English Grammar: Hypothetical Past

It sounds silly, but, don't laugh, I'm serious.

English language is full of syntax, including tense(time + aspect), verb inflections, subject-operator inversion, cleft sentences, gender and number concord between subjects and verbs, etc.

Some languages, e.g. Chinese, don't have any of those syntax, when we want to express a meaning, we always add some words into the sentence.

For example, there is an English sentence like this:
Sentence 1: [I play football.]
If I want to change its meaning, to express I don't play football now, but I played football in an indefinite past time, I can change it into this:
Sentence 2: [I played football.]

In Chinese language, we don't change the tense of the verb "play" to achieve the above effect, our verbs are always in the same form, we add some words to express that the activity happened in an indefinite past time, like:
Sentence 3: [I play football in an indefinite past time.]
This is not grammatical in English, but Chinese language expresses meaning in this way. There are no verb inflections, only adding words with the wanted meaning.

So, being a Chinese, I have innate difficulty to understand the grammar of "hypothetical past". The following is my interpretation, I don't know whether it is correct.

A sentence containing an "if clause" as conditional adverbial in indicative mood can be like this:
Sentence 4: [If I have binoculars, I can see that comet clearly.]
This sentence has two implications:
(1) I'm stating the fact that condition "I have binoculars" can cause the result "I can see that comet clearly".
(2) Whether I have binoculars? I'm not saying. I don't know or I'm not telling you, at least just in this very sentence.

If I change the Sentence 4 into the grammar of hypothetical past, it will be like this:
Sentence 5: [If I had binoculars, I could see that comet clearly.]
This sentence also has two implications, different from the Sentence 4:
(1) I'm stating the fact that condition "I have binoculars now" can cause the result "I can see that comet clearly now".
(2) Whether I have binoculars now? I am saying clearly that I really don't have binoculars, it's sure, or I'm not totally certain but probably. In other words, the condition "I had binoculars" and the result "I could see that comet clearly" are only a pair of hypotheses of which they two have a deduction relationship. And these hypotheses are contradictory to the fact.

Chinese English learners know the verb in the "if clause", i.e. "had" is the past form of the verb "have", and the verb in the "main clause", i.e. "could" is the past form of the modal auxiliary verb "can", so many of them think that the Sentence 5 expresses whatever meaning in a past time.

In fact, the Sentence 5 doesn't express anything in a past time, its whole time frame is within now, the use of the past form of the verbs is just for expressing a hypothetical meaning and a violation to the fact.

In Chinese language, we don't speak in this way, we don't shift a verb's tense to the past to express a hypothetical meaning. Chinese verbs don't have inflections, so you can't shift their tense, when we want to express a hypothetical meaning, we add words: "..., but those are hypotheses and contradictory to the fact.".

Things get more complicated when I wanted to express a meaning not only being a hypothesis, but also being in a past time. I had learned that, English speakers use past forms of verbs to express a hypothetical meaning, what would be left for them to express a hypothetical meaning which is itself in the past?

Then I learned that they use perfective tense to shift even further back in time to express a hypothetical meaning in a past time, like this:
Sentence 6: [If I had had binoculars (yesterday night), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]

In Chinese language, we don't speak in this way, we don't shift even further back in time to express a hypothetical meaning in a past time. Chinese verbs don't have inflections, so you can't shift their tense, when we want to express a hypothetical meaning in a past time, we add words: "..., those are assumed to happen in a past time but are only hypotheses and are contradictory to the fact.".

Some Chinese English learners stop learning here, they say: "English language is impossible to learn, I have tried my best to finally successfully have understood that in English you change a verb into its past form to express an action in a past time, now you have told me again that they don't use past forms of verbs to express a meaning in a past time but to express a meaning in a hypothetical now? This is what I can barely understand and you are even telling me now that they use an even much much more complicated structure to express a hypothetical meaning in a past time, and this hypothetical meaning in a past time was contradictory to the fact in the past time? How could I understand these? Bye bye English language."

