Conditional

Question

Hi dear teachers,(A boy and a girl are discussing what to do on their date):Girl: I think if we go watch a movie, eat at some good restaurant, and then have some great coffee, that would be very nice.[Teachers, in the sentence above, would is used with the present tenses in the if clause - "If we go..., eat... and have some..., that would be very nice". Is this a conditional sentence? Can we use "present tense in the if-clause and then would in the following clause (result clause) without being grammatically incorrect?Here's another one:(A boy with his girlfriend is walking on a beach and the boy says:)If you hold my hand, I'd be happy.(Again, I don't understand why "would" in the second part is used in the sentence above when we have "present simple" in the "if clause"?Teachers, can we use this structure if it's possible to? When should we use it, teachers?Thank you.

Enoon · Accepted Answer

All the things she said are "that", and that would be nice. No error.

The boy is probably not a native speaker. No matter how eager he is, he should say, "If you held my hand, I'd be happy."

Grammarfreak · Answer

Laborious(A boy and a girl are discussing what to do on their date):Girl: I think if we go watch a movie, eat at some good restaurant, and then have some great coffee, that would be very nice.

My first impression of the sentence is that it doesn't sound natural to me. If the boy asked the girl to plan the date, it will be natural for her to say: " Would you like to see the movie " Iron Man" and then go to a nice restaurant for dinner ? Would - is used every day in conversational context, especially in question form and it is not intended to be "conditional. i.e. "Would you like a cup of Cappuccino ?" I would love to, but the caffeine bothers me. I would love a glass of iced tea. (if you have it).

Laborious · Answer

Dear enoon and grammarfreak, thank you very much for your replies.

Dear grammarfreak, so can I draw conclusion from your post that would in the examples you give is not conditional, but a polite way of saying "are you willing to" or "do you want to"?

Do the following sentences sound natural to you? Does 'would' convey the idea of "politeness" rather than the "conditional" in the following examples?

- If I go to the cinema tomorrow, would you join me? (Here, would saying 'If I went to..., would you join me?' mean the same thing?)

- If you give me $10, I would help you with your homework. (Here, is it correct to use 'would' with 'give'?)

Dear sir, by looking at a sentence, how can we judge/decide that 'would' is being used as conditional?

Thank you again.

Grammarfreak · Answer

LaboriousDo the following sentences sound natural to you? Does 'would' convey the idea of "politeness" rather than the "conditional" in the following examples?- If I go to the cinema tomorrow, would you join me? (Here, would saying 'If I went to..., would you join me?' mean the same thing?)

You mentioned "politeness" and asked if the use of "would" was correct in your example .If you wanted an answer, I would say "yes". (notice the conditional here?) That being said, the sentence still has that dull ring to the ear; at least from the idiomatic perspective. There are different ways to express the same thing, and with each additional word correct used, we are in essence adding relevance to the core meaning of the sentence. Your sentence which I highlighted in green is a "mixed conditional" which you may have heard people use from time to time in conversations. I, and some others, do not like to mix them as they may confuse the perception of the listeners. If I were to make a change to change to improve the sound and semantics of it, I would write: 1 conditional) If I have time to go to a movie tomorrow, will you join me? ( I feel positive)
or 2 conditional ) If I had time for a movie tomorrow, would you join me? ( I am painting my room today. I am not completely sure if I can get it finished. But just in case I do...) They are both correct conditional sentences with understood semantic meanings.

Also consider the following for comparison:
1st conditional: If it snows tomorrow I’ll go skiing. (The person says this in December and he feels it might snow tomorrow.)

2nd conditional: If it snowed tomorrow I’d go skiing. (The person says this in August and he is almost sure it won’t snow tomorrow)

One thing learners needs to be aware which is that the 'past form' in English sometimes isn't really a past form, but rather a form of the verb which is often used to describe or talk about the past, and it can be used in other ways too. The future meaning in some conditional sentences is one way, but there are others. For example, as you may already know we can use the past form of 'will' - 'would' and " the past form " can" - "would" - to indicate politeness without the past connotation: That's how I see it.

Grammarfreak · Answer

Typo corrections:
One thing learners need to be aware of which is the 'past form' in English sometimes isn't really a past form, but rather a form of the verb which is often used to describe or talk about the past, and it can be used in other ways too. The future meaning in some conditional sentences is one way, but there are others. For example, as you may already know we can use the past form of 'will' - 'would' and " the past form of " can" - "could" to indicate politeness without the past connotation: That's how I see it.

Conditional

Top answer

Get the Weekly English Kit 📬

Related Questions