Job Discussion Forums

[sisyphus]

Hi everyone,

What is the grammar point here with this question?

Would you use in the following sentence present or past tense?

'If I hit somebody�s car in the car park, I would wait till he comes. ( or came?)' ....

cheers

Sis

[spiral78]

Past - because it's not that likely.

'came'



Present tense can be used in this sentence, though, under some circumstances:

'If I hit someone in the car park, I will......
indicates that I think it's likely to occur.
Not impossible to use this, of course - in the case, for example, that the car park is notoriously poorly-designed and accidents are common. Or if 'I' am a very poor driver.

[johnslat]

Dear sisyphus,

The difficulty here is the verb "hit" since there is no difference in form or pronunciation between the simple present and the simple past (unless. of course, the subject is "he, she. it," in which case the "s" would be added.)

Consequently, without more context, it's impossible to say which should be used (as both are correct.)

If I hit somebody's car in the car park, I will wait till he/she comes.

and

If I hit somebody's car in the car park, I would wait until he/she comes.

are both fine - although I agree with spiral78 that using the present unreal (the second conditional) would be a much more common context.

Regards,
John

[sisyphus]

sorry I was referring to the verb to come in the sentence. I notice one of you has chosen 'came' ; the other 'comes'....

I aware of the second conditional etc...its the comes/ came thing im not 100 per cent on .

ta

[spiral78]

Yeah, I chose past tense for consistency. I think it's correct to put all verbs in this case in the same tense. But I'm not 1,000% sure
Wouldn't stake my teaching license on it!

[nickpellatt]

I am guessing here...and both posters above have far greater grammar knowledge than I do!

I would think 'comes' would be quite common in genuine, natural speech for many people ... and so it sounds and feels like it could be correct, but I would be pretty sure, 'came' would be correct grammatically. Thats a bit of a guess mind!

Is there a difference due to the forms used in Spirals and Johns examples?

I will wait until he comes - I would wait until he came.

[spiral78]

I will wait until he comes - I would wait until he came

Yes - again, the present tense is used in conditionals to express liklihood. The past tense is hypothetical.

So your first sentence is a plan, probably made just now.
The second one expresses a hypothetical situation.

Here's a quick link for conditionals in general:

http://www.usingenglish.com/articles/english-conditionals-an-introduction.html

But I'm still curious about the same question sisyphus posed: should the final verb be past or can it change to present? I suspect Nick's answer is likely correct

[fluffyhamster]

I think the comes/came "issue" is a bit of a red herring compared to the hit part. I'd suggest changing the context more generally (see how the following sound with 'you', 'should', 'did' etc - better/more "comprehensible", right?):

A: If you hit a car, you should wait until the owner returns (*returned).

B: Hey, I resent the implications of what you're saying! If I DID hit a car, of course I'd wait until the owner returns/returned!

This thread's sort of example is a bit more complex than the usual two-clause, main versus subordinate ones found in learner textbooks (especially the less ambitious ones): here there is not just one but two subordinate clauses ('If sb hit a car' and 'until the owner RETURN') each side of the main one (don't ask me what all those clauses should be exactly called terminologically, though!), and my guess is that the supposed rules will start to break down and not be applied as "consistently" when the points at which they "should" be applied start multiplying beyond the "usual" (~ textbook stuff). Still, many teachers would say it would be too challenging (but to whom exactly?!) to present learners with more complicated examples, almost as if the exact choice of verb form in the further subordinate clause really mattered, but was too "advanced" or something...but that is of couse ultimately just a stalling tactic that merely delays the inevitable, the eventually necessary knicker-twisting and sweating. (This could perhaps be summed up as the "Let's not even think about that one either for now" method!). So it's obviously to the Sisyphus's credit that (s)he's brought this up and given us something to chew over!

[artemisia]

Yeah, I think it�s to do with two things in operation here: a conditional sentence and a time clause.

If I hit his car I will wait.
If I hit his car I would wait.
..until he returns
..until he returned

I think the 2nd conditional sentence could take both time clause versions. However, it would be in keeping with the use of past simple as subjunctive in conditional 2 to match that with �he returned�. Using �he returns� togther with the 2nd conditional does have more of a colloquial feel to it.

[fluffyhamster]