Fortunately, I seem to have understood these. Congratulations to myself! But understanding these doesn't mean that I have understood English language, there are things even more tricky beyond my imagination.
Both Sentence 5 and Sentence 6 are in hypothetical past, the pair of "if clause" and "main clause" within each of these two sentences is either in the present or in the past. There can be a sentence whose "if clause" is in the past and whose "main clause" is in the present, or vice versa. So I can have:
Sentence 5: [If I had binoculars, I could see that comet clearly.]
Sentence 6: [If I had had binoculars (yesterday night), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]
Sentence 7: [If I had had binoculars (yesterday night), I could retrieve it (now) and could use it to see that comet clearly.].
Sentence 8: [If I had binoculars (now), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]


Many Chinese English learners can't understand the Sentence 8, they think, how could "now" determine the "past"? Past is past, they are fixed, whether I have binoculars or not now doesn't in any way influence whether I saw that comet clearly yesterday night. So the Sentence 8 is wrong.
I think in the Sentence 8, it is not that "if clause" determines "main clause", rather, "if clause" deduces "main clause", like you can observe chemical residuals to deduce what were the chemical reagents. That being said, the Sentence 8 means, if I don't have binoculars now, I probably didn't have it yesterday night, either, so I probably didn't see that comet clearly, on the opposite, if I have binoculars now, I might also have it yesterday night, so I probably did see that comet clearly, yet, the fact is that I really don't have it now.
I joined many Chinese English language learning groups, I found not many really understood the Sentence 8. I'm also not sure about my own interpretations. Did I make any mistake?
I think, this is a silly question but it should be an interesting problem among many language speakers whose mother tongues are not like English in being full of syntax structures. They and we (I mean we Chinese people) innately have difficulty of being accustomed to use a pair of "if clause" and "main clause" with each of them being in a neat structure and correlating to each other to express a subtle modal meaning.
 
Sorry my topic is too silly.

It is not silly to me, I feel strenuous and arduous to try to comprehend these.

But I suppose it might sound silly to English speakers, especially in our forum whose members are all excellent thinkers.

If any of what I said could potentially offend or bother anyone, please tell me, thanks. :)
 
Sorry my topic is too silly.

It is not silly to me, I feel strenuous and arduous to try to comprehend these.

But I suppose it might sound silly to English speakers, especially in our forum whose members are all excellent thinkers.

If any of what I said could potentially offend or bother anyone, please tell me, thanks. :)
Though I speak the English language and find it easy, I have heard that it is not so easy for those whose first language is some other. I would liken the comprehension difficulties you are having to be the same I me listening to Shakespeare. He too wrote in English but it might as well be a foreign language to me. You might find this site useful. http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/grammar-girl
 
It sounds silly, but, don't laugh, I'm serious.

English language is full of syntax, including tense(time + aspect), verb inflections, subject-operator inversion, cleft sentences, gender and number concord between subjects and verbs, etc.

Some languages, e.g. Chinese, don't have any of those syntax, when we want to express a meaning, we always add some words into the sentence.

For example, there is an English sentence like this:
Sentence 1: [I play football.]
If I want to change its meaning, to express I don't play football now, but I played football in an indefinite past time, I can change it into this:
Sentence 2: [I played football.]

In Chinese language, we don't change the tense of the verb "play" to achieve the above effect, our verbs are always in the same form, we add some words to express that the activity happened in an indefinite past time, like:
Sentence 3: [I play football in an indefinite past time.]
This is not grammatical in English, but Chinese language expresses meaning in this way. There are no verb inflections, only adding words with the wanted meaning.

So, being a Chinese, I have innate difficulty to understand the grammar of "hypothetical past". The following is my interpretation, I don't know whether it is correct.

A sentence containing an "if clause" as conditional adverbial in indicative mood can be like this:
Sentence 4: [If I have binoculars, I can see that comet clearly.]
This sentence has two implications:
(1) I'm stating the fact that condition "I have binoculars" can cause the result "I can see that comet clearly".
(2) Whether I have binoculars? I'm not saying. I don't know or I'm not telling you, at least just in this very sentence.

