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Message from discussion Counterfactual conditions
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Harrison Hill  
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 More options Nov 16 2012, 4:29 pm
Newsgroups: alt.usage.english
From: Harrison Hill <harrisonhill2...@gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 16 Nov 2012 13:29:57 -0800 (PST)
Local: Fri, Nov 16 2012 4:29 pm
Subject: Re: Counterfactual conditions
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On Nov 16, 4:34 pm, Athel Cornish-Bowden <athel...@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

> The other day I wrote the following sentence, and each time I re-read
> it I have a doubt about the last word but three:

> "In consequence, if a reaction in a biosynthetic pathway displays
> negative cooperativity with respect to the concentration of its
> substrate, and if the same metabolite acts as an effector of a reaction
> in another pathway, then the flux through the second pathway will be
> more sensitive to the flux through the first than it would be if there
> was no negative cooperativity."

> Don't worry about whether you find this an elegantly written sentence
> or not, I'm just thinking about the final if clause. It seems to me to
> be clearly counterfactual, and yet I can't persuade myself that the
> "was" should be "were": it just seems wrong to me with "were".

> Would "were" be better?

Is "counterfactual" a trap for fabzorba? Even Aussies know lies are
lies :)

 
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