# Use of Subjunctive
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [October 12, 2012, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489 "2012-10-12T04:45:47Z")
**Posts on this page:** 17
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@IceQube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IceQube)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2012, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/1 "2012-10-12T04:45:47Z")
Is it
“Perhaps the grass were red”
Or
“Perhaps the grass was red”?
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### Author:  [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2012, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/2 "2012-10-12T06:03:23Z")
In your example, were. “If the grass were red, the war might have been won.” Subjunctive. “If the grass was red, it may have been bled upon.” A contingency in the past tense.
“Ah, wilderness were paradise enow.”
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### Author:  [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2012, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/3 "2012-10-12T12:40:34Z")
Why would “perhaps” take a subjunctive? I have never heard of that.
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### Author:  [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2012, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/4 "2012-10-12T13:44:54Z")
The subjunctive is used when the clause is known to be false. “Perhaps” or “maybe” leaves that in doubt.
If the grass were red, I would not fertilize it.
Perhaps the grass was red, but I didn’t get that good a look at it.
> [@Trinopus](#):
>
> In your example, were. “If the grass were red, the war might have been won.” Subjunctive. “If the grass was red, it may have been bled upon.” A contingency in the past tense.
To keep tenses consistent, it would be “If the grass had been red, the war might have been won.”
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### Author:  [@Gary\_T](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_T)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2012, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/5 "2012-10-12T13:48:10Z")
> [@njtt](#):
>
> Why would “perhaps” take a subjunctive? I have never heard of that.
Neither have I. The word “if” seems to be quite common for many uses of the subjunctive; while “perhaps” may be correct in some cases I don’t recall ever seeing it used that way.
It seems to me that saying “perhaps the grass were/was red” suggests that it may well have been red, thus would not be a condition contrary to fact (one significant use of the subjunctive) and would call for “was.” Then again, the subjunctive can be used for some cases of possibility, so maybe “were” would be appropriate, but it sounds off to me. I’ll be interested in seeing if someone who knows more than I can clarify that. ETA: Which **CookingWithGas** has done, at least to some extent.
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### Author:  [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2012, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/6 "2012-10-12T19:53:40Z")
**CookingWithGas** : do tenses in different clauses have to agree? “If the grass had been green, I will be a rich man tomorrow.” It sounds dumb, but is it, strictly speaking (ah, Edwin Newman!) forbidden?
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### Author:  [@barbitu8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/barbitu8)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2012, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/7 "2012-10-12T20:58:40Z")
> [@Trinopus](#):
>
> **CookingWithGas** : do tenses in different clauses have to agree? “If the grass had been green, I will be a rich man tomorrow.” It sounds dumb, but is it, strictly speaking (ah, Edwin Newman!) forbidden?
I’m not **CookingWithGas** , but the sentence should read: “If the grass had been green, I would be a rich man tomorrow.”
Subjunctive tense is used not only when the sentence is false but when it is conditional or in doubt. The words “if” or “perhaps” are not necessary to make a sentence subjunctive.
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### Author:  [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)
#### Post date: [October 12, 2012, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/8 "2012-10-12T21:18:17Z")
> [@barbitu8](#):
>
> I’m not **CookingWithGas** , but the sentence should read: “If the grass had been green, I would be a rich man tomorrow.”
>
> Subjunctive tense is used not only when the sentence is false but when it is conditional or in doubt. The words “if” or “perhaps” are not necessary to make a sentence subjunctive.
All sentences following “perhaps” are in doubt, but they are not (normally) in the subjunctive (mood not tense), at least not in virtue of being in doubt or following “perhaps”.
The OP’s sentence “Perhaps the grass were red,” is plainly ungrammatical.
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### Author:  [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)
#### Post date: [October 13, 2012, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/9 "2012-10-13T02:39:49Z")
Mathematicians use the subjunctive regularly not for contrarity, but for contingency. "A necessary and sufficient condition that a ring have quasi-inverses… But try telling a British copy editor that.
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### Author:  [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)
#### Post date: [October 13, 2012, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/10 "2012-10-13T12:20:04Z")
> [@Trinopus](#):
>
> **CookingWithGas** : do tenses in different clauses have to agree? “If the grass had been green, I will be a rich man tomorrow.” It sounds dumb, but is it, strictly speaking (ah, Edwin Newman!) forbidden?
> [@barbitu8](#):
>
> I’m not **CookingWithGas** , but the sentence should read: “If the grass had been green, I would be a rich man tomorrow.”
In the interests of full disclosure, I’m CookingWIthGas but I’m not a professional authority in this field. Nonetheless, I will say that moods should be consistent. The first clause is subordinate to the second so if you use subjunctive mood in the first you need conditional in the second, as \*\*barbitu8 \*\*shows. Strictly speaking the tenses don’t have to agree, but they have to be consistent; in that example the tenses/moods are pluperfect subjunctive and future conditional. The error is not in mixing past and future; it is in conflicting moods.