If I change the Sentence 4 into the grammar of hypothetical past, it will be like this:
Sentence 5: [If I had binoculars, I could see that comet clearly.]
This sentence also has two implications, different from the Sentence 4:
(1) I'm stating the fact that condition "I have binoculars now" can cause the result "I can see that comet clearly now".
(2) Whether I have binoculars now? I am saying clearly that I really don't have binoculars, it's sure, or I'm not totally certain but probably. In other words, the condition "I had binoculars" and the result "I could see that comet clearly" are only a pair of hypotheses of which they two have a deduction relationship. And these hypotheses are contradictory to the fact.

Chinese English learners know the verb in the "if clause", i.e. "had" is the past form of the verb "have", and the verb in the "main clause", i.e. "could" is the past form of the modal auxiliary verb "can", so many of them think that the Sentence 5 expresses whatever meaning in a past time.

In fact, the Sentence 5 doesn't express anything in a past time, its whole time frame is within now, the use of the past form of the verbs is just for expressing a hypothetical meaning and a violation to the fact.

In Chinese language, we don't speak in this way, we don't shift a verb's tense to the past to express a hypothetical meaning. Chinese verbs don't have inflections, so you can't shift their tense, when we want to express a hypothetical meaning, we add words: "..., but those are hypotheses and contradictory to the fact.".

Things get more complicated when I wanted to express a meaning not only being a hypothesis, but also being in a past time. I had learned that, English speakers use past forms of verbs to express a hypothetical meaning, what would be left for them to express a hypothetical meaning which is itself in the past?

Then I learned that they use perfective tense to shift even further back in time to express a hypothetical meaning in a past time, like this:
Sentence 6: [If I had had binoculars (yesterday night), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]

In Chinese language, we don't speak in this way, we don't shift even further back in time to express a hypothetical meaning in a past time. Chinese verbs don't have inflections, so you can't shift their tense, when we want to express a hypothetical meaning in a past time, we add words: "..., those are assumed to happen in a past time but are only hypotheses and are contradictory to the fact.".

Some Chinese English learners stop learning here, they say: "English language is impossible to learn, I have tried my best to finally successfully have understood that in English you change a verb into its past form to express an action in a past time, now you have told me again that they don't use past forms of verbs to express a meaning in a past time but to express a meaning in a hypothetical now? This is what I can barely understand and you are even telling me now that they use an even much much more complicated structure to express a hypothetical meaning in a past time, and this hypothetical meaning in a past time was contradictory to the fact in the past time? How could I understand these? Bye bye English language."

Fortunately, I seem to have understood these. Congratulations to myself! But understanding these doesn't mean that I have understood English language, there are things even more tricky beyond my imagination.
Both Sentence 5 and Sentence 6 are in hypothetical past, the pair of "if clause" and "main clause" within each of these two sentences is either in the present or in the past. There can be a sentence whose "if clause" is in the past and whose "main clause" is in the present, or vice versa. So I can have:
Sentence 5: [If I had binoculars, I could see that comet clearly.]
Sentence 6: [If I had had binoculars (yesterday night), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]
Sentence 7: [If I had had binoculars (yesterday night), I could retrieve it (now) and could use it to see that comet clearly.].
Sentence 8: [If I had binoculars (now), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]


Many Chinese English learners can't understand the Sentence 8, they think, how could "now" determine the "past"? Past is past, they are fixed, whether I have binoculars or not now doesn't in any way influence whether I saw that comet clearly yesterday night. So the Sentence 8 is wrong.
I think in the Sentence 8, it is not that "if clause" determines "main clause", rather, "if clause" deduces "main clause", like you can observe chemical residuals to deduce what were the chemical reagents. That being said, the Sentence 8 means, if I don't have binoculars now, I probably didn't have it yesterday night, either, so I probably didn't see that comet clearly, on the opposite, if I have binoculars now, I might also have it yesterday night, so I probably did see that comet clearly, yet, the fact is that I really don't have it now.
I joined many Chinese English language learning groups, I found not many really understood the Sentence 8. I'm also not sure about my own interpretations. Did I make any mistake?
I think, this is a silly question but it should be an interesting problem among many language speakers whose mother tongues are not like English in being full of syntax structures. They and we (I mean we Chinese people) innately have difficulty of being accustomed to use a pair of "if clause" and "main clause" with each of them being in a neat structure and correlating to each other to express a subtle modal meaning.

