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    Use of would/future

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    Use of would/future
    Message from valoris posted on 08-07-2017 at 20:02:21 (D | E | F)
    Hi everybody!
    In an exercise on the use of “would” to talk about a time in the future from a point in the past, I found these sentences:
    January: ‘The building work should be finished by the end of March.’
    April: We thought that the building work would be finished / would have been finished by now.
    I thought that “would have been finished” was not used to talk about a time in the future from a point in the past, but in conditionals. In other words, I would have considered this solution as wrong.
    Can you please help me to understand if both possibilities are correct?
    Thank you so much!

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    Edited by lucile83 on 08-07-2017 21:05


    Re: Use of would/future from mah, posted on 09-07-2017 at 04:10:46 (D | E)
    Hi!
    If the workers had worked hard, the building would have been finished .
    This is a conditional you know. I want to say future in the past is right anyway. Should rarely is used instead of would ( only with I and We subjects). (would is more common in modern English)
    If you had studied hard, you would have passed your exam.
    Infact it's unreal and only an imagination , again future in the past. Passing the exam is something that was possible to happen in the past After studying hard. But didn't happen since studying hadn't happend before. I hope it can help.



    Re: Use of would/future from dsmith, posted on 09-07-2017 at 05:25:29 (D | E)
    Hello,
    Would be finished by now...we thought that the building would be in a finished state before now. Imagine a building in a finished state.
    would have been finished by now...we thought that sometime before now there would be a period during which the building was already finished. Imagine yourself yesterday knowing that the building had been finished before yesterday.
    Here is an interesting example:
    If the war started I would have died.
    If the war started I would have been dead.

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    Edited by lucile83 on 09-07-2017 07:24



    Re: Use of would/future from traviskidd, posted on 09-07-2017 at 13:09:51 (D | E)
    Hello,
    "would" can be used as a past tense of "will", that is, to express something that is in the future relative to a point in the past.
    Ex.: "Who could have imagined that after he became deaf, Beethoven would become one of music's greatest composers?"
    "Would" is often used in reported speech:
    Yesterday he said "I will come tomorrow." -> He said he would come today.
    See you.



    Re: Use of would/future from valoris, posted on 09-07-2017 at 17:28:50 (D | E)
    Thank you for your help!



    Re: Use of would/future from freeenglish, posted on 20-07-2017 at 20:45:28 (D | E)
    Hello,
    As an English person, either are fine / sound the same.

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    Edited by lucile83 on 20-07-2017 21:52




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