Hello,
Have a nice day!
And here is an exercise that makes me very confused ,I need your useful helps:
Put the correct form of the verb to the blank:
1.If I …(know) you weren’t going to come tomorrow ,I …(not buy) any food.
I don’t know what type is this conditional sentence and why it is ‘‘tomorrow’’ but not ‘‘the next day’’.
Please help me.
Thank you very much
Hi Kidnapper
In theory, it could be a type 2 conditional:
Type 2: If I knew you weren’t going to come tomorrow, I wouldn’t buy any food.
Or it could be a type 3 conditional (type 3 is more likely, in my opinion):
Type 3: If I had known you weren’t going to come tomorrow, I wouldn’t have bought any food.
In either case, the word ‘tomorrow’ is used because tomorrow is tomorrow at the time the sentence is spoken.
For example:
Let’s say today is Friday and tomorrow is Saturday. I went shopping for food at 10 o’clock this morning (Friday). It is now 5 pm on Friday, and you have just said this to me: “I am not going to come tomorrow.” (Tomorrow = Saturday) My response could be “If I had known (before I went shopping this morning) that you weren’t going to come tomorrow, I wouldn’t have bought any food.” (Tomorrow = Saturday)
.
But why it is ‘‘you weren’t going…’’ but not ‘‘are going’’ because to the best of my knowledge ,in type 3 conditional ,in IF-clause ,’‘had V-ed’’ is not the past perfect tense ,it is just a form of verb ,so it can be ‘‘are going’’ ,can’t it? I just think so 
I’d say this (weren’t going to) has to do with the sequence of tenses. Look at these:
- I know you are not going to come. (i.e. I know X now)
- I knew you were not going to come. (i.e. I knew X in the past)
The condition in your type 3 conditional sentence is “If I had known (fact X), …”.
In that sentence, fact X needs to be worded the same way as in sentence 2 because the reference is to what you thought or didn’t think in the past.
.