# Is this English speaker referring to an “Unlikely Future situation” or a “Likely Past situation”? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 1, 2015, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994 "2015-05-01T13:57:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Melia\_Antiqua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a698b9/32.png) [@Melia\_Antiqua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melia_Antiqua)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/1 "2015-05-01T13:57:35Z")
ORIGINAL SENTENCE: “If that gargantuan predator **made it** into the city before us, it **is sure to have wrecked** everything in sight.” By the verb tense “\*\*\*\*made \*\*\*\*it” in the if-clause, I wonder if the speaker is referring to an **Unlikely Future situation** or a **Likely Past situation**? Or can it go either way, depending on what tense follows in the second half of the sentence? 1. If the speaker has an **Unlikely Future situation** in mind, I think she is going to use the tense “ **would** ” and say… **Unlikely Future situation** : “If that gargantuan predator { **made it** / **were to make it** / **should make it** (BrE)} into the city before us, it { **would wreck** } everything in sight.” 2) Considering the original sentence does not use the tense “ **would** ”, I wonder if the speaker is referring to a **Likely Past situation** instead? If so, is the tense “ **made it** ” close to “ **has made it** ” or “ **has already made it** ” in the speaker’s mind? **Likely Past situation** : “If that gargantuan predator { **made it** / **has made it** / **has already made it** } into the city before us, it { **is sure to have wrecked** / **must have wrecked** } everything in sight.” ---
**Author:** ![Ornery\_Bob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/da6949/32.png) [@Ornery\_Bob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ornery_Bob)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/2 "2015-05-01T14:24:53Z")
By the way you’ve set things up, it’s a Likely Past Situation. If this event has already happened, then these results will have also happened. ---
**Author:** ![SanVito](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sanvito/32/2805_2.png) [@SanVito](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SanVito)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/3 "2015-05-01T14:31:39Z")
Past situation, although the sentence structure don’t seem correct to me. Rather I would say: “If that gargantuan predator had made it into the city before us, it is sure to have wrecked everything in sight.” In your unlikely future situation, I would say: “If that gargantuan predator makes it into the city before us, it is sure to wreck everything in sight.” ---
**Author:** ![Lasciel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e79b87/32.png) [@Lasciel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lasciel)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/4 "2015-05-01T14:37:57Z")
Past situation. Replace “made it” with “got” and it is much more clear. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/5 "2015-05-01T14:44:21Z")
I’m thinking along the same lines as SanVito. Adding the “had” before “made it” clears it up for me as a past situation. ---
**Author:** ![HowSoonIsThen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@HowSoonIsThen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HowSoonIsThen)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/6 "2015-05-01T14:49:32Z")
I don’t know about adding “had”. To me that makes it sound like a hypothetical. It definitely hasn’t made it, but if it _had_… ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Tildrum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@Tom\_Tildrum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Tildrum)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/7 "2015-05-01T14:51:41Z")
I think the answer is ambiguous because the tenses do not match. ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/8 "2015-05-01T22:06:20Z")
> [@SanVito](#): > > “If that gargantuan predator had made it into the city before us, it is sure to have wrecked everything in sight.” I disagree. By adding “had”, you have changed the precedent to a counterfactual, and the consequent would then be “…it would have wrecked everything in sight.” ---
**Author:** ![hibernicus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hibernicus/32/2802_2.png) [@hibernicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hibernicus)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/9 "2015-05-01T22:09:48Z")
> [@Melia\_Antiqua](#): > > 1. Considering the original sentence does not use the tense “ **would** ”, I wonder if the speaker is referring to a **Likely Past situation** instead? > > If so, is the tense “ **made it** ” close to “ **has made it** ” or “ **has already made it** ” in the speaker’s mind? Yes. The sentence expresses the idea that “If X has happened, Y will have happened”. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/10 "2015-05-01T22:40:54Z")
> [@Tom\_Tildrum](#): > > I think the answer is ambiguous because the tenses do not match. I don’t think so. There’s no requirement for tenses to “match” in order to be unambiguous, if by “match” you mean “be the same.” We’d never be able to express ourselves completely if we only combined clauses with the same tense. However, if you mean that the _mood_ doesn’t match–if it were different from one clause to the other–then it would indeed be unclear, and prescriptively ungrammatical. And **hiberncus** is correct: Using the past perfect aspect (_ **had made** _), would make the conditional clause counterfactual, and change the meaning completely. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2015, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/11 "2015-05-01T23:24:14Z")
I don’t understand how this could be interpreted as talking about something happening in the future. It seems unambiguously talking about an event set in the past - the ambiguity is around whether it actually happened or not. ---
**Author:** ![Ken001](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/43a26b/32.png) [@Ken001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ken001)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2015, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/12 "2015-05-02T01:18:17Z")
Past pluperfect tense. Tell me I’m wrong. Go on. Dare ya. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2015, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/13 "2015-05-02T01:57:29Z")
> [@elfkin477](#): > > I don’t understand how this could be interpreted as talking about something happening in the future. It seems unambiguously talking about an event set in the past - the ambiguity is around whether it actually happened or not. If a present conditional is _counterfactual_ (_contrary-to-fact_, _unlikely_, _hypothetical_, etc.–there are various ways of referring to it) then you might say it has a future perspective, because one is saying that it’s something that hasn’t happened, (and probably won’t happen), but the fact that you are speculating about it at all implies by default some kind of vision of a future potential–of what could happen should circumstances change: _If you gave me a thousand bucks right now, I’d go to Vegas this very evening._ But that’s not the case here, as you note–it’s clearly about the past. The OP is confusing the present counterfactual with the past factual. Because _made_ is the past of _make_ (similarly to how _gave_ is the past of _give_, in the example above), he or she is wondering if it could be a present hypothetical conditional (like the example above). ---
**Author:** ![Melia\_Antiqua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a698b9/32.png) [@Melia\_Antiqua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melia_Antiqua)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2015, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-this-english-speaker-referring-to-an-unlikely-future-situation-or-a-likely-past-situation/718994/14 "2015-05-02T07:12:48Z")
> [@hibernicus](#): > > Yes. The sentence expresses the idea that “If X has happened, Y will have happened”. The very fact that the “made it” part per se could be taken as meaning either Unlikely Future or Likely Past threw me off. When the speaker has Likely Past in mind, am I correct in assuming that the tense in the main clause can be “ **will have wrecked** ”? Likely Past (Version A): “If that gargantuan predator **made it** into the city before us, it **will have wrecked** everything in sight.” Likely Past (Version B): “If that gargantuan predator **has made it** into the city before us, it **will have wrecked** everything in sight.”