By Modals, English grammar

Milky wrote:<To my mind, the articles are the trickiest part of English grammar> And modals?They are similar to other Germanic languages in structure and as there are only two infinitives in English (and in Swedish, for that matter), the modals or defective auxiliaries are very easy and...

<To my mind, the articles are the trickiest part of English grammar> And modals?

Let's spread out the issue a little bit: ____ O ____ Type 2. Basic forms. a. If we caught the 10 o'clock train, we would (could, might, etc.) get there by lunch-time. b. If I came into a fortune, I would give up smoking. c. If I knew how it worked, I could tell...

In much of the talk about English grammar you will find discussions of modals or discussions of modal verbs. These are the same thing. CJ

There are other websites that don't agree with each other, so I think I have the right to be confused, don't I? Absolutely. A joyous acceptance of confusion is essential, if you want to understand English grammar. But another grammar book I have (by Cambridge) says nothing about that, it...

Thank you.Michael Swan thinks the same as you, in reported speech when backshifting, present conditional ===> past conditional.But another grammar book I have (by Cambridge) says nothing about that, it just says that "could, should, would, might" don't change when reporting. Another one...

Inchoateknowledge wrote:What does (simple) future tense mean in this sentence? The grammarian (it is a grammarian, isn't it?) you're quoting would probably tell you that there is no future tense. Many linguists claim English has only two tenses: Past and Non-past (sometimes called present)....

Rahul Malhotra wrote:but, i dont know why so many books on english grammar says that modals should not be used in the condition of conditionals and can only be used in the result. Often, this is caused by this situation where the above rule is correct: ---------- would have for had. In...

but, i dont know why so many books on english grammar says that modals should not be used in the condition of conditionals and can only be used in the result. how to know a word in a sentence whether it is in the adjective form or past participle form.? because we say, ex: i got my shirt...

Thank you to all those who have posted their suggestions to my little imagination game. Some have taken it very seriously thinking they would have to relearn English after the 'changes'. This was meant to be just a game, not for those wo take everything seriously, and of course in this game...