Interesting! I never thought about that difficulty of learning English. But I'm always impressed by someone like yourself who has put in the time and effort to master another language. I recently did two Pimsleur lessons on Mandarin and it was tough!

I'm no grammer expert and I'm sure the Texas country accent makes its way into my posts here and there, but I'll give you my take.

The way I might use sentence 5 is: I'm looking up at the comet, and at that moment the idea strikes me that I should go find my binoculars for a better view, but I don't have a clue where they are. I might say sentence 5 as a way to express the desire for binoculars, the slight frustration at not having them, and/or as a subtle request for help in looking for them as I rummage through the house: "hmm... Now if only I had my binoculars, I could see that comet more clearly... Dear, do you have any idea where we put them?"

Sentence 6 would be more like I'm telling someone a story about viewing the comet last night, and I would always make a contraction of the first had. Or I might not use the first had at all because it sounds more country and less formal... I'm not even sure it is correct grammar. So... if I were talking to my farmer neighbor here in Texas, I might say: "Yep, that comet sure was purdy last night. If I'd had my binoculars with me, I mighta seen it a little better, but I lost'em last huntin' season." If I were talking to someone with more refined grammer, I'd try to sound a little more erudite and say: "The comet last night was simply beautiful! If only I had binoculars, I could have seen it better. I turned the house upside down looking for them but unfortunately I couldn't find them anywhere."

Sentence 7 is just wrong I think. Sentence 8 is correct if you change the (now) to (last night).

(Edited to fix grammatical errors.)
 
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I think "had had" is correctly used when you're talking in the past tense about something that happened even further back: "I was about to drive home for the night, but I'd had one too many drinks while I was at the party that evening, so I called a friend to come pick me up."
 
It is difficult, because the conditional in English describes different hypothetical situations in very similar ways. For example, your sentences four and five are actually both describing present situations, even though one (sentence 5) uses the past tense. Sentence five's use of the past tense implies an aspect of regret or sadness about the current situation while sentence four is trying to be vague about whether or not the speaker has binoculars.

The important bit here is whether or not we are trying to use the "zero conditional". This is the grammatical name given for a conditional which is always true. For example:

"If you heat water to 100 degrees centigrade, it boils."

Is always true (at sea level) (and at 1G gravity, on the Earth, I assume).

So the correct form for explaining that possession of a pair of binoculars will help you see a comet would be:

"If you have a pair of binoculars, you'll be able to see the comet clearly."

Which brings in another aspect of English which is hard to define: the difference between "I can" and "I am able to". Which is perhaps for another post. It's getting late here.

And Hurmanetar is right. Sentence six is the grammar you would use if telling a story about something that happened in the past (it is basically sentence five shifted into the past tense) and sentence seven is wrong. Or slightly odd. It should be "If I had bought binoculars, I could retrieve it and see the comet clearly."

Sentence eight ("If I had binoculars, I could have seen that comet clearly") is, as you said, telling us that the speaker did not own binoculars and so they didn't see the comet clearly.

I taught English as a Second Language for four years, and in that time I was constantly amazed by how many things I had assumed were obvious were actually obscure and absurd once you tried to explain them.
 
Though I speak the English language and find it easy, I have heard that it is not so easy for those whose first language is some other. I would liken the comprehension difficulties you are having to be the same I me listening to Shakespeare. He too wrote in English but it might as well be a foreign language to me. You might find this site useful. http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/grammar-girl
Thanks for the link, I find I need to rectify many sporadic, small structural, and yet important and significant habit of my using English language. I will follow those tips and will constantly visit there to learn more and more.:D
 
It's a good post.

