hypothetical sense..


But, TT, phrases like "given that" or "provided that" also introduce a condition, I think. Don't you get the feeling the speaker is actually saying:
We don't know if the item was bought online - it may have been or it may not have been. But if/given that it was (i.e. if this condition is met), you will be able to...
I surely get this sense.


----------



## Thomas Tompion

boozer said:


> But, TT, phrases like "given that" or "provided that" also introduce a condition, I think. Don't you get the feeling the speaker is actually saying:
> We don't know if the item was bought online - it may have been or it may not have been. But if/given that it was (i.e. if this condition is met), you will be able to...
> I surely get this sense.


This is the heart of the matter, Boozer.

When _if_ means _given that_, I get the sense:

_The item was bought online, so I am able to..._

When _if_ introduces a true condition, I get the sense:

_If the item is bought online, I will be able to... _or
_If the item was bought, I would be able to..._

In these last two cases the possibility remains open that the item is not or was not bought online. This possibility is closed in the false conditional: the item was bought online and we are concerned with what follows from that fact.


----------



## Einstein

Magnalp said:


> If something happens to be true, [then] *~*. [Reality]
> —If it is/was/will be/has been like that, something is/was/will/would happen.
> _____[If something is true].
> 
> If something happened to be true, [then] *~*. [Unreality]
> —_If it were like that, something would happen._
> —_If it had been like that, something would have happened.
> ______[If something were true].
> 
> What do you think, gentlemen, about this? It is the way in which conditions work in Spanish; it is based on what the _'prótasis'_ (the if part of the condition, the first part) expresses, on whether it shows an uncertain or certain correlation to time; with the first one we would use the subjunctive, the same—in a minor way—happens in English; the indicative would be used in those conditions that were close to reality.


Magnalp, here we are talking about a different use of "if", not in standard conditional sentences. I think the same phenomenon exists in your language; see here.


----------



## Thomas1

Thomas Tompion said:


> [...]
> "_If the item was purchased on line then you should be able to send it back without a reason.... "_
> 
> I'm not sure I agree here and the sentence is complicated by the 'should' which can be several tenses, and so introduces ambiguities. Let's change the form to show what's happening here:
> 
> _1. If the item is bought online, you will be able to send it back without giving a reason_ - this is the true conditional: tense sequencing is that of a type I conditional sentence. The hypothetical sense is very apparent.
> 
> _2. If the item was bought online, you will be able to send it back without giving a reason_ - this is the false conditional: _if_ means _given that_. Tense sequencing is unconventional. There is no hypothetical sense.
> 
> _3. If the item was bought online, you would be able to send it back without giving a reason_ - this is the true conditional: tense sequencing is that of a type II conditional sentence. The hypothetical sense is very apparent.
> 
> _4. If the item was bought online, you are able to send it back without giving a reason_ - this is the false conditional: _if_ means given _given that_. Tense sequencing is unconventional. There is no hypothetical sense.
> 
> Granted the wide range of tenses which can be conveyed by that _should_ in "_If the item was purchased on line then you should be able to send it back without a reason.... " _I'd be very unsure which of the four meanings was being suggested (with the addition of a sense of entitlement, of course). On the lips of the customer, I'd take it to mean 4. I can't really see how it can refer to a prospective purchase.


I think we are talking past each other, because I see no problem with your interpretation of the sentences and I didn't mention the hypthetical meanings of the sentece as I took it for granted that they aren't what we are interested mostly in this thread, and the thing that poses a problem is the name then.
Let me give you another example, what type of conditional is the following sentence to you, Thomas? What does 'if' mean?
_If you heat ice, it turns into water._


----------



## Thomas1

Thomas Tompion said:


> This is the heart of the matter, Boozer.
> 
> When _if_ means _given that_, I get the sense:
> 
> _The item was bought online, so I am able to..._
> 
> When _if_ introduces a true condition, I get the sense:
> 
> _If the item is bought online, I will be able to... _or
> _If the item was bought, I would be able to..._
> 
> In these last two cases the possibility remains open that the item is not or was not bought online. This possibility is closed in the false conditional: the item was bought online and we are concerned with what follows from that fact.


