"The city was going about its business without knowing the aliens arrived."

[mella@mella]

Would it be wrong to write "The city was going about its business without knowing the aliens arrived.

 

[Rover_KE]

Welcome to the forum, mella@melia.

In what context have you seen or written this sentence?

 

[Tarheel]

I would say:

The city was going about its business unaware that the aliens had arrived.

You can keep "without knowing" but I like "unaware" better.

Are you writing a science fiction novel?

 

[mella@mella]

Welcome to the forum, mella@melia.

In what context have you seen or written this sentence?

I didnt see it ia a context i was studying more about tenses and it was an example about past simple with past contnous all the other sentences were written in that form following the rule past simple is used to talk the action that interrpts and past continous is written for the acton interrupted but this sentence was written the city was going about its business without knowing the aliens had arived.I got confused.

 

[jutfrank]

Yes, you're right that the past perfect is needed there, since the arrival of the aliens happened before.

Please provide us with the title and author of the sentence.

 

[mella@mella]

Its from grammaly site about past continous tese thx for your reply could you please tell me the difference in meaning between both sentences and is the first one grammarly wrong.

 

[mella@mella]

I would say:

The city was going about it's business unaware that the aliens had arrived.

You can keep "without knowing" but I like "unaware" better.

Are you writing a science fiction novel?

No Im learning English I want to know the subtle difference between past continuous and past perfect.In Arabic language we dont have these differences so its challangig for me but still didnt get the perfect answer.

 

[Rover_KE]

It's from a Grammarly site about past continuous tense. Thanks for your reply. Could you please tell me the difference in meaning between these two sentences and is the first one grammatically wrong?

 

[Rover_KE]

No, I'm learning English and I want to know the subtle difference between the past continuous and past perfect tenses. [space] In Arabic language we don't have these differences so it's challenging for me, but I still haven't got the perfect answer.

 

[emsr2d2]

I didn't see it ia in a context. I was studying more about tenses and it was an example about of the past simple with the past continuous. All the other sentences were written in that form following the rule that the past simple is used to talk about the an action that interrupts, and the past continuous is written used for the action that was interrupted. but However, this sentence was written about the a city that was going about its business without knowing the aliens had arrived. space here I got confused.

Please note my corrections above. You really need to install an English spell-checker on your browser. You also need to work on your closing punctuation - remember to end every sentence with one appropriate closing punctuation mark. Take some time to study articles too.

 

[emsr2d2]

Would it be wrong to write "The city was going about its business without knowing the aliens arrived"?

 

[Tarheel]

@emsr2d2
Would somebody please fix the typo in post #3?

@mella@mella I suggest that you write shorter, simpler sentences. You need to get a handle on the shorter ones first. (You need to be able to walk before you can run.) As for tenses, I suggest that you focus on one at a time right now.

 

[mella@mella]

Please note my corrections above. You really need to install an English spell-checker on your browser. You also need to work on your closing punctuation - remember to end every sentence with one appropriate closing punctuation mark. Take some time to study articles too.

Thanks teacher.I really appreciate your efforts,its hard to learn a new language,I do understand what's written but when it comes to writing I'm next to zero.

 

[emsr2d2]

Thanks. teacher. I really appreciate your efforts. It's hard to learn a new language. I do understand what's written English but when it comes to writing, I'm my skills are next to zero.

See above. I just Googled to see if full stops (periods) are used in Arabic and discovered that they're used in much the same way they are in English - to mark the end of a sentence.

Follow these basic rules of written English:
End every sentence with one appropriate closing punctuation mark (full stop, question mark, exclamation mark).
Put a space after every full stop, comma, question mark and exclamation mark.
Start every new sentence with a capital letter.

Next time you write a post, stop and check you have followed those rules before you actually submit the post.

 

[mella@mella]

See above. I just Googled to see if full stops (periods) are used in Arabic and discovered that they're used in much the same way they are in English - to mark the end of a sentence.

Follow these basic rules of written English:
End every sentence with one appropriate closing punctuation mark (full stop, question mark, exclamation mark).
Put a space after every full stop, comma, question mark and exclamation mark.
Start every new sentence with a capital letter.

Next time you write a post, stop and check you have followed those rules before you actually submit the post.

Ok, I'll be aware of that next time. Could you please tell me what is the difference in meaning between these two sentences: "Iwas sleeping when my parents arrived". "I was sleeping when my parents had arrived".

 

[emsr2d2]

Ok, OK/Okay, I'll be aware of that next time. Could you please tell me what is the difference in meaning between these two sentences:

1. I was sleeping when my parents arrived."
2. "I was sleeping when my parents had arrived."

The difference is that the first is grammatically correct and the second is not. You need to have a good reason to use the past perfect and there is no reason for it in this sentence.

 

[jutfrank]

... but still didnt get the perfect answer.

If your question is whether the original sentence is correct, then my answer is no. In my judgement, it needs the past perfect, as I said in post #5.

 

[mella@mella]

Thank you Sir, would you please, tell me why it's not correct if I followed the rule- past simple is used to talk about an action that interrupts and past continous is used to talk about an action that is interrupted, as an Arabic learner I couldn't tell why its wrong.

 

[emsr2d2]

Thank you. Sir, Would you please no comma here tell me why it's not correct if I followed the rule no dash here that the past simple is used to talk about an action that interrupts and the past continuous is used to talk about an action that is interrupted. As an Arabic learner I couldn't tell why it's wrong.

You don't seem to have taken any notice of my previous corrections. You misspelled "continuous" for the third of fourth time. You used a comma instead of a full stop twice. You missed out an article. You failed to capitalise the first word of a sentence. Please go back and re-read all the previous posts and look very carefully at the corrections. You need to get the basics right before worrying about anything else.

 

[Tarheel]

@mella@mella You need to simplify everything.

I have no idea what you mean by "an action that interrupts". Interrupts what?