People have wondered if English's very structure might lead to often unseen preconceptions of what reality is.

edit: Here's an example:

Thanks for the youtube video.

In China, youtube is inaccessible by ordinary means. However for several reasons I'm about to purchase a vpn(network proxy) service, and then I will be able to visit youtube freely and will learn carefully this video.

I agree that language plays an important role in us fathoming unseen preconceptions of what reality is.

By comparing English language with my mother tongue I can see different languages reach the similar reality by taking different paths, how marvelous.:D
 
Interesting! I never thought about that difficulty of learning English. But I'm always impressed by someone like yourself who has put in the time and effort to master another language. I recently did two Pimsleur lessons on Mandarin and it was tough!

I'm no grammer expert and I'm sure the Texas country accent makes its way into my posts here and there, but I'll give you my take.
Thanks for your instructions and opinions.

Chinese language has an abundant diversity in accent, dialect, etc. Some Chinese people not from my region, my province, speak like foreigners to me. I can communicate with many English speakers but I have zero understanding of many Chinese accents and dialects. For example I'm empty in Cantonese. But I'm good at official Chinese language which may be called Mandarin. If you take interest in Mandarin, it will be my pleasure to provide helps. :) We can have message chatting in this forum or through emails, this is my email address:

tarantulanebula@outlook.com

I would really like to use facebook, twitter, but in China, many western websites and services are inaccessible by ordinary means. China has a strict censorship policy on foreign networks. Microsoft's outlook mail service is one of the few foreign social contact services we can use freely. I'm about to purchase a vpn(network proxy) service so that I can contact many friends abroad a bit easier.

The way I might use sentence 5 is: I'm looking up at the comet, and at that moment the idea strikes me that I should go find my binoculars for a better view, but I don't have a clue where they are. I might say sentence 5 as a way to express the desire for binoculars, the slight frustration at not having them, and/or as a subtle request for help in looking for them as I rummage through the house: "hmm... Now if only I had my binoculars, I could see that comet more clearly... Dear, do you have any idea where we put them?"

Thanks for the vivid description about the feelings when a speaker is speaking out the Sentence 5. I can now understand this English sentence better. And I think your description should be carved into textbooks.

Sentence 6 would be more like I'm telling someone a story about viewing the comet last night, and I would always make a contraction of the first had. Or I might not use the first had at all because it sounds more country and less formal... I'm not even sure it is correct grammar. So... if I were talking to my farmer neighbor here in Texas, I might say: "Yep, that comet sure was purdy last night. If I'd had my binoculars with me, I mighta seen it a little better, but I lost'em last huntin' season." If I were talking to someone with more refined grammer, I'd try to sound a little more erudite and say: "The comet last night was simply beautiful! If only I had binoculars, I could have seen it better. I turned the house upside down looking for them but unfortunately I couldn't find them anywhere."

Sentence 7 is just wrong I think. Sentence 8 is correct if you change the (now) to (last night).

(Edited to fix grammatical errors.)

Thanks for your rectifying. I originally thought English word "have" could have a meaning of "get", "be going to have", "manage to possess", so I used two "had"s.
Now I've known my example sentences are not good. I shall change Sentence 6 into this:

Sentence 6: [If I had bought binoculars (yesterday night), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]
or
Sentence 6: [If I had gotten binoculars (yesterday night), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]

Of course, this sentence: "If only I had binoculars, I could have seen it better." sounds more natural.

"have", "possess" can mean having something both yesterday, today, and tomorrow. They are not action verbs but status verbs.
 
It is difficult, because the conditional in English describes different hypothetical situations in very similar ways. For example, your sentences four and five are actually both describing present situations, even though one (sentence 5) uses the past tense. Sentence five's use of the past tense implies an aspect of regret or sadness about the current situation while sentence four is trying to be vague about whether or not the speaker has binoculars.

The important bit here is whether or not we are trying to use the "zero conditional". This is the grammatical name given for a conditional which is always true. For example:

"If you heat water to 100 degrees centigrade, it boils."

