a) In those days, a man might be hanged for stealing a sheep. (Michael SWAN, Practical English Usage)

b) In those days, they might hang a man for stealing a sheep.

Does the "might" in the second sentence have the same role (The Simple Past form of 'may') as the one in the first sentence.

My second question is : Considering the first sentence above conveys the idea of an action that happened in the past; are the following sentences more or less equivalent to each other. In what way are they different?

You might kill yourself with that gun.

You might have killed yourself with that gun.

Thanks for your valuable comments.

a) In those days, a man might be hanged for stealing a sheep. (Michael SWAN, Practical English Usage)

b) In those days, they might hang a man for stealing a sheep.

Does the "might" in the second sentence have the same role (The Simple Past form of 'may') as the one in the first sentence.

My second question is : Considering the first sentence above conveys the idea of an action that happened in the past; are the following sentences more or less equivalent to each other. In what way are they different?

You might kill yourself by that gun.

You might have killed yourself by that gun.


Well in my view: The first sentences do have the same meaning.(mights are the same)
As for the second question they differentiate from each other in this way:
You might have killed yourself by that gun. ( In the past: Thank God you were lucky!)
You might kill yourself by that gun. (Possibility not reffering to the past)

You might kill yourself by that gun. (Possibility not reffering to the past)

Hello D.M,

How about the following lines by Micahel SWAN in Practical English Usage, 3. edition entry no: 339


In scientific and academic, language, "may" is often used to talk about typical occurences-things that can happen in certain situations.

A female crocodile may lay 30-40 eggs.

The flowers may have five or six petals, pink or red in colour.

with this meaning, "might" can be used to talk about past.

In those days, a man might be hanged for stealing a sheep.




The first sentence rings true to my ear, but when I undo the passive structure and reorder the word sequence in the active form, for whatever reason, there does seem to be something jarring. As MP puts it, something sits unhappily in my ears.

In those days, a man might be hanged for stealing a sheep.
Hi There,
Well i was wondering about the same stuff as well. The part "In those days" loading onto itself the meaning of the past.(As i guess)
>In those days, people(they) might hang a man for stealing a sheep.<
Both sentences sounded same to me, though.

Yours Respectfully.

a) In those days, a man might be hanged for stealing a sheep. (passive)
b) In those days, they might hang a man for stealing a sheep. (active)


You might kill yourself with that gun. (probability continues even if it is weak)
You might have killed yourself with that gun. (unfulfill past action)

a) In those days, a man might be hanged for stealing a sheep. (pasif)
b) In those days, they might hang a man for stealing a sheep. (aktif)


You might kill yourself with that gun. (olasılık zayıf da olsa devam ediyor)
You might have killed yourself with that gun. (geçmişte olasılık)

Hello Kemalkasap,

May I kindly request you to write the whole message in English since our native moderators are unfamiliar with Turkish. Thanks anyway..

For those who might want to see the discussion about the same topic Click HERE (http://www.englishforums.com/English/MightMightPassiveVersionsBoth/vndwx/Post.htm)

a) In those days, a man might be hanged for stealing a sheep.

b) In those days, they might hang a man for stealing a sheep.

Does the "might" in the second sentence have the same role (The Simple Past form of 'may') as the one in the first sentence.

Put simply, yes. But to both sentences should be added the caveat that using "might" in such a sentence lends the sentence a slightly odd tone and style that—depending on who you're talking to—would sound either colloquialish or old-fashioned.

My second question is : Considering the first sentence above conveys the idea of an action that happened in the past; are the following sentences more or less equivalent to each other. In what way are they different?

You might kill yourself with that gun.
You might have killed yourself with that gun.

These sentences are entirely different and in virtually no way equivalent to one another.

The first one has nothing to do with the past in any way (logic might say that it could insofar as "might" is, or can be, the past of "may"—but we should remember that modals have almost nothing to do with logic anymore: each modal has traveled its own route through history and emerged at a slightly different destination from what one might have expected); rather, it can mean:

(a) It's possible for you to kill yourself with that gun (so be careful).
(b) I suggest you kill yourself with that gun.

Needless to say, (a) is the much more likely interpretation of the sentence.

As for "You might have killed yourself with that gun", that one is entirely in the past (as the perfect form implies), and means more or less "(You were doing something with that gun and while doing so) there was a possibility of you killing yourself with it (so be careful in the future)."

