About a second conditional sentence
Hello everyone. I have a couple of questions.
The following dialogue is from a grammar book. The author of the book says that it is a joke about a lion tamer in training.
Trainer: All you have to do is look the lion in the eye and show him you're not afraid.
Trainee Yes, but the lion would know I was just being deceitful.
Q1 In the last sentence, why is the trainee speaking in the second conditional? Is it just because the situation the trainer has described is an imaginary one? Or is it because of the trainee judges (maybe unconsciously) that such a taming method is unlikely?
Q2 Can we paraphrase the sentence as this? --
Yes, but if I did that (=looked the lion in the eye and showed him I were not afraid), the lion would know I was just being deceitful.
Top answer
seagull Q1 In the last sentence, why is the trainee speaking in the second conditional? Yes. seagull Q2 Can we paraphrase the sentence as this?
- seagull Q1 In the last sentence, why is the trainee speaking in the second conditional?
- Yes.
- seagull Q2 Can we paraphrase the sentence as this?
- Yes.
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seagullQ1 In the last sentence, why is the trainee speaking in the second conditional?
Yes.
seagullQ2 Can we paraphrase the sentence as this?
Yes.
0seagullTrainer: All you have to do is look the lion in the eye and show him you're not afraid.
The trainer may be speaking from his experience, but the trainee is dubious that this technique would work for him.
0
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