Another question that's just occured to me, Thomas:
do you also happen to interpret such sententeces, _If the item was bought online, you should be able to..._, in the way Boozer does? It seems to me a very probable way to do so too (and I'm fairly sure people also interpret it like that). This is not to say that the pure 'polar' interpretations, i.e. causal and conditional, are not possible. But how about something in the middle? And if the answer is yes, what type of conditional would you classify them as? If the answer is no, how would you express such a meaning?


----------



## Magnalp

Einstein said:


> Magnalp, here we are talking about a different use of "if", not in standard conditional sentences. I think the same phenomenon exists in your language; see here.



If this were true, [then] *~*. [Unreality (subjunctive)] 
These are standard conditional sentences.
_If I were like that, would you tell me?_
_If the item were bought_, _I would be happy with that._

If this is/was/will be true, [then] *~*. [Reality (indicative)]
And, if I understood well, these are the conditionals you all are talking about.
*If I was like that, why didn't you tell me?
If the item was bought**, I'm happy with that.*

Are you not talking of this?


----------



## Thomas1

You're spot-on, Magnalp. I agree also with your delineation of moods (I tried to get it across in one of my first posts).


----------



## Thomas Tompion

Thomas1 said:


> [...]Let me give you another example, what type of conditional is the following sentence to you, Thomas? What does 'if' mean?
> _If you heat ice, it turns into water._


I suspect it means almost exactly the same thing as 
_When you heat ice, it turns into water._ It's presenting the matter as a scientific truth. This seems to me subtly different from
_If you heat ice, it will turn into water_, which raises a true hypothetical.

I'm concerned in the thread about another use of _if_:

_If you have heated the ice, you have seen how it turns into water_, in its sense of _now that you've heated the ice, you have seen how it turns into water_, rather than in its sense of _as long as you have heated the ice, you will have seen how it turns into water_. I hope we agree that these two are different.



Thomas1 said:


> Another question that's just occured to me, Thomas:
> do you also happen to interpret such sententeces, _If the item was bought online, you should be able to..._, in the way Boozer does? It seems to me a very probable way to do so too (and I'm fairly sure people also interpret it like that). This is not to say that the pure 'polar' interpretations, i.e. causal and conditional, are not possible. But how about something in the middle? And if the answer is yes, what type of conditional would you classify them as? If the answer is no, how would you express such a meaning?


 
Boozer said he took it to mean We don't know if the item was bought online - it may have been or it may not have been. But if/given that it was (i.e. if this condition is met), you will be able to...

I've been arguing that at the crux of the explanation, after the word _But_, there is a difference between _if_ and _given that:_

If you want the word to be _if_, the sentence will have to be_ If it was, you would be able to..._
If you want the words to be _given that_, then the sentence could be_ Given that it was, you will be able to..._

So my problem is that Boozer seems at that moment to allow the sentence two meanings, and you are asking me if I would accept that one meaning. This makes it hard for me to answer helpfully.

I'm puzzled, you see, by if/given that it was (i.e. if this condition is met), because _if_ meaning _in the case that_ isn't the same thing as_ if_ meaning _it is the case that, and so.._.

_If it was bought online_ can mean_ in the case that it was bought online_ OR _it was bought online, and so.._. It's this potential ambiguity which I'm trying to highlight.


----------



## Einstein

Magnalp said:


> If this were true, [then] *~*. [Unreality (subjunctive)]
> These are standard conditional sentences.
> _If I were like that, would you tell me?_
> _If the item were bought_, _I would be happy with that._
> 
> If this is/was/will be true, [then] *~*. [Reality (indicative)]
> And, if I understood well, these are the conditionals you all are talking about.
> *If I was like that, why didn't you tell me?
> If the item was bought**, I'm happy with that.*
> 
> Are you not talking of this?


Yes, maybe it wasn't clear to me.


----------

