will x 2

Originally Posted by MrPedantic

Has something dropped out there, M56?

Yup. It was "same".
...

Also:

...an epistemic sentence like (265) cannot be truthfully uttered by someone who either knows that John is asleep or that John is not asleep.

(265) John must be asleep.

http://ling.rutgers.edu/papers/WernerThesis.pdf

[Tdol]

Nor by someone who has good reasdon to think he's awake.

[MrPedantic]

Originally Posted by X Mode

Good question.

That statement sounds like the speaker might be talking about something that is only true for the present circumstance. However, one can also understand this as being true "whenever Joe is late", that is to say all the time.

That's an interesting extension of the 'zero conditional'. Your reasoning seems perfectly clear to me.

But let's imagine our student returns at this point. He consults his course book and finds something like this under 'zero conditional':

We use the so-called zero conditional when the result of the condition is always true, like a scientific fact. Take some ice. Put it in a saucepan. Heat the saucepan. What happens? The ice melts (it becomes water). You would be surprised if it did not. So:

IF condition | result
If you heat ice | it melts.

Notice that we are thinking about a result that is always true for this condition. The result of the condition is an absolute certainty. We are not thinking about the future or the past, or even the present. We are thinking about a simple fact. We use the present simple tense to talk about the condition. We also use the present simple tense to talk about the result. The important thing about the zero conditional is that the condition always has the same result.

Tip: we can use 'when' instead of 'if': when you heat ice, it melts.

Our student applies this to our example.

1. If Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic.

It's a zero conditional. So according to the book, this must be the condition:

If Joe's late (= if you heat ice)

And this must be the result:

he's stuck in traffic. (= it melts)

But (the student thinks) isn't it the other way round? Isn't 'being late' the result of 'being stuck in traffic'? i.e. if Joe is late, it's because he's stuck in traffic.

How do we help the student here? Do we have to revise the definition of the 'zero conditional', to take account of the fact that the 'result' may be in the IF clause?

MrP

[Steven D]

Originally Posted by MrPedantic

That's an interesting extension of the 'zero conditional'. Your reasoning seems perfectly clear to me.

But let's imagine our student returns at this point. He consults his course book and finds something like this under 'zero conditional':



Our student applies this to our example.

1. If Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic.

It's a zero conditional. So according to the book, this must be the condition:

If Joe's late (= if you heat ice)

And this must be the result:

he's stuck in traffic. (= it melts)

But (the student thinks) isn't it the other way round? Isn't 'being late' the result of 'being stuck in traffic'? i.e. if Joe is late, it's because he's stuck in traffic.

How do we help the student here? Do we have to revise the definition of the 'zero conditional', to take account of the fact that the 'result' may be in the IF clause?

MrP

Perhaps in this case we can say that "if" means "whenever".

Whenever Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic.

I guess it goes to show that all the ways in which grammatical structures are defined in grammar books and course books don't, and perhaps can't, take into account everything that, in reality, we may or may not say.

Everything we say isn't limited to form and function as indicated by books. I think this might be especially true with conditional sentences.

Joe first has to be late, then the speaker can say he's stuck in traffic. This logic is based on the speaker's view of the situation, that is to say he knows Joe very well. The condition and the result are understood in the mind of the speaker.

First Joe has to be late. Then I can conclude that he's stuck in traffic. I cannot conclude this unless I first know that Joe is late. The speaker would have his or her own logic in this case. It's a very confident and strong statement. Nonetheless, it's what the speaker thinks.

The speaker's conclusion is the result of finding out that Joe is late or is going to be late.


If you heat ice, it melts. Okay

If ice melts, you heat it. ???

If it rains, the ground gets wet.

If the ground gets wet, it rains. ???

It seems that conditions and results based on human action cannot always be seen from the limited perspective that we view conditions and results based on things which occur that humans have no control over.


If the sun's out, we take a walk in the park.

If we take a walk in the park, the sun's out.

If Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic.

If Joe's stuck in traffic he's late.



Perhaps in this case we can say that "if" means "whenever".


Is all this too complicated for our student? I think a student who can think of such a question in English will be able to understand such an explanation in English.

This is a good question, however. It's interesting to consider.

I don't want to downplay the importance of it, but I'm not so sure of its true practical value. Though as I said, it's an interesting question.

[MrPedantic]

Interesting.

And would this (overheard a few weeks ago) also count as an 'extended' zero conditional:

"Well, if Chelsea don't win tomorrow, all I can say is, someone's tapped up the ref."

(I should explain that 'tapping up' is when an agent illicitly suggests to a player that he'd get a better deal elsewhere. I think the speaker here simply meant 'bribed'; but 'tapping up' was much in the news.)

