Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by alex_young 1311 days ago
“You could own” is present tense. Perhaps “could have” would be better?
1 comments
valleyer 1311 days ago
"Could" can be both the conditional present tense or preterite tense in English (at least AmE). It's ambiguous.

See: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/could#Verb

link
alex_young 1311 days ago
The point I was attempting to make is that the usage is incorrect and misleading in this context. The way the title is worded is indeed the past tense usage.
link
kergonath 1311 days ago
The point the parent was making is that it is not incorrect or misleading, just ambiguous. And even then, it’s ambiguous only if you leave out the second clause.

“I could have a banana” has two perfectly correct meanings: it is possible for me to have a banana right now depending on some factor (conditional), or I had the possibility to have a banana in the past (preterite).

A preterite in the second clause eliminates the possibility of a present conditional in the first one.

link
PebblesRox 1310 days ago
Don't you need to add another verb for “I could have a banana” to work as past tense?

E.g. "I could have eaten" or "I could have had"

Edit: Oh wait, now I see it. Something like "I knew I could have a banana if I got hungry."

link