26 EXPRESSION OF DOUBT, CONDITION, HYPOTHESIS AND CONTRAST.

Introduction:
- Uncertainty, hypothesis, condition and contrast are concepts that frequently overlap.
- Linguistically, hypothesis means something assumed to be false.
Condition is a grammatical relationship in which one situation is said to be
dependent on another.
Contrast is a difference between two things, statements or situations.
Doubt:
- Impersonal style is preferred when expressing certainty, probability...
It is certain / It is unlikely
Doubt can be defined as a state of uncertainty about the past, present or future; or about
how to carry out an action relation with the concepts of thruth / Falsehood We
can then understand these notions in terms of a scale of likelihood.
Degrees of likelihood:
1. Uncertainty.
2. Improbability.
3. Possibility.
4. Probability.
5. Certainty.
Expressed by:
1. Modal Auxiliaries.
2. It / That Clauses.
3. Adverbials.
4. Expressions involving different structures.
5. Intonation.
Uncertainty:
1. Uncetainty Expressed with modal verbs.
2. Uncertainty expressed with other lexical and Grammatical means.
The Verb Know and its synonyms.
With adjectives semantically related to certainty
3. Uncertainty expressed with Intonation.
(Usually by means of rising intonation)
4. Uncertainty expressed with conversational strategies.
- Question Tags.
- Formulas.
Probability and Possibility:
1. Probability and possibility are expressed with modal verbs.
- Probability: Ought to / Should.
- Possibility: Can, May, Could, Might, Maybe, IT's possible that...
Possibility of the Fact (factual) The railways may be
improved.
Possibility of the Idea (Theoretical) The railways can be
improved.
Theoretical possibility is weaker than factual.
2. Probability and possibility expressed with other lexical and grammatical
means.
Semantic and morphological relation.
Adverbials.
It- Clauses.

- Certainty:
- Distinction between knowing the fact or deducing it from secure premises (=logical
necessity).
Certainty expressed with modal verbs:
- Must + Inf.
- Have to + inf.
The negative for the certainty meaning is CAN'T
- WILL Prediction about the present / future.
Certainty expressed with other lexical and grammatical means
- The verb KNOW and its synonyms.
- The use of Adjectives.
- The IT- Clause.
- Adverbials.
Certainty Expressed with Intonation:
- Usually falling intonation.
Condition:
- Conditional Clauses.
- The form of conditional clauses: If / Unless.
- One form of Conditional clauses is built by means of an inverted word order.
Had I started earlier, I would have already finished.
- Coordinated clauses: Take this medicine and you'll feel better.
- Participle clauses: Cleared, the place will look lovely.
- Putative Should: Should you know any details, let me know.
- Fix Types:
Type 0
Type 1
Type 2
Type 3 Further variations are possible.
Direct Condition: The Condition and the resulting action are expressed explicitly
Indirect Condition:
1. Metalinguistic comment.
2. Uncertainty.
3. Contextual condition.
4. Expressing politeness.
The meaning of conditional clauses.= Types.
Hypothesis:
- Hypothetical meaning in conditional constructions.
Notice that the Past tense used to express hypotheses does not refer to the past, but to the
present or future.
- Past time combined with hypotheses requires the perfective:
If I had had enough money, I'd have bought it.
+ other constructions to express hypothetical meaning.

Contrast:
Clauses of contrast and Concessive clauses If two clauses are in contrast, it means
that the one is surprising or unexpected in view of the other.
Concessive subordinators: Though / Although.
Coordinating Conjunction: But.
Contrast Conjunctions: while / whereas.
Alternative conditional / concessive clauses: Either...or/ Whether...or; with or without.
Other constructions to express contrast: In spite of...;Despite...; notwithstanding, for

Prepositions of contrast.
Conjunctions: Yet, however, nevertheless, all the same, still, even so.
Contrast exprfessed by stress and intonation.

Conclusion:
The view of language teaching from the position of notional/conceptual approach puts us in the
necessity of being able to express notions and concepts not only from the semantic or syntactic
view, but from being able to understand and rephrase ideas.
Our students must acquire the command of working with words and sentences in order to
achieve communicative purposes of which linguistic resources are just a tool.
The key Competences basically fostered in this unit are:
- Linguistic Competence.
- Learn to Learn.
- Social and civic competence.