0
Deepcosmos Posted 3 years ago
Grammar

‘they were being tested’

Hello, everyone,

“Imagine this scene. There are six people in an elevator with an actor hired by researchers. The actor drops a bunch of coins and pencils. They fall to the floor with a clatter. And then, as the elevator goes down floor by floor, not one person moves a muscle to help. The people in the elevator have to notice the actor picking up the coins and pencils on the floor. But each person is surrounded by five others who are doing nothing. If the people knew they were being tested, every one would instantly come to the aid of the stranger.”

* source; ‘The Hidden Brain, How our unconscious minds elect presidents, control markets, wage wars, and save our lives.’ by Shankar Vedantam

I think the underline part is in a subjunctive mood – the second conditional. If so, I wonder why the author wrote “they were being tested” instead of “they are being tested”, since I feel the ‘knew’ is a counterfactual conditional but the event - ‘a test is being done’ is a factual one. I mean the subjunctive mood can’t be extended to the other verb in the subordinate clause depending on the context, especially not allowed in the sentence above.

Your response would be much appreciated.

  

Top answer

'knew' is past. 'were' is past. We virtually always use the past after introductory clauses with "knew (that)", "thought (that)", "said (that)", etc.

— CalifJim

  • 'knew' is past.
  • 'were' is past.
  • We virtually always use the past after introductory clauses with "knew (that)", "thought (that)", "said (that)", etc.
  • We assume it's subjunctive because of the meaning, but there is actually no observable difference between subjunctive "they knew", "they were" and indicative "they knew", "they were".
  • The only time the difference is observable is for "I", "he", "she", and "it", and only for the verb be , where "was" becomes "were".
Free · every Monday

Get the Weekly English Kit 📬

New words, one handy idiom, and a 2-minute quiz — delivered to your inbox to keep your streak alive.

1 Answers
0

'knew' is past.

'were' is past.

We virtually always use the past after introductory clauses with "knew (that)", "thought (that)", "said (that)", etc.

We assume it's subjunctive because of the meaning, but there is actually no observable difference between subjunctive "they knew", "they were" and indicative "they knew", "they were".

The only time the difference is observ

0

Related Questions