Can, Could and Shall

Question

Hello! What question is right?Can I open the window?Could I open the window?Shall I open the window?Is there a difference between can & could in that type questions?Please, tell me about 'shall' in modern English. (with examples, please)Thank you!!!

Bokeh · Accepted Answer

In your sentences "can" and "could" are being used a substitutes for "may", i.e you are asking permission. "Shall" on the other hand is being used, not to ask permission, but to get another person's opinion.

Uni-hk · Answer

Did I understand you right:
'Shall I open the window?' equals 'Have I enough strengths to open the window?'.

Bokeh · Answer

uni-hkDid I understand you right:
'Shall I open the window?' equals 'Have I enough strengths to open the window?'.

I guess not. "Shall I open the window?" means you are asking another person for their opinion. It has nothing to do with your physical or other capacity to do so.

CalifJim · Answer

Can I open the window?
= Do I have your permission to open the window?
Will you permit me to open the window?
Is it all right (with you) if I open the window?
Do you mind if I open the window?

Could I open the window?
= Can I open the window?
(Not used as often. More self-effacing, deferential, perhaps.)

Shall I open the window?
= Would you like me to open the window?
Do you want me to open the window?
(Also, Should I open the window?)

In American English shall is hardly used at all except as shown above in a first-person question, and even here, the paraphrases shown are often used instead. You can live your whole life in the U.S. without ever saying shall.

CJ

Anonymous · Answer

The first two should be 'May I'
Saying 'can/could I' is asking if it possible for you to do something.
For example, saying 'Can I go to the bathroom?' is asking whether it is physically possible for you to go to the bathroom.

CalifJim · Answer

AnonymousThe first two should be 'May I'
Saying 'can/could I' is asking if it possible for you to do something.
For example, saying 'Can I go to the bathroom?' is asking whether it is physically possible for you to go to the bathroom.

This advice seems to be from a seventy-five-year-old textbook! No one but the most conservative prescriptive grammarian would say this today!

CJ

Bokeh · Answer

CalifJimThis advice seems to be from a seventy-five-year-old textbook! No one but the most conservative prescriptive grammarian would say this today!

Maybe the "can/could/may" thing in the USA has gone the same way as the "shall/will" thing, but here in Europe we still say "may" when asking for permission, and correct our children when they use "can/could" as a substitute. And I'm far from being a seventy-five-year-old or a conservative (of any kind).

CalifJim · Answer

Bokehhere in Europe we still say "may" when asking for permission, and correct our children when they use "can/could" as a substitute

That's interesting, because the British writer on linguistics, F. R. Palmer, observed as early as 1965 (The English Verb) that "Both may and can are used for ... giving permission, but may is mostly literary, formal or old-fashioned. In speech can is more common." He gives these examples:

You may be seated -- the meeting will commence.
You can come in now -- we're ready.

then continues, "The first might be uttered by the president of a society, the second by participants in a guessing game."

(I can't help but feel that he used "president" and "participant" as veiled references to "elitist usage" and "egalitarian usage", but that may just be my own American point of view!)

In any case, it appears that maywas already "old-fashioned" in 1965.

I think children instinctively acquire the forms appropriate to their own generation, and it's doubtful that any amount of "correction" by their elders will have a lasting effect.

CJ

Can, Could and Shall

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