In Numbers^x, Modals^x, Modal auxiliaries^x

Kilimanjaro wrote: Hello Cool Breeze, This sentence is taken from Michael SWAN's Practical English Usage. He says "might" can be used in such contexts Hi Kilimanjaro Yes, I know it's from that book. You mentioned it in a previous post. I didn't say it was right or wrong in my opinion. I...

Milky wrote: He has to go and He must go.> Well, I guess that would be part of the mastering part of the language - i.e. the complex part. It's easy for anyone to claim that English is not complex, or is much simpler than many other languages, if he/she avoids talking about...

Milky wrote: "I'd like to can swim" is ungrammatical. In English, modal auxiliaries like can and must are disallowed in infinitival clauses." That is a statement that is true of any variety of English with which I am familiar. Prescriptivists and descriptivists are often going to agree...

1. You must be pretty dumb if you get a bad mark. This is fine. It’s the first conditional: modal auxiliary verb + if + present simple 2. You must be pretty dumb if you got a bad mark. This would work as the second conditional if you replaced ‘must’ with ‘would’. In such a...

One reference -- Paul Roberts' Understanding Grammar -- says need has become a sometimes modal auxiliary, while have to, be able to, and be used to are "equivalents of modal auxiliaries." Need was not originally a modal auxiliary, but it has been drawn into the group because of its meaning,...

The Grammar Book ... in English modal auxiliaries (can, may, shall,will, etc.) are distinguished from other auxilairy verbs (be, have, do) as well as from ordinary verbs by their lack of tense ... In English, modals are derived from verbs that DID carry tense and take agreement markers...