I think it's a _diiferent_ tense required, Chris, since it is clear that the
interviewer is talking about a future date, not a past date. Thus "were to
do", the future conditional, an even rarer species than the pluperfect, and
in that respect way more better an example*.
Alternatively, if you insist on your version, then the interviewer would
need to continue "would have been a better outcome"!! I duly claim my £2
Gift Voucher.
But yes, it also gets up my olfactory organ, this forced obsequiousness
(blimey, can I spell that word?) which is no more than a veiled insult.
--
Piers
* For casual readers, please note the deliberate non-conventional (for
British English) usage of reduplicated comparatives, for artistic effect.
-----Original Message-----
From: olympus-owner@xxxxxxxxxx [mailto:olympus-owner@xxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of Chris Barker
Sent: 15 December 2005 06:19
To: olympus@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [OM] Re: OT English as she is spoke OT
Not at all Brian. I was a little cross with myself because of my schoolboy
error ;-).
You missed the mistake in tenses in that radio interviewer. It should have
been, " ... do you not think that if you *had done* this on Friday ...". It
is a common problem on the US media: we are losing part of the past because
no one is using the pluperfect tense.
Chris
~~ >-)-
C M I Barker
Cambridgeshire, Great Britain.
+44 (0)7092 251126
www.threeshoes.co.uk
homepage.mac.com/zuiko
On 14 Dec 2005, at 23:33, Brian Swale wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I didn't really mean to get up the nose of Chris and I hope you
> noticed the
> :-)> Chris.
>
> One source of persistent irritation for me is a practice that our
> announcers
> (interviewers) on National Radio here have; and that is to ask
> questions in a
> negative form. I frequently take issue with them on it. And
> sometimes they
> take notice for a day or two.
>
> These announcers/interviewers tend to be somewhat aggressive in their
> questioning manner, and often seem to disagree with the person being
> interviewed. So a question might go like this.
>
> For example: " Do you not think that if you did this on Friday
> rather than
> Thursday there would be a better outcome?"
>
> It seems to me that if the person being questioned answers "Yes" or
> "No" it
> would mean about the same.
>
> For my dollar I'd rather have the form of the question be
> " Do you think that ... .... ?"
> Then a Yes or No answer would be quite unambiguous.
>
> Maybe I'm out of practice with current argument, since most questioned
> people answer No, in agreement. Or something.
>
> Brian
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