Put simply, yes. But to both sentences should be added the caveat that using "might" in such a sentence lends the sentence a slightly odd tone and style that—depending on who you're talking to—would sound either colloquialish or old-fashioned.



These sentences are entirely different and in virtually no way equivalent to one another.

The first one has nothing to do with the past in any way (logic might say that it could insofar as "might" is, or can be, the past of "may"—but we should remember that modals have almost nothing to do with logic anymore: each modal has traveled its own route through history and emerged at a slightly different destination from what one might have expected); rather, it can mean:

(a) It's possible for you to kill yourself with that gun (so be careful).
(b) I suggest you kill yourself with that gun.

Needless to say, (a) is the much more likely interpretation of the sentence.

As for "You might have killed yourself with that gun", that one is entirely in the past (as the perfect form implies), and means more or less "(You were doing something with that gun and while doing so) there was a possibility of you killing yourself with it (so be careful in the future)."

Hello Saposcat,

I have no doubt "might have" plus "past participle" refers to past.Your comment is to the point and I totally agree with you. Can you please compare the following sentences in terms of time aspect?

In those days, they might hang a man for stealing a sheep. (as you mention above, this one is in the past)

In those days, one might kill himself with a gun. (What about this. Can we think the same way as we do for the above sentence)

What makes us think the first sentence happened in the past (aside from the time marker "In those days") and why is that we don't think "You might kill yourself with that gun" is in the past but in the present or future tense.

Thanks..

Thanks for all the explanations and i thank Mr.Kili for indicating the source of the thread.
As i can see i was right about my sayings.
In order to refer to the past might,could,would...modals need time indicators with themselves(In those days, yesterday etc..)
And yeah the Perfect Modals refer to the past naturally.

You might kill yourself with that gun (some day)
You might have killed yourself with that gun (you didn't)

Can you please compare the following sentences in terms of time aspect?

In those days, they might hang a man for stealing a sheep. (as you mention above, this one is in the past)

In those days, one might kill himself with a gun. (What about this. Can we think the same way as we do for the above sentence)

What makes us think the first sentence happened in the past (aside from the time marker "In those days") and why is that we don't think "You might kill yourself with that gun" is in the past but in the present or future tense.

You say "[w]hat makes us think the first sentence happened in the past (aside from the time marker 'In those days')" ... but the truth is, the time marker is the only thing that alerts us to the fact that "might" is here being used as the past of "may". In fact, aside from in reported speech (where "may", of course, changes into "might"), "might" is so very rarely used as the past of "may"—apart from perhaps certain dialectal uses—that when we do use it as such, we are virtually constrained to add a time marker to signal what the hell is going on and not leave the listener/reader in a well-nigh unresolvable ambiguity as to our meaning. Apart from that, the use of the indefinite article in "a man" and "a sheep", as opposed to a more precise modifier, gives us a very slight clue as to the sentence's past meaning, but it is very slight indeed, and far from being enough to resolve the ambiguity that would emerge if we removed the time marker.

As for "You might kill yourself with that gun", here the very precise modifier "that" is giving us a clue that this sentence is not in the past. For example, consider the following changes:

(a) You might kill yourself with that gun.
(b) You might kill yourself with that garrotte.
(c) You might kill yourself with a garrotte.
(d) In those days, you might kill yourself with a garrotte.

I changed "gun" to "garrotte" (metalden boğma halkası) in order to start moving the sentence into the past (garrottes are hardly common killing tools these days), then changed "that" to "a" to make it general. At this point, even in sentence (c) and despite the obsolescence of garrottes, the sentence still sounds—at least to my ear—as if it is referring to present/future time, and so it requires the addition of a time marker such as "in those days" to clarify that we mean to talk about the past.

Thanks Saposcat,

There seems to be more to it than just a mere tense concordance. Even the tiny pests "a/an/the etc.." can be determining factors in distinguishing which form to choose. Gee! English is not piece of cake..:(

Thanks Saposcat,

There seems to be more to it than just a mere tense concordance. Even the tiny pests "a/an/the etc.." can be determining factors in distinguishing which form to choose.