[Steven D]

Originally Posted by MrPedantic

Interesting.

And would this (overheard a few weeks ago) also count as an 'extended' zero conditional:

"Well, if Chelsea don't win tomorrow, all I can say is, someone's tapped up the ref."

(I should explain that 'tapping up' is when an agent illicitly suggests to a player that he'd get a better deal elsewhere. I think the speaker here simply meant 'bribed'; but 'tapping up' was much in the news.)

First, I would say this. As far as I know, if "Chelsea" is a collective noun, then "if Chelsea don't win" is okay in British English. If Chelsea is not a collective noun, then it should be "if Chelsea doesn't win".

In American English, either way it should be "if Chelsea doesn't win".


What's an "extended zero conditional"? Why did you choose to use the term "extended zero conditional"?




By the way, if we are defining "zero conditional", a zero conditional uses the simple present.

As to your sentence, I don't know of a specific way of classifying it as a conditional. What do you call it?

How is that you could possibly think that your example sentence could be classified as a zero conditional?

"Well, if Chelsea don't win tomorrow, all I can say is, someone's tapped up the ref."

If Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic. - That is a zero conditional. It can be seen as what the speaker always concludes when Joe is late. To the speaker, that is the truth. While this can be thought of as what the speaker always concludes about Joe when he's late, it's possible that this sentence might apply to one specific circumstance as well. In this way, we might choose to not see it as a zero conditional. However, if form serves as a definition, then it is a zero conditional.

Do you know what I mean?

How is your example sentence a zero conditional? In your sentence, it seems that the speaker is referring to one specific circumstance. If we put it in the form of a zero conditional, it doesn't really make sense, does it? Here's your example sentence. Both clauses use the simple present.

"Well, if Chelsea don't win tomorrow, all I can say is, someone taps up the ref."

In my sentence, both clauses use the simple present. We can deduce that the speaker is inferring something about Joe. The speaker can conclude something to be true based on what he or she knows about Joe. It's his or her viewpoint. We could conclude that this is what he always assumes to be the case if Joe is late.

Taking a look at your example sentence, we can see that the speaker can't make a similar type of logical inference based on what he or she knows about Chelsea.

What's an "extended zero conditional"? Why did you choose to use the term "extended zero conditional"?


By the way, if we are defining "zero conditional", a zero conditional uses the simple present.

As to your sentence, I don't know of a specific way of classifying it as a conditional. What do you call it?

[MrPedantic]

Originally Posted by X Mode

What's an "extended zero conditional"? Why did you choose to use the term "extended zero conditional"?

...

If Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic. - That is a zero conditional. It can be seen as what the speaker always concludes when Joe is late. To the speaker, that is the truth. While this can be thought of as what the speaker always concludes about Joe when he's late, it's possible that this sentence might apply to one specific circumstance as well. In this way, we might choose to not see it as a zero conditional. However, if form serves as a definition, then it is a zero conditional.

Maybe 'reverse zero conditional' would have been a better term.

Let me explain.

In the zero conditional, we have this structure:

1. If P, next Q.

e.g. (to use a popular example) "If you heat water to 100C, it boils."

We may rephrase this as:

1a. When P, next Q.

e.g. "When you heat water to 100C, it boils."

Your sentence is:

2. If Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic.

We may rephrase this as:

2a. When Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic.

We've established that this also means:

2b. When Joe's late, it's because he's stuck in traffic.

But if we look at our zero conditional example, we find that inserting 'it's because' doesn't work:

3. When you heat water to 100C, it's because it boils.

Instead, we have to say:

3a. When water boils, it's because you've heated it to 100C.

In other words, the sequence of events in #3 is wrong.

From this we can establish that where we can sensibly insert 'it's because' into an IF statement, the structure is not 'If P, next Q', but:

4. If Q, it's because P.

Your original example confirms this:

a) If P, next Q => If Q, it's because P.
b) When Joe's stuck in traffic, he's late => When Joe's late, it's because he's stuck in traffic.

I haven't ever seen the zero conditional defined in a way that would include the structure of #4, however; so I would call your example a 'reversed zero conditional'.

MrP

Edit: I should add that 'If Q, it's because P' embodies the logical fallacy of affirming the consequent, except where 'if' means 'if and only if'. You've confirmed that this is your speaker's interpretation of his sentence.

[Steven D]

Okay, call it that, but it is something someone could say.

"If Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic."

[Steven D]

Okay, call it that, but it is something someone could say.

"If Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic."

[MrPedantic]

Originally Posted by X Mode

Okay, call it that, but it is something someone could say.

"If Joe's late, he's stuck in traffic."

Yes indeed. Perfectly good English.