Question
Updated on
23 Apr 2021
- Korean
-
English (US)
Question about English (US)
"As a last resort, we got a loan from Simon's older brother, and he'd only give us money if Simon embarrassed himself by dyeing his hair a weird color..."
(*Simon dyed his hair due to the condition of his brother.)
What's the tense of that sentence "he'd only give us money if Simon embarrassed himself ~~" ??
Is it past tense? or present tense? or both of these are possible?
"As a last resort, we got a loan from Simon's older brother, and he'd only give us money if Simon embarrassed himself by dyeing his hair a weird color..."
(*Simon dyed his hair due to the condition of his brother.)
What's the tense of that sentence "he'd only give us money if Simon embarrassed himself ~~" ??
Is it past tense? or present tense? or both of these are possible?
(*Simon dyed his hair due to the condition of his brother.)
What's the tense of that sentence "he'd only give us money if Simon embarrassed himself ~~" ??
Is it past tense? or present tense? or both of these are possible?
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- English (US)
I think it’s the conditional simple tense, but I’m not positive 🤔
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- Korean
- English (US)
- Korean
Then this part "he'd only give us money~" is past tense or present tense??
How do I understand this sentence??
This subjunctive mood is so confusing.
How do I understand this sentence??
This subjunctive mood is so confusing.
- English (US)
@hhoc2000 There are two types of sentence structures for the conditional simple tense
1. If + simple past..., + conditional simple (would + verb)
2. Conditional simple (would + verb) + if + simple past
In this sentence:
Conditional simple (would + verb) - He would only give (us money)
+ If
+ Simple past - Simon embarrassed himself
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- Korean
He would give us money in the future if Simon embarrassed himself ??
- English (US)
@hhoc2000 Ok, I understand why you’re confused now, because I’m having a hard time coming up with a good way to explain it. 😅
So, this entire sentence is past tense. The speaker is saying that Simon’s older brother had a condition that they had to follow in order for him to give them money. The condition was that Simon had to embarrass himself, and Simon did embarrass himself by dyeing his hair, so Simon gave them the loan. Would is a modal verb. It’s a verb that indicates possibility, permission, or obligation. In this case, it was possibility. It was only possible for them to get the money if Simon embarrassed himself. I’m sorry that I can’t explain it any better, it’s very advanced English grammar.
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- Korean
wow.. it's difficult. I think I managed to understand just a bit. haha. I'm sorry for taking so long.
Then isn't this sentence more suitable than the original?
"As a last resort, we decided to ask for a favor about a loan of Simon's brother"
because I understood it this way.
"As a last resort, we got a loan from Simon's older brother" -> result
"and he'd only give us money if Simon embarrassed himself by dyeing his hair a weird color... " -> condition
I was confused about how result is ahead of condition.
(like, I bought icecream, and he'd only give me the icecream if I paid in cash)
Or are there any implications in the grammar??
(So sorry to bother you with this, because it's important to me... haha)
Then isn't this sentence more suitable than the original?
"As a last resort, we decided to ask for a favor about a loan of Simon's brother"
because I understood it this way.
"As a last resort, we got a loan from Simon's older brother" -> result
"and he'd only give us money if Simon embarrassed himself by dyeing his hair a weird color... " -> condition
I was confused about how result is ahead of condition.
(like, I bought icecream, and he'd only give me the icecream if I paid in cash)
Or are there any implications in the grammar??
(So sorry to bother you with this, because it's important to me... haha)
- Korean
- English (US)
@hhoc2000 It’s not a bother! The sentence you came up with works, too, but I think the way the author wrote it definitely sounds more natural. You understood it correctly! In the simple conditional tense, the hypothetical action can sometimes come before the condition.
“He’d only give me the ice cream if I paid in cash”
“She’d only watch my dog if I agreed to do her homework for a week”
Sometimes the condition can come before the hypothetical action, too
“If I agreed to do her homework for a week, she’d watch my dog”
“If I paid attention in class, my grades would be better”
Yeah, it’s really confusing and I don’t think I’m very good at explaining things, but I hope this might be at least a little bit helpful.
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- Korean
oh nono, umm, sorry I wrote it to be complicating.
I mean the order between 'I bought icecream' and 'he'd only give me the icecream if I paid in cash'
My question was whether 'I bought icecream(from his store)' could be ahead of 'he'd give me the icecream if I paid in cash'.
But in order of time, it doesn't make sense, I think..
1. I bought icecream // We got a loan.
>after that
2. He'd only give me icecream if I paid in cash // only give us money if Simon dyed.
(I already bought icecream, but the simple conditional tense comes after..)
(And originally, #2's structure is present tense and hypothetical)
Did you interpret that line as indirect discourse or that kind of things by any chance??
and
Is 'loan' implying 'permission' besides 'borrowing money'?
Sorry to bother you this long!
I think this is the last question, haha.
I mean the order between 'I bought icecream' and 'he'd only give me the icecream if I paid in cash'
My question was whether 'I bought icecream(from his store)' could be ahead of 'he'd give me the icecream if I paid in cash'.
But in order of time, it doesn't make sense, I think..
1. I bought icecream // We got a loan.
>after that
2. He'd only give me icecream if I paid in cash // only give us money if Simon dyed.
(I already bought icecream, but the simple conditional tense comes after..)
(And originally, #2's structure is present tense and hypothetical)
Did you interpret that line as indirect discourse or that kind of things by any chance??
and
Is 'loan' implying 'permission' besides 'borrowing money'?
Sorry to bother you this long!
I think this is the last question, haha.
- English (US)
Yeah, you’re right, “If I paid in cash” can’t come before “he’d only give me ice cream” because it changes the meaning of the sentence and makes no sense.
“If I paid in cash, he’d only give me ice cream.” It implies that if the speaker paid in cash, the only item they could receive in return is ice cream
“He’d only give me ice cream if I paid in cash” it implies that the only way the speaker can receive the ice cream that they want is if he pays in cash
So, like I said there can be two sentence structures for the simple conditional tense.
1. If + simple past..., + conditional simple (would + verb)
2. Conditional simple (would + verb) + if + simple past
They can be interchangeable sometimes, but not for either of these example sentences. I don’t think I should try to answer your other questions because to be honest, I don’t know the answer and I don’t want to give you wrong information. I haven’t studied English for about five years, and to me, I don’t even think about why or how things are written the way they are when I read a sentence because it just already makes sense to me, you know? So it’s really difficult for me to try to explain these things. Do you know about the app HelloTalk? I think it’s a better app for these kinds of questions than HiNative is. I think there might be some people on there that could help explain it much better than I can. Sorry I’m not able to help you more
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- Korean
Sorry I fell asleep. Thats not what I want to know but thank you all this time anyway haha
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