Is always true (at sea level) (and at 1G gravity, on the Earth, I assume).

So the correct form for explaining that possession of a pair of binoculars will help you see a comet would be:

"If you have a pair of binoculars, you'll be able to see the comet clearly."

Which brings in another aspect of English which is hard to define: the difference between "I can" and "I am able to". Which is perhaps for another post. It's getting late here.

And Hurmanetar is right. Sentence six is the grammar you would use if telling a story about something that happened in the past (it is basically sentence five shifted into the past tense) and sentence seven is wrong. Or slightly odd. It should be "If I had bought binoculars, I could retrieve it and see the comet clearly."

Thanks for your instructions and opinions.

I seem to have fully understood your meaning. I believe you are a wonderful teacher.

I originally thought English word "have" could have a meaning of "get", "be going to have", "manage to possess", so I used two "had"s.
Now I've known my example sentences are not good. I shall change Sentence 6 into this:

Sentence 6: [If I had bought binoculars (yesterday night), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]
or
Sentence 6: [If I had gotten binoculars (yesterday night), I could have seen that comet clearly (yesterday night).]

"have", "possess" can mean having something both yesterday, today, and tomorrow. They are not action verbs but status verbs.

Sentence eight ("If I had binoculars, I could have seen that comet clearly") is, as you said, telling us that the speaker did not own binoculars and so they didn't see the comet clearly.

I think, Sentence 8 not only conveys a meaning "the speaker did not own binoculars", but also conveys a meaning "the speaker doesn't own binoculars even now". May be I'm wrong on this.

I taught English as a Second Language for four years, and in that time I was constantly amazed by how many things I had assumed were obvious were actually obscure and absurd once you tried to explain them.

I agree with you. Mandarin is sometimes difficult and absurd to be explained, in a similar sense.
 
And, I forgot Sentence 7, thank ersby for helping me to make a better sentence:

"If I had bought binoculars, I could retrieve it and see the comet clearly."
This is a reasonable sentence.

The original Sentence 7 is not reasonable.
 
Is this sentence a hypothesis (and especially a hypothesis which is opposite to the fact):
"If I had bought binoculars, I could retrieve it and see the comet clearly."

Is it a hypothesis sentence which implies in fact I didn't buy binoculars (yesterday) so I can't retrieve it (now)?

If I want to convey, condition "I bought binoculars (yesterday)" leads to the result "I can retrieve it (now)", but I want to be vague on whether the condition conforms to the fact, should I say:

If I bought binoculars (yesterday), (now) I can retrieve it and see the comet clearly.

According to ersby's instruction, I tried to use the above sentence to convey a meaning parallel to a zero conditional, I shouldn't convey a zero conditional, because zero conditional conveys something always true, it doesn't matter whether I bought binoculars yesterday, or I have bought it today, or I am buying it now, or I will buy it today afternoon.
Zero conditional is usually in simple present.

I should use this instead:

If I bought binoculars (yesterday), (now) I will be able to retrieve it and see the comet clearly.

I think I'm now clearer by the help of all.
 
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A favourite of mine, needs some thought:

Where Tom had had 'had', Jimmy had had 'had had'. 'Had had' had had the teacher's approval.


:eek:
There is no modal auxiliary verb in this sentence, so I guess it is not a hypothesis.

I know it is in past perfective, but when [had] or [had had] is embraced within a pair of single quotation marks, I have no idea what do they mean.

:eek:
 
There is no modal auxiliary verb in this sentence, so I guess it is not a hypothesis.

I know it is in past perfective, but when [had] or [had had] is embraced within a pair of single quotation marks, I have no idea what do they mean.

:eek:
Well, in those two sentences, they don't mean anything in the usual sense. It could be rewritten as:
Where Tom had had 'X', Jimmy had had 'Y'.
'Y' had had the teacher's approval.
 