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### Author:  [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)
#### Post date: [October 13, 2012, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/11 "2012-10-13T14:15:28Z")
> [@barbitu8](#):
>
> Subjunctive tense is used not only when the sentence is false but when it is conditional or in doubt. . .
As noted directly above, the subjunctive is not a _tense_ but a _mood_.
What everyone is talking about here are contrary-to-fact _ **conditionals** _, and all that really means is using past forms (together with _would_ or _could_) to indicated that something is a hypothetical, or untrue. The term “subjunctive” is popularly used for this (often even in textbooks), but it’s not truly the subjunctive mood, and I prefer not to do that, to avoid confusion
A true example of the subjunctive would be something like this, indicating a kind of volition:
_The judge ordered that Mr. Smith **pay** five thousand dollars_.
In this case, _pay_ is used instead of _pays_, and in that way demonstrates the subjunctive _mood_.
It’s important to realize that grammar often serves purposes that are not necessarily representational, so in a discussion such as this it helps not to say past “tense,” but rather just “past form.”
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### Author:  [@nomdenet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nomdenet)
#### Post date: [October 13, 2012, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/12 "2012-10-13T15:39:23Z")
> [@guizot](#):
>
> A true example of the subjunctive would be something like this, indicating a kind of volition:
>
> _The judge ordered that Mr. Smith **pay** five thousand dollars_.
>
> In this case, _pay_ is used instead of _pays_, and in that way demonstrates the subjunctive _mood_.
Do you disagree, then, with the Wikipedia article [English subjunctive](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_subjunctive), which describes both the “mandative subjunctive” that you and **Hari Seldon** are talking about, and the other type, the counterfactual subjunctive that the OP is asking about?
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### Author:  [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)
#### Post date: [October 13, 2012, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/13 "2012-10-13T17:00:21Z")
> [@nomdenet](#):
>
> Do you disagree, then, with the Wikipedia article [English subjunctive](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_subjunctive), which describes both the “mandative subjunctive” that you and **Hari Seldon** are talking about, and the other type, the counterfactual subjunctive that the OP is asking about?
I don’t disagree with _the article_. (It’s Wikipedia, after all.) I just think the same term shouldn’t be used. Counter-factual conditions shouldn’t be clumped with the others–they’re notionally very different. I’ve said as much in seminars with people like Marianne Celce-Murcia, and they accept my point, and still say that for better or for worse people still use the term that way. But still, when you say something like, “If I hadn’t done that,” etc., you’re not employing _a different mood_ in the same why that the imperative mood is different from the indicative. It’s still a proposition as any other conditional statement is. The fact that it involves counter-factuals doesn’t change that. The Wiki article simply reflects popular habits of terminology.
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### Author:  [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)
#### Post date: [October 13, 2012, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/14 "2012-10-13T17:12:25Z")
> [@CookingWithGas](#):
>
> Nonetheless, I will say that moods should be consistent.
To continue the point I made just above: The consistency that folks are talking about here is not regarding the _mood_ of the respective clauses, or anything else about “grammar” (i.e., the tenses). It’s about the notional consistency. If I say something like:_Have some more waffles, because I really like them._…there’s nothing ungrammatical about the inconsistency of the moods. It’s simply a notional inconsistency. There’s nothing that I’m aware of that requires tenses _ **in and of themselves** _ to be “consistent.”
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### Author:  [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)
#### Post date: [October 14, 2012, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/15 "2012-10-14T16:16:12Z")
Can’t wait to see how long it takes before someone pops in with the obligatory comment about the lack of a need for prescriptive grammar. 😃
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### Author:  [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)
#### Post date: [October 14, 2012, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/16 "2012-10-14T18:43:48Z")
> [@DSYoungEsq](#):
>
> Can’t wait to see how long it takes before someone pops in with the obligatory comment about the lack of a need for prescriptive grammar. 😃
(Psst: Read the post directly before yours.)
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### Author:  [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)
#### Post date: [October 15, 2012, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/use-of-subjunctive/637489/17 "2012-10-15T19:25:08Z")
> [@guizot](#):
>
> To continue the point I made just above: The consistency that folks are talking about here is not regarding the _mood_ of the respective clauses, or anything else about “grammar” (i.e., the tenses). It’s about the notional consistency. If I say something like:_Have some more waffles, because I really like them._…there’s nothing ungrammatical about the inconsistency of the moods. It’s simply a notional inconsistency. There’s nothing that I’m aware of that requires tenses _ **in and of themselves** _ to be “consistent.”
“I think you should have some more waffles, because I really like them”?