Type 2 or 3

Question

X: I didn't buy that house?Y: If I were you, I would buy the houseor Y: If I were you, I would have bought the houseX: Is my calculation correct?Y: If you included temperature in the calculation, it would be correct.or Y: If you had included temperature in the calculation, it would be correct.Can you please explain when to use Type 2 or 3? I understand that type 2 me is unreal in present and type 3 is unreal in past but which one to use when contexts are given?

Kooyeen · Accepted Answer

Hi, I'll try to answer:

If I were you, I would buy the house. If I were you (but I'm not, of course), I would buy the house (that's what I would do if I were in your situation now).

If I were you, I would have bought the house. If I were you (but I'm not, of course), I would have bougth the house (that's what I would have done if I had been in your situation, a past situation).

Is it correct, Mr. Brown? ---- If you included the temperature t₀ in the calculation (I don't know if you actually did), then it is correct, provided you didn't make any mistakes. If you didn't include the temperature (I don't know if you actually didn't), then the result is definitely wrong.

Is it correct, Mr. Brown? ---- If you had included the temperature t₀ in the calculation (you didn't include it!), the result would have been correct. Sorry, next time remember to take account of the temperature.

I tried to give you my opinion, now let's see if others feel like commenting.

New2grammar · Answer

Kooyeen, actually I prefer your sentence which combines both present and past tenses.With your sentence, I can imagine the answer is right in front of me and I do not know whether the student included temperature in his calculation.

If you didn't include the temperature, then the result is definitely wrong.

The reason I chose 'didn't ... would' was that I was following Type 2 format and it sounds unnatural to me.

If you didn't include the temperature, then the result definitely would be wrong.

I am trying to understand the difference between a pure Type 2 sentence and your sentence. Please help me.

Marius Hancu · Answer

This is very clear, IMO:

http://www.englishpage.com/conditional/conditionalintro.html

Kooyeen · Answer

Well,

If you didn't include the temperature, then the result is definitely wrong. This sentence describes a fact. If you didn't include the temperature (in the past, when you were supposed to include it), then the result can't be correct, it's wrong of course.

If you didn't include the temperature, then the result would definitely be wrong. This sentence doesn't describe a real fact, but a hypothetical situation. If you didn't include the temperature (but you do include it, I know you include it in your calculation), then the result would definitely be wrong (but the result is not wrong, provided you didn't make any other mistakes).

That's the way I see it. I know it seems confusing and strange. If you look at the first part of those sentences, you can see they are the same, "If you didn't include", but they have different meanings.

New2grammar · Answer

Thanks Kooyeen for your patience in explaining it to me. I love the way you have explained it to me and I think now I'm able to understand it better. Hope that this is still applicable to other contexts as I find some contexts have different interpretations - maybe it's just me. <img class='emoticon' style='Width:19px;Height:19px;' data-delaysrc='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/7.gif' src='https://uat-englishforward-forums-backend.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/Emoticons/7.gif' alt='Emotion: tongue tied'/>

Type 2 or 3

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