brodicius:(and I've actually been using forms such as '..antas' for a while now) so I suspect I'll end up using 'devintus'. But I shall attempt to use 'estus devinta'.

I would use "-intus" before I'd use "-antas"

-intus is frequently heard at Esperanto gatherings; it's obvious that people feel the need for that "estus -inta" kind of construction and don't want to give such a long-winded word.

-antas is hardly ever heard. Remember that Esperanto, by and large, prefers to use simple verb tenses, not complex ones. We only use the complex constructed tenses when it's important (for whatever reason) to convey the exact timing of an action. We normally stick to a simple -as ending for all forms of the present tense, including continual. Therefore "Mi dormas" could be translated not only as "I sleep" but also "I am sleeping", "I have been sleeping", etc.

In English it's important to distinguish between a simple present tense (I sleep) and a present continuous test (I am sleeping) so English-speaking beginners tend to want to overuse the complex tenses, especially the "estas -anta" form.

So if you find yourself using -antas a lot, you might want to take a closer look at your grammar! Most people would have no need to use that form (or "estas -anta") with any great frequency.

brodicius:
This is my main issue. I could think of things which made sense, but not for a past conditional sort of tense.

A past conditional was exactly the thing you asked about, wasn’t it?

The lack of words that fully cover the English words "should" and "could" does seem kind of odd. I mean, we English speakers use both of those words a LOT, but in order to properly express them in Esperanto we have no choice but to twist the grammar slightly in order to accomplish it.

"Should" and "must" are distinctly different. "Must" says that something WILL happen, come hell or high water. "Should" is a whole lot weaker, and allows for the fact that whatever "should" happen might actually not. That possibility of failure is not present in the Esperanto verb devi, in any of the tenses, moods, flavors, colors, etc.

So, "devus" doesn't really mean "should", if we strictly follow the rules*. But we treat it as if it does, thus actually adding a tiny bit of meaning to the construction that isn't really meant to be there. "Devintus", "povus" and "povintus" are treated in much the same manner (the last two also suffering from the same issue, although we haven't mentioned them yet in this thread).

Why can't we have nice things? (I.e., maybe it wouldn't be so bad if we introduced some new words that actually meant "should" and "could", so we don't have to twist devi and povi in such unnatural and probably-banned-in-Boston ways.)

I don't really have any suggestions. Maybe ŝudi and kudi. Whatever. I'm not really throwing that out there; mostly just griping about what seems to me to be a real missing element.

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* It is supposed to always be part of a conditional clause in a sentence to which you could append the phrase "but that won't happen" and the meaning of the sentence wouldn't change.

RiotNrrd:The lack of words that fully cover the English words "should" and "could" does seem kind of odd. I mean, we English speakers use both of those words a LOT, but in order to properly express them in Esperanto we have no choice but to twist the grammar slightly in order to accomplish it.

I think the reason that there are no exactly matching words is that the English words "should" and "could" are odd themselves. They're the past tense forms of "shall" and "can", but they are used with a present tense (conditional) meaning. They are used because the more logical forms *would shall and *would can aren't allowed.

If you translated "could" to Swedish and Finnish you would get "skulle kunna" and "voisi", which are the conditional forms of the words for "can" (that is, they are the exact translations of "povus"!). Because these are my native languages, it makes more sense to me to use devi and povi and "twist the grammar slightly" than to have separate words like "ŝudi" and "kudi", but I can't say with full certainty that this logic applies to all languages, and that I'm not biased because of my native languages.

TatuLe:If you translated "could" to Swedish and Finnish you would get "skulle kunna" and "voisi", which are the conditional forms of the words for "can" (that is, they are the exact translations of "povus"!). Because these are my native languages, it makes more sense to me to use devi and povi and "twist the grammar slightly" than to have separate words like "ŝudi" and "kudi", but I can't say with full certainty that this logic applies to all languages, and that I'm not biased because of my native languages.

I have to say that I agree with TatuLe. It makes more sense to use the available grammar of the language than forcing it to be used as another language.

In my case, the sentence in Spanish would be "debería (conditional of "must","devi") haber (which means the next verb is a past participle)...." So then, I would use cFlat7's "devus esti" instinctively.

I can't accept the view that somehow the grammar of Esperanto gets twisted in translating English modals.

A standard use of the -us form in Esperanto is to soften requests, enquiries, desires - in addition to its purely hypothetical use (se -us tiam -us).

So what is odd in using 'devus' to express a weaker obligation in contrast to devas?

Anyway, given the many different uses of 'should' in English it would be nightmarishly difficult for alilingvanoj to have to use 'ŝudi' to fully cover the English word "should".

To the original poster: note the difference between 'Mi devus esti farinta tion' and 'Mi estus devinta fari tion'

sudanglo:To the original poster: note the difference between 'Mi devus esti farinta tion' and 'Mi estus devinta fari tion'

Would that be: 'I should have done that' and 'I would have had to do that'?

TatuLe:They are used because the more logical forms *would shall and *would can aren't allowed.

Well they aren't really logical at all - that'd probably be like saying "skulle ska" I guess from a Swedish perspective .

Should is just the same as would in English really, the difference being that "Should" talks about a feeling of being indebted or having a need to, while "would" talks about volition (historically anyway).

I believe their conditional meanings aren't so much grammatical as they are implied, all the conditional meaning is contained within the (sometimes implied) "if".

(Technically if we're gonna get complicated, the future and conditional tenses don't really exist in English do they? All we do is use round-about constructions using verbs that used to mean "want" and "be obliged" instead )

UUano:

sudanglo:To the original poster: note the difference between 'Mi devus esti farinta tion' and 'Mi estus devinta fari tion'

Would that be: 'I should have done that' and 'I would have had to do that'?

In my view, you are right. But the first is an approximation, as would be Mi devintus fari tion, since there is no exact equivalent of "should" in Esperanto. So devus is commonly used for "should", and devintus for "should have".

ceigered:

TatuLe:They are used because the more logical forms *would shall and *would can aren't allowed.

Well they aren't really logical at all - that'd probably be like saying "skulle ska" I guess from a Swedish perspective .

Yes, the problem there is also that "shall" and "can" aren't infinitives but present tense forms (just like Swedish "ska"). Do "shall" and "can" even have infinitive forms? For "ska" there is "skola", but "skulle skola" is strange because it's a repetition.

RiotNrrd's "ŝudi" would actually make sense from a Swedish perspective (but not from Finnish), since Swedish has "böra" with that meaning. But you could also argue that this word is necessary only because *skulle skola and *skulle måsta (which would be the exact translations of "devus") aren't possible.

ceigered:Should is just the same as would in English really, the difference being that "Should" talks about a feeling of being indebted or having a need to, while "would" talks about volition (historically anyway).

I believe their conditional meanings aren't so much grammatical as they are implied, all the conditional meaning is contained within the (sometimes implied) "if".

(Technically if we're gonna get complicated, the future and conditional tenses don't really exist in English do they? All we do is use round-about constructions using verbs that used to mean "want" and "be obliged" instead )

It seems to me that the volition in "would" is only historical, in most sentences. It can be used together with subjects that cannot 'want' anything, like in "Without the bed this room would look too empty", or "A vacation would be nice".

I can't really argue against you about the conditional meaning being implied/grammatical, since as a native English speaker, what you think is by definition correct