A side note about binoculars: The word "binoculars" is plural so I think the pronouns to use when referring to binoculars are the plural "them" or "those" or "these" instead of "it". So then how do you differentiate between one and many binoculars? You could say "a pair of binoculars" just like you would say "a pair of shoes".

Is this sentence a hypothesis (and especially a hypothesis which is opposite to the fact):
"If I had bought binoculars, I could retrieve it and see the comet clearly."

Is it a hypothesis sentence which implies in fact I didn't buy binoculars (yesterday) so I can't retrieve it (now)?

Yes. It is a hypothesis and it is implied that it is opposite to the present fact. It is usually a way to express regret or frustration that an alternate timeline - from choice to consequence - didn't happen.

"If I had saved more money instead of wasting it, I would not be in these present financial difficulties." "If I had known then what I know now, I would have done things much differently, and I wouldn't now be paying for the mistakes of my youth."

You could also present a hypothesis that is opposite to the fact and add uncertainty to its result by adding the word "might".
"If I had ordered this pair of shoes one size larger, they might fit better."

Hypotheticals can also be used to deceive or state things while maintaining plausible deniability. It is only implied that the hypothetical is not a fact, but still vague because it is a hypothetical. So suppose you are about to give your child a pair of binoculars as a gift and you want to create in her the longing for binoculars before you reveal that you actually do have a pair for her. You might say: "If we had bought those binoculars you were looking at in the store yesterday, you could use them now to see that comet more clearly." After this statement has created sadness in your child at not having any binoculars, you then give them as a gift to her surprise. You technically did not lie to her since it was a hypothetical. You deceived her because you knew she would assume the hypothetical to be false.

Hypotheticals can also be used to deceive by implying things to be true while maintaining the thin ability to deny that you said them. Suppose a salesman is trying to close a sale on a 10 karat gold ring and in order to get the customer to buy the ring he says, "if I told you this ring is 14 karat gold, would you buy it?"

If I want to convey, condition "I bought binoculars (yesterday)" leads to the result "I can retrieve it (now)", but I want to be vague on whether the condition conforms to the fact, should I say:

If I bought binoculars (yesterday), (now) I can retrieve it and see the comet clearly.

I started to say no because it doesn't sound right even though the form is technically okay. I think the reason it doesn't sound right is because the subject is "I" and normally a person remembers what they bought yesterday so why would there be uncertainty? I think it works better if someone else is the subject: "If you bought binoculars yesterday (and I don't know whether or not you bought them), we can use them to see the comet more clearly now." This would be another way of asking: "Did you buy binoculars yesterday?"

"If I bought binoculars, I can get them and see the comet more clearly." This would imply to me that you think maybe you bought binoculars, but are now unsure.

"If I bought binoculars, I could see the comet more clearly." You would say this if you are considering a future course of action. "Is it a good decision to buy binoculars now?" It is past tense because it is like you are imagining yourself in the future after making the decision and considering whether or not you like the consequences of that decision. You can also say: "If I buy binoculars, I will be able to see the comet more clearly." It is the same meaning, you're just mentally placing yourself on the other side of the decision.

If I bought binoculars (yesterday), (now) I will be able to retrieve it and see the comet clearly.

Again this is a little awkward but only because the subject is "I" so it sounds like you have memory problems. And replace (now) with (later) since you used the future tense "will be".

So suppose it is afternoon, and you aren't sure whether your friend bought binoculars and you're hoping he did, you might say: "If you bought binoculars yesterday, we will be able to use them to see the comet more clearly tonight. Did you buy them?"
 
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Sorry my topic is too silly.
No it isn't - and it is certainly interesting to discover that Chinese is so different in this respect - do you have any tense other than the present.

There is no modal auxiliary verb in this sentence, so I guess it is not a hypothesis.
Wow - you can analyse English better than I can!

I wasn't clear if you feel that this language difference impacts on the way we see issues connected with ψ - but I can imagine that it might.

David
 
A side note about binoculars: The word "binoculars" is plural so I think the pronouns to use when referring to binoculars are the plural "them" or "those" or "these" instead of "it". So then how do you differentiate between one and many binoculars? You could say "a pair of binoculars" just like you would say "a pair of shoes".



