Which one is a conditional condition to be 3?
Is it true that the home could have been burnt by the fire if the firefighters hadn’t arrived?
Is the form similar to third conditional, so it never really looks like third conditional. Why we use third conditional about wishes in past. Also this could be written in following form using just “could have” and not “could have been” Could have burned.
This is a form of 3rd conditional (which combines “If + past perfect/past modal ideal conditional, note, your example has the clauses reversed).
Why is the if clause necessary on the second part of the language? The addition of the meaning of “could have” adds an extra layer of “imaginary situation”.
If the firefighters hadn’t arrived = The firefighters arrived And The home could have
burned = The home didn’t
burn
Note that “could
have
burned” indicates that there was
only
a chance for it
to burn if the firefighters hadn’t come.
I think the sentence sounds better (second part of your question) if we say:
The home could have burned (down), had the firefighters not arrived.
I can’t seem to justify having “been burned” as a passive structure that sounds cool. Also I’ve been reading that
there’s a passive structure somewhere else.