That's the way it is when you veer away from abstract grammatical flights of fancy and land in the cold, hard, mixed-up mud of English as she is actually spoke. It's all very well for grammar teachers to talk black and white and say "might" is the past of "may" ... but it's better to realize that, these days at least, and with fairly rare exceptions, that's not really the case at all. In those days, one might frequently use "might" simply as the past of "may", but these days, one might get into trouble if one goes around thinking that such a use is common.

Gee! English is not piece of cake..:(

No, it ain't ... but Turkish is no walk in the park, either.

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This is the only point I disagree with:
But to both sentences should be added the caveat that using "might" in such a sentence lends the sentence a slightly odd tone and style that—depending on who you're talking to—would sound either colloquialish or old-fashioned.
I would be hard put to recast the sentences in any more standard or current fashion.
.

At this point, I'd like to compare "might have done" with "might" used for past. Are the comments for these two sentences right?

In those days, they might hang a man for stealing a sheep. (In those days, it was possible or common to hang a man for stealing a sheep, but not every single time. Actually the sentence is talking about a general possibility with a weak probability, say %30. Not talking about a specific situation )

In those days, they might have hung man for stealing a sheep. (Two different meanings are possible: 1. We are not sure but they may have done such a thing. 2. If they had a chance or opportunity, they would have done such a thing, it was possible. But they did not since they never had such a chance.)

I would be hard put to recast the sentences in any more standard or current fashion.

Then perhaps it's just my own personal ear for tone and style (which, as we know, are notoriously slippery things). To make it a bit more "standard" and "current", I'd probably just use could (or possibly would) instead of might (though I admit such a change would change the meaning slightly, though not so much as to completely alter what's being expressed).

At this point, I'd like to compare "might have done" with "might" used for past. Are the comments for these two sentences right?

In those days, they might hang a man for stealing a sheep. (In those days, it was possible or common to hang a man for stealing a sheep, but not every single time. Actually the sentence is talking about a general possibility with a weak probability, say %30. Not talking about a specific situation )

In those days, they might have hung man for stealing a sheep. (Two different meanings are possible: 1. We are not sure but they may have done such a thing. 2. If they had a chance or opportunity, they would have done such a thing, it was possible. But they did not since they never had such a chance.)

In reply to "Are the comments for these two sentences right?"—yes, I think they are, and 100% so as far as I can see.

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In those days, they might have hanged a man for stealing a sheep.
.

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In those days, they might have hanged a man for stealing a sheep.
.

Do we have a AmE vs BrE issue? 'Cause, as I know, both are possible for past participle of hang.

Do we have a AmE vs BrE issue? 'Cause, as I know, both are possible for past participle of hang.

No, they are different.

Hang (hanged / hanged): To kill someone by stringing them up.
Hang (hung/ hung) : To put something in a position so that the bottom part is free to move etc...

Do we have a AmE vs BrE issue? 'Cause, as I know, both are possible for past participle of hang.

It's just as Kili says above, although it's worth noting that there is a colloquial (and dirty) use of past participle "hung" for people—specifically, for men.

Aside from that, though, it's—in my humble opinion—perfectly alright (and certainly common) to say something like "The criminal was hung from a tree just outside town" ... but then again, I'm much more a descriptivist than a prescriptivist.

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USAGE NOTE: 'Hanged', as a past tense and a past participle of 'hang', is used in the sense of 'to put to death by hanging,' as in 'Frontier courts hanged many a prisoner after a summary trial'. A majority of the Usage Panel objects to 'hung' used in this sense. In all other senses of the word, 'hung' is the preferred form as past tense and past participle, as in 'I hung my child's picture above my desk'. (American Heritage Dictionary)

Usage note: 'Hang' has two forms for the past tense and past participle, 'hanged' and 'hung'. The historically older form 'hanged' is now used exclusively in the sense of causing or putting to death: 'He was sentenced to be hanged by the neck until dead'. In the sense of legal execution, 'hung' is also quite common and is standard in all types of speech and writing except in legal documents. When legal execution is not meant, 'hung' has become the more frequent form: 'The prisoner hung himself in his cell'. (Random House Unabridged)

USAGE: In modern English 'hang' has two past tense and past participle forms: 'hanged' and 'hung'. Sometime after the 16th century 'hung' replaced the earlier form 'hanged' in general contexts, as in 'they hung out the washing', while 'hanged' was, as it still is, retained for use in reference to execution by hanging, as in 'the prisoner was hanged'. (Oxford Online)