Yes. It is a hypothesis and it is implied that it is opposite to the present fact. It is usually a way to express regret or frustration that an alternate timeline - from choice to consequence - didn't happen.

"If I had saved more money instead of wasting it, I would not be in these present financial difficulties." "If I had known then what I know now, I would have done things much differently, and I wouldn't now be paying for the mistakes of my youth."

You could also present a hypothesis that is opposite to the fact and add uncertainty to its result by adding the word "might".
"If I had ordered this pair of shoes one size larger, they might fit better."

Hypotheticals can also be used to deceive or state things while maintaining plausible deniability. It is only implied that the hypothetical is not a fact, but still vague because it is a hypothetical. So suppose you are about to give your child a pair of binoculars as a gift and you want to create in her the longing for binoculars before you reveal that you actually do have a pair for her. You might say: "If we had bought those binoculars you were looking at in the store yesterday, you could use them now to see that comet more clearly." After this statement has created sadness in your child at not having any binoculars, you then give them as a gift to her surprise. You technically did not lie to her since it was a hypothetical. You deceived her because you knew she would assume the hypothetical to be false.

Hypotheticals can also be used to deceive by implying things to be true while maintaining the thin ability to deny that you said them. Suppose a salesman is trying to close a sale on a 10 karat gold ring and in order to get the customer to buy the ring he says, "if I told you this ring is 14 karat gold, would you buy it?"



I started to say no because it doesn't sound right even though the form is technically okay. I think the reason it doesn't sound right is because the subject is "I" and normally a person remembers what they bought yesterday so why would there be uncertainty? I think it works better if someone else is the subject: "If you bought binoculars yesterday (and I don't know whether or not you bought them), we can use them to see the comet more clearly now." This would be another way of asking: "Did you buy binoculars yesterday?"

"If I bought binoculars, I can get them and see the comet more clearly." This would imply to me that you think maybe you bought binoculars, but are now unsure.

"If I bought binoculars, I could see the comet more clearly." You would say this if you are considering a future course of action. "Is it a good decision to buy binoculars now?" It is past tense because it is like you are imagining yourself in the future after making the decision and considering whether or not you like the consequences of that decision. You can also say: "If I buy binoculars, I will be able to see the comet more clearly." It is the same meaning, you're just mentally placing yourself on the other side of the decision.



Again this is a little awkward but only because the subject is "I" so it sounds like you have memory problems. And replace (now) with (later) since you used the future tense "will be".

So suppose it is afternoon, and you aren't sure whether your friend bought binoculars and you're hoping he did, you might say: "If you bought binoculars yesterday, we will be able to use them to see the comet more clearly tonight. Did you buy them?"

Hello Hurmanetar, I enjoyed the perusal and fathoming of your kind, profound explanation and I find it is my first time getting so deep in the syntax and semantics of the English language.
It makes me feel that English language is even further more exquisite, beautiful and ingenious than I have sensed strongly before.

I think you have expressed these subtle meanings very very clearly and I have fully (or nearly fully) understood what you mean.

Chinese people innately feel difficult to be accustomed to past tense of verbs. We must keep reminding ourselves to change the lexical form of a verb into past tense when we want to express an action which took place in the past. When we are told that "past tense of verbs doesn't always convey a meaning of the past, but sometimes conveys a hypothesis about now", it is like that a person had been asked to fly to Alaska and on his arrival to his destination, he was dictated again to immediately fly to Florida.

You not only told me unambiguously this phenomenon of "using past tense to convey hypothesis", but also made me understand why so use for the first time of my life.

"Different timeline", "parallel universe", these words ignite a bulb in my mind. A hypothesis is like an event actually happened in one of the parallel universes, and that parallel universe has a different timeline. I'm not sure whether parallel universes exist, just an analogy, metaphor.

This is not the only key concept I learned from your writing, for the rest significant discovery and enlightening, I need to fathom more carefully and try to memorize them firmly.
 
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