Decisions will continue to be taken in a context...

English as a Second Language English Vocabulary, Grammar and Idioms
1

Hi,
Please have a look at this:

Decisions will continue to be taken in a context of emergency and without appropriate thinking or incorporation of environmental considerations, as has been the case with the uncontrolled development of biofuels

Decisions will continue to be taken in a context of emergency and without appropriate thinking or incorporation of environmental considerations, as [color=red]it has been the case with the uncontrolled development of biofuels

=> Which of the two is correct? I personally think the former is (it’s the inverted form of "as the case with the uncontrolled development of biofuels has been) - I think I’ve come across this usages some times, but now I can’t remember any. If it’s correct, please give me another example - thank you in advance :slight_smile:

As for the latter sentence, I’m not sure if it’s correct or not…

Please help.
Many thanks in anticipation :slight_smile:
Nessie.

2

Hi Nessie,

I agree that the first sentence is correct and the second not. Here’s another example:

It is agreed that politeness is essential in these situations, as has been argued in other places.

Alan

3

English is too complicated! Are these sentences like above usually used by native English speakers? Can I communicate with native English speakers without using these kinds of complicated sentences? I am about to run out of patient.

4

Hi TMH,

You probably mean that you are running out of patience.[YSaerTTEW443543]

TOEIC listening, photographs: Visiting a patient[YSaerTTEW443543]

5

Yes, I’ve made a spelling mistake. You’re right. It is ‘patience’. I am not a doctor. So I never have any patient. :smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

6

Hi THM

Yes, sentences such as Nessie’s are used, especially in written English. You don’t need to use long, complicated sentences yourself. However, you should be able to decipher sentences such as Nessie’s.

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7

Thank you all very much :slight_smile:
Now I have another question: what’s the part of speech of “as” in those sentences?

8

Hi Nessie

I’d say ‘as’ is a conjunction in your sentence.
.

9

Thanks a lot, Amy :slight_smile:
By the way, can other conjunction be used in such usage? If yes, could you please give me an example?

Thank you so much once again :slight_smile:
Nessie.

10

Hi Nessie

I’m not sure exactly what you want. Lots of words are used as conjunctions, but they cannot all be used the same way. Nothing pops into my head as a replacement conjunction for ‘as’ in that sentence. However, you could replace ‘as’ with ‘which’, I suppose, in order to introduce a non-defining relative clause.

Take a look at this link. Maybe it will be helpful for you:
conjunctions
(Scroll down to the part about subordinating conjunctions.)
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11

I’m sorry Amy, I know you can’t get my idea very well, as I myself can’t :stuck_out_tongue:
It’s somehow so abstract and I can’t express myself very well, just a feeling of not understanding the syntax profoundly enough.
I remember seeing people use “than is” (the whole sentence I can’t remember), and I wonder if it’s the same case here (the second part with a conjunction in place of an adjective pronoun (“as” instead of “which”)) I know I’m expressing meself very poorly, but really this syntax is very difficult for us non-native speakers.
Is it inversion, Amy?
And back to the original sentence, you said “as” can be replaced by “which”, I suppose the 2 versions have different meanings, don’t they?

Thank you very much.
Nessie.

12

Hi Nessie

‘Than is’ would be used to contrast two things that are different. ‘As is’ would be used to to compare two similar things.

Using ‘which’ in your sentence wouldn’t change the overall meaning of your sentence very much – it simply eliminates the word that specifically makes a comparison.
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