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Chapter 3 - Time reference

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 September 2014

Irena Polańska
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Summary

The present section will outline the discussion of temporal reference in relation to the types of conditional sentences. I will follow the classical division of open and hypothetical conditions, since conditionals seem to be less connected with the verb form than traditional grammars would like to admit.

Hypothetical sentences

Hypothetical sentences are said to express a negative belief of the speaker, which means that the consequences of the action described in protases are unlikely or impossible to happen. The time reference is quite difficult to establish on the basis of verb forms exclusively. Taking into consideration the first pattern, i.e. hypothetical past in the protasis and the past modal in the apodosis:

[1] If I had enough money, I would buy a sport car.

it is hard to believe that the speaker is assuming having a lot of money at the moment of speaking or even in the future. The time of having money is unspecified and the time span understood by the utterance is much broader that the present state; it touches not only the future but also the past. That means that the sentence conveys its meaning disregarding time. A very good example of such an interpretation is given by Dancygier (Dancygier 1998:32):

[2] If water boiled at 200°C, making tea would take twice as long.

The speaker of [2] is just imagining different properties of water in general, without any time specification.

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Expressing Condition in English and in Polish , pp. 37 - 57
Publisher: Jagiellonian University Press
Print publication year: 2006

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