Conference thebay::joyoflex

ref: Anerican Heritage (2nd College Ed)

"if" can be ambiguous as in "Let her know if she is invited" can mean

Let her know whether she is invited. OR
Let her know in the event she is invited.

This all depends on whether the invitation has or has not yet been made.

The "could" in your example implies future action, hence "if" is not
ambiguous in your example.

Pat Sweeney

Fowler says this:
"To avoid possible ambiguity it may be prudent to confine 'if' to its
proper duty of introducing the protasis of a conditional sentence, and
not to use it as a substitute for 'though' or 'whether' or (with 'not')
to introduce a possible alternative."

 My own taste, for what it's worth, says that "whether" is better.

-John

Wow, an answer, an example, and two references.  I can see the difference
but I don't know if I'll ever really care.  I gave it to my wife though,
and she says thanks.

	HRB

re .1

It's weird that 'could' implies future action, as 'could' used to be (and
maybe still is) the past tense of 'can.'

Dave C.

Is it because it's also the subjunctive?  /bob

In that instance, the "if" looked perfectly fine to me, but the 
"wasn't" looked strange. It seemed as if Joe should ask Jim if 
there WAS something he could do.

Maybe.

What was the question?

Never mind.


beck

Re "could" as a so-called future: the semantics say "yes", but why?  
(Oops, I sound like a former prof. already, and I've just started!  
Unfortunately I am, but Comp. Sci., not language.)  The sentence  
"Joe asked Jim if there wasn't anything he could do" contains reported 
speech, and hence the past tense.  "Could" is indeed the past of "can", 
and since reported speech must use the past tense there is no choice.  

The words being reported are, "Isn't there anything I can do?"  The 
future meaning comes not from the grammar/syntax (which is what most 
of the discussion has been about), but from the pragmatic fact that 
one "can" do only something which hasn't been done yet (if you see what 
I mean).  What Joe originally said also makes clear why it was 
"wasn't" and not "was".  (God, this gets worse and worse.)

B.t.w., "could" is -- and is used to express -- the conditional tense 
(as well as being the past of "can"), and one way of thinking of the 
conditional in some contexts is that it's the future, but from the point 
of view of a past moment.  (What?  Come again?)

Well, never mind.    Gabriel.

You say that the reported speech makes it (id est the word 'could') past.
Au contraire!  Reported speech can use the historic present tense.  This is
very common in English because our quotations are so often ambiguous.  We can
say, "He told me whatever..." which could (conditional) be expressed as, "He
told me, 'Whatever...'," or "He told me that whatever..."

I'm afraid I totally fail to follow .-1.  Could you rephrase it?  
There is NO present tense in your examples -- reported, historic or 
otherwise.

"Reported speech" is contrasted with "direct quotation".  I meant 
that, when the speech took place in the past and is being reported 
(NOT quoted), the reported verb changes from present to past tense 
-- to match the reporting verb.

Cheers.   Gabriel.

    My two cents (2 � if you have a vt200).  The bug is not on the
    use of IF or WHETHER but on the use of WAS.  The proper wording
    is "weren't something else he could do", since the phrase is in
    the subjunctive.  It is true, but if it _were_ false, it wouldn't
    be.
    
    fred_the_part_time_wordsmith

    	Talking about the "whether"...
    
    	I was taught that one *never* uses "whether" without its
    accompanying "or not".  I.e., "John was wondering whether he should
    go to the party."  would be incorrect.  The same arguments apply
    as they do to the "if"; namely, the meaning is unclear.  Are we
    saying,
    
    	"John was wondering whether *or not* he should go...", or
    	"John was wondering whether he should go to the party, or to
    the beach."
    
    	Lately, however, I see more and more examples of "whether" without
    *some* other condition -- either the "or not", or some alternative
    to the "whether".  Is this incorrect usage?  Is anyone else bothered
    by this?  Has anyone else noticed it?  Have I been doing situps
    under parked cars? ...
    
    	Frank     8-|)
  

    I was taught that "whether or not" was trite and redundant, and
    that one should use a simple "whether." I suspect that there is
    really no rule on this, just a few loudmouths who have broadcasted
    their opinion. Most of "grammar" falls into this category.
    
    	Jon

>    really no rule on this, just a few loudmouths who have broadcasted [sic]
>    their opinion. Most of "grammar" falls into this category.
        
        Perhaps you mean "loudmouths who have broadcast their opinions"?
        
        Tom

    The French have a name for the grammatical construct of the original
    example -- I think it's called "past future imperfect".  If the
    sentence is amended to the subjunctive, as another note suggested,
    I think it becomes the "past future subjunctive". 
    
    Does anybody else remember this? I took my last French class in
    1975....
    
    --bonnie
    

    You mean you were going to have mentioned this subject?
    

    Um, yes, you can say that in French, as in, very roughly,
    
    "Yes, I was going to have mentioned that subject before now, but
    I've been busy."
    
    But I can't say that, because I did mention the subject. But I wasn't
    going to.
    
    --b