ESL General English Grammar Questions

Re: third conditional

CalifJim — Mon, 19 May 2008 21:57:52 GMT

Mr. Woodham is simply saying that the presence of a negation in the if-clause does not change the basic idea behind the third conditional, namely, that it contains counterfactual statements -- statements that are the "opposite" of what actually happened.

If I had seen the approaching car, I would not have crashed into it. [I did not see the approaching car. I crashed into it.]

If I had not seen the approaching car, I would have crashed into it. [I saw the approaching car. I did not crash into it.]

In Mr. Woodham's way of explaining it, the first sentence talks about something that didn't happen (seeing the approaching car), and the second sentence talks about something that did happen (seeing the approaching car).

You can combine both ideas into one by saying that the third conditional talks about things in an "opposite" way -- counterfactually.

Re: third conditional

Marius Hancu — Mon, 19 May 2008 12:35:59 GMT

I received some really excellent training for this job. Had I not been trained in this way, I wouldn't have survived in the job for very long. [He survived just because he had been trained that way ...

When my car broke down, I had to run very fast all the way to the station. If I hadn't run so fast, I would surely have missed the train. [He didn't miss the train just because he had run so fast ...

Re: third conditional

Anonymous — Mon, 19 May 2008 10:33:11 GMT

Thank you, Mr. M and Marius. Can anyone shed some light on what Roger Woodham is saying here to a question about a third conditional in BBC LEARNING ENGLISH?

Now, Elena, as well as talking about things that didn't happen, we also use the third conditional to talk about things that did happen but that might not have happened. In other words, we use it to both to describe past action and to regret past inaction. If we are referring to things that did happen, we need a not in the if-clause of the following conditional sentence. Compare the following:

I received some really excellent training for this job. Had I not been trained in this way, I wouldn't have survived in the job for very long.

When my car broke down, I had to run very fast all the way to the station. If I hadn't run so fast, I would surely have missed the train.

Re: third conditional

Marius Hancu — Sun, 18 May 2008 23:07:32 GMT

I don't think you should memorize what the 3rd conditional should do (educated native speakers don't know that), but what are correct conditionals in general, get the feel of it.

Instead of using:

http://www.englishclub.com/grammar/verbs-conditional_4.htm

which isn't bad, you should use:

http://www.englishpage.com/conditional/conditionalintro.html

which is more clear in terms of the times involved.

>If I hadn't studied hard last night until mid-night, I would surely have failed the exam.

Only past here.

If you have questions about that, you need a major readup of the 2nd reference here.

Re: third conditional

Mister Micawber — Sun, 18 May 2008 23:05:37 GMT

If I hadn't studied hard last night until mid-night, I would surely have failed the exam.

All past and contrary to fact. In fact, he did study hard last night and he did not fail the exam.

third conditional

Anonymous — Sun, 18 May 2008 22:32:20 GMT

Hi,

I think a common thinking is that a third conditional indicates what might have happened when a certain condition had happened or not had happend.

But I found out a third conditional also possibly can say about things that did happen but that might not have happened. This argument for present-time relevancy is difficult for me to accept since what I learned is that a third conditional mostly (all??) shows a past condition and a past result

If I hadn't studied hard last night until mid-night, I would surely have failed the exam.

I think it says if he didnt' study hard last night, he would have failed but he didn't fail. -- not all past condition and past result but seems to tell what has happened at the present time.