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Would a native BrE speaker use "may/might/could/can" when talking about both personal experience and general possibility in these examples?

  1. "Earthquakes can/could/may/might be frequent/dangerous. (Generally)

  2. "Earthquakes can/could/might (not "may") be frequent/dangerous here." According to "English Grammar in Context" by Michael Vince "can" is the only option when talking about a general possibility as in sentence 1. I have read that "may" is not used when talking about what is possible based on personal experience as in the second sentence.

  3. "Winters can be cold." Generally. Thus either "can", "could", "may", or "might" is correct here, but

  4. "Winters can be cold here" "can", "might", "could" is correct but "may" is not.

Antonia A
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    I don't see what difference personal experience makes. It doesn't affect the grammar if we have lived through the cold winters or just read about the climate in a book. I would use can or may for generalisations, but would only use could or might for a hypothetical statement. "Winters in the West of England could become colder if we lost the effect of the Gulf Stream." – Kate Bunting Jun 21 '21 at 12:20
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    I don't think it makes a blind bit of difference whether you tack *here* onto the end of some "generic" assertion like *Winter can be cold. Apart from the fact that if such an assertion isn't* either explicitly or contextually constrained to some particular region, it's a totally pointless thing to say in the first place. – FumbleFingers Jun 21 '21 at 12:21
  • So its not that either is correct in them. Right? For generalisations only can or may not could or might. For hypothetical statements only could or might . But for experience can I use all if them? If I am talking about the weather in my country and say "Winters can/may/might/could be cold here" would either be correct? – Antonia A Jun 21 '21 at 13:46

1 Answers1

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In Antonia's country winters can be cold

So I am fairly confident about this

In Antonia's country winters may be cold

I am slightly less sure, perhaps sometimes they are not

In Antonia's country winters could become cold

At the moment they are not but with changes in ocean currents they might become colder. You could replace could with might in that example.

mdewey
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