Modal verbs

Modal verbs + Perfect Infinitive

(Выражение «вероятности», «предположения»)

Task 1. Study the following table. Compare the forms of the Infinitive after modal verbs. Pay attention to their translation.

Модаль-ный глагол	Форма инфинитива	Значение модального глагола	Перевод
MUST	She must be busy now. She must be typing your article. She must have been typing your article since morning. She must have typed your article. She must have been given the article only yesterday.	предположение, вероятность совершения действия (с большей долей уверенности)	Она, должно быть, сейчас занята. Она, по всей вероятности, печатает вашу статью. Она, должно быть, печатает вашу статью с утра. Она, по всей вероятности, уже напечатала вашу статью. Вероятно, ей дали статью только вчера.
MAY	She may be busy now. She may be typing your article. She may have been typing your article since morning. She may have typed your article. She may have been given the article only yesterday.	предположение с оттенком неуверенности (might – еще меньшая степень уверенности)	Она, возможно, сейчас занята. Она, может быть, печатает вашу статью. Она, возможно, печатает вашу статью с утра. Она, может быть, уже напечатала вашу статью. Ей, возможно, дали статью только вчера.
CAN	She can be busy tomorrow. Can she be busy tomorrow? Can she have done it by herself? You can’t have done it! You could have done it yourself!	предположение удивление в вопросительных предложениях сомнение (в большой степени) в отрицательных предложениях возможность (в утвердительном предложении) сделать что-либо, но которая не реализовалась	Она, возможно, будет занята завтра. Неужели она будет занята завтра? Разве она сделала это сама? Не может быть, чтобы вы это сделали! Вы могли бы сделать это сами!
SHOULD	I should have done it myself. They should have repaired this instrument by now.	упрек, порицание, неодобрение (уже совершенных действий) предположение (меньшая степень уверенности по сравнению с must)	Я должен был сделать это сам. (Мне следовало бы сделать это самому) Наверное (вероятно), они уже отремонтировали этот прибор.

Task 2. Translate the sentences paying attention to modal verbs followed by Perfect Infinitive.

I.

2. The friends must have been playing chess non-stop the whole day.

3. My watch stopped running. I think that the water might have ruined it.

4. The Browns must have failed to get in touch with us.

5. Janice’s number is still engaged. She must have been on the phone all morning.

6. I thought you must have found a close parking place since you always get here so early.

7. The student couldn’t take one of the courses because it may have been cut because of the budget.

8. The committee must have been informed of the coming changes.

9. Oh, no! You can’t have failed the exam again!

10. Can the child have been watching the telly all day long?

11. What can have happened to change him so much?

12. You should have warned him that the ice was dangerous.

II.

1. In Devonian times (some 350 million years ago) the day must have been about 22 hours long.

2. Strong evidence suggests that the Antarctic ice sheet may have been more extensive in the past.

3. Newton himself suggested that the solar system might have been formed from a thin cloud of gas and dust that slowly condensed under gravitational attraction.

4. It is obvious that the more deeply buried sediments must have suffered compaction and may have been reduced to perhaps half or less of their original thickness.

5. The time required to produce a particular ore deposit may have been centuries or thousands of years, and some deposits probably required hundreds of thousands or millions of years to build up.

6. During past earth history rocks must have been formed and some of them subsequently broken down physically or chemically.

7. By the 1890’s the physicists showed that the earth could not have been solid for more than a few million years, while geologists and biologists proved that the earth must have been solid for not less than a billion years.

8. One of the reasonable theories to explain the lunar glass is that it may have originated when meteoroids fell on the moon.

9. There is convincing evidence that some of the rocks now exposed (обнажать) at the surface once must have been several miles below.

10. By the time the earth had cooled a little the still hot waters must have contained a great number of carbon-hydrogen-oxygen-nitrogen compounds in solution.

11. Several billion years ago there must have been twice as much radioactivity in the earth’s crust as there is now.

12. According to the dust cloud hypothesis Earth must have originated from the sun by the accumulation of dust particles from the sun’s periphery.

13. Chemistry tells us that proteins could not have formed in the presence of much oxygen, although there is a great deal of oxygen on the earth today.

14. Astronomers believe that the sun and all its planets were formed from the same cloud of gas and dust, so the planets should have started out with fairly similar atmospheres.

15. Earth may have come into existence as a result of a cataclysmic explosion of a single mass of highly concentrated matter.

Task 3. Translate from Russian into English. Mind the use of modal verbs with Perfect Infinitive.

1. Должно быть, они уже сравнили результаты эксперимента с полученными ранее.

2. Неужели в этом регионе шли такие дожди, которые привели к значительным разрушениям?

3. Не может быть, чтобы этот минерал не был до сих пор идентифицирован.

4. Существует предположение, что жизнь, возможно, появилась на земле из внешнего космического пространства.

5. Возможно, в первые дни ранней земли были многочисленные штормы.

6. Луна, будучи меньше Земли, должно быть, охладилась гораздо быстрее.

7. Вероятно, большинство газов в современной атмосфере и большая часть воды были освобождены из недр Земли в результате вулканической деятельности.

8. Первые сформировавшиеся океаны, очевидно, были не такими солеными как сейчас.

9. Опарин был одним из первых ученых, кто предложил, что жизнь, должно быть, возникла в атмосфере.

10. В древних морях, по всей видимости, было образовано миллионы тонн сложных соединений.

11. Вся вода на Венере, возможно, приняла форму водяного пара благодаря высоким температурам из-за близкого расстояния от Солнца.

12. В масштабах галактики, наша Вселенная, должно быть, находилась в состоянии высокой степени турбулентности.

13. В соответствии с одной из гипотез, большая часть воды на Марсе, очевидно, долго оставалась в замерзшем состоянии вследствие очень низких температур.

Ex. 5. Read the following putting the verbs in brackets into the correct form. Be ready to speak on this topic.

Ferdinand Magellan (1) _____ (be) a Portuguese sailor who (2) _____ (want) to sail around the world. Emperor Charles V of Spain (3) _____ (give) him five ships and two hundred and sixty-five Spanish sailors. They (4) _____ (leave) Spain on 20^th September, 1519 and (5) _____ (begin) their long and dangerous journey.

On the journey, Magellan (6) _____ (discover) the Pacific Ocean. Unfortunately, he and many of the sailors (7) _____ (die) in a battle on 27^th April, 1521. After that, a Spanish sailor (8) _____ (take) control of the ships and (9) _____ (set off) to complete the voyage. Only one ship and sixteen men (10) _____ (survive) the journey. They (11) _____ (arrive) back in Spain on 6^th September, 1522. They (12) _____ (be) the first men to sail around the world.

Ex. 3. Read the following putting the verbs in brackets into the correct form. Be ready to speak on this topic.

Do you think Mars 1. _______ (colonise) by humans one day? The planet Mars 2. _______ (know) as “the red planet”. The soil there is red and its surface 3. ______ (cover) in volcanoes. Until recently, it 4. _______ (believe) that nothing could live on Mars, but during a recent space mission, tests 5. ______ (carry out), and now it 6. ______ (think) that life on Mars might be possible one day. During the space mission, special equipment 7. ______ (use) to examine the planet. No form of life 8. ______ (find) yet, and so far the planet 9. ______ (consider) unsuitable for inhabitation. However, we 10. ____ (tell) by scientists that, by 2020, humans 11. ______ (send) to Mars, and that one day, special cities 12. _______ (build) so that we can live there. It 13. __________ (hope) that by 2150, Mars will be a wonderful place to live. If a colony 14. _________ (build) on Mars, would you like to live there?