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You may find fake bagels on store shelves soon.

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May 26th 2011 13:25 food
According to the press, a milling company began selling new flour of bagels for business use which does not require one to boil the dough. The ingredients are mixed with some starches from corn, tapioca, etc. You may have such bagels on the street some time in the future. They should be called なんちゃって bagels.
connfucius
Thank you for your correction!
May 26th 2011 14:18
  • According to the press, a milling company began to sell new flour of bagels which does not need a process of boiling flour.

  • According to the press, a milling company began to sell new flour of bagels which does not require the process of boiling flour.

 
  • It is for business purpose and is mixed with starch.

  • It is an ingredient mixed with starch, to be used for generating more profit.

 
  • You may have such bagels on the street some time.

  • You may have such bagels on the street some time in the future.

 
That's scary! What is the new process/ ingredient?
May 26th 2011 14:57 satoshi
Thanks. It contains some starches from corn, tapioca, etc. Sad!
GaryW
Thank you for your correction!
May 26th 2011 15:44
  • You may have fake bagels.

  • You may have purchased fake bagels.

 
  • According to the press, a milling company began to sell for business use new flour of bagels which does not need the process of boiling flour.

  • According to the press, a milling company began selling for business use new flour for bagels which does not require the process of boiling the flour.

 
  • It is an ingredient mixed with some starches from corn, tapioca, etc.

  • It contains an ingredients mixed with some starches from corn, tapioca, etc.

 
  • They are to be called なんちゃってbagels.

  • They will be called なんちゃってbagels.

 
Interesting topic. Good English.
Lyren
Thank you for your correction!
May 26th 2011 18:13
  • You may have purchased fake bagels.

  • You may have purchased fake bagels. Since these bagels aren't out yet, I think it might be better to say "You may soon be purchasing fake bagels."

 
  • According to the press, a milling company began selling new flour of bagels for business use which does not need the process of boiling flour.

  • According to the press, a milling company began selling new flour of bagels for business use which does not need the process of boiling flour. I don't think you boil flour to make bagels. You boil dough, which is made from flour, but this isn't the same as "boiling flour". You could say, "which does not require one to boil the dough", or "which does not require one to boil flour-based dough".

 
  • It is ingredients mixed with some starches from corn, tapioca, etc.

  • The ingredients are mixed with some starches from corn, tapioca, etc. Using "it" in this situation would refer to the bagels, and the bagels themselves are not ingredients, so you have to change this.

 
I like the name.
May 26th 2011 19:04 satoshi
Thanks.
> You may soon be purchasing fake bagels
It sounds too serious...

May 26th 2011 19:49 Lyren
Well, in my opinion the original sounds kind of serious too, haha. It's good, kind of funny. But, if you want to change it, I think "You may find fake bagels on store shelves soon" or something. Using the present perfect sounds strange to me when the bagels aren't out yet (had they been out for a while, it would be fine)
May 26th 2011 19:54 satoshi
How about "You may have fake bagels." Does it cover the thing in the future?
May 26th 2011 19:42 Lyren
Hm... well, it definitely covers the future, but it could also mean the present, and I really feel like it should be the future in this sense. Like, "You may have a cold", would almost certainly mean right this moment, at this second. "You may have troubles" could be either, and without context I'd probably assume this is present as well. Without an explicit mention of the future in that sentence, it sounds like you mean right now, rather than in a few weeks or months.
May 26th 2011 20:00 satoshi
Is it the difference between the "present tense" of Japanese and that of English? To begin with, "may" is one of the interesting words. The fact that "probably" and such are adverbs is easily understandable. However, why is "may" a modal verb?
May 26th 2011 22:10 Lyren
Oof, I'm afraid I don't know enough about English grammar to answer those sorts of questions. But, yes, I would say this is probably one difference between Japanese present tense and English present tense. It sounds better if you make it explicitly future tense. When I read the first line of your article, I thought that these bagels were already out.
May 26th 2011 22:06 satoshi
Really, I want to study English at uni. Because there are a lot of questions I have.
May 27th 2011 04:00 fatedquest
The difference between English and Japanese present tense is that Japanese presence tense is the same as Japanese future tense in most cases. However in English, that is usually not the case from the grammar alone, but in certain context, it might imply a future event. "may" in most cases in strictly present tense. The word you might want to use is "might" Might can be used for both present and future events equally well. "you might find fake bagels on the store shelves soon" sounds like in the future there will be fake bagels in the store but "you may find fake bagels on the store shelves soon" sounds like there are already fake bagels in the store and you are now in there store with a friend trying to look for fake bagels. And you tell him this sentence to inform him you are almost reaching the exact shelve where the fake bagels are on.
May 27th 2011 04:27 fatedquest
I think for your level of English, reading books and talking to people in addition to Lang - 8 is the best way to improve. In a university, teachers or lecturers only want to prescribe to you what is in the textbooks they use or is chosen by the university. I believe you understand most of that already. You just do not have the usage data to decide between what sounds natural and unnatural and the subtle nuances between words and sentence structures. You have already learned more than what any university classroom can teach you, in my opinion.
May 27th 2011 04:34 Lyren
I don't mean to start an argument or anything but I feel I have to take issue with your assessment of "may" in this situation. I don't see any reason to think that "may" would be significantly different from "might" in this way, and although I could potentially see what you have described as a possible interpretation, I can hardly see it as the most likely.
May 27th 2011 05:04 fatedquest
It could be that I read distinctly different literature from you or it might be because I grew up in Malaysia and not US that I see such a difference between may and might. I also speak Malay and Cantonese and the mappings of the words in my head could differ.The examples you quoted do sound strange to me as I would use might in those cases. I don't think you should take issue with my assessment haha.I don't represent the English language, I only represent the English language in my mind and like you, I'm referencing the immediate data that comes to me but we don't really have the statistics do we?

Another point. In the first two examples, the inclusion of the words "in 2011" and "shortly" indicates it is a statement about the future. However when I read the 3rd sentence, I saw it as a statement about the present. I'm not 'supporting" I am right, but that's just how it naturally comes to me. While I feel this is how it is generally distinguished, it might well be that there is really no distinction between the two words for the majority of people.

The wonders of language eh?
May 27th 2011 04:47 Lyren
Well, no harm in getting two opinions.
May 27th 2011 04:51 fatedquest
Nope, and I'm actually writing an journal about the nuances of word in language and will publish it shortly.
May 27th 2011 09:02 satoshi
> You have already learned more than what any university classroom can teach you
I agree with you. Thanks.

> in English, that is usually not the case from the grammar alone, but in certain context,
haha. Manay people in the world, as well as scholars in Japan, often say that the Japanese language is the language that depneds on the context and it is not logical. However, generally, I don't agree with them.
May 27th 2011 09:38 satoshi
> You have already learned more than what any university classroom can teach you
However, I need a trained tutor who will answer my questions soon. Reading books and using net is for free (or inexpensive), but they are not so efficient.
詠美
May 27th 2011 00:01
なんちゃって bagels? that's hilarious!! did you come up with that, or is that what they're really going to be called?..
May 27th 2011 04:29 fatedquest
haha imagine if they have a bagel with that name in English. "Just kiddin' bagels!"
x

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According to the press, a milling company began selling new flour of bagels for business use which does not require one to boil the dough. The ingredients are mixed with some starches from corn, tapioca, etc. You may have such bagels on the street some time in the future. They should be called なん


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