predictive SEE (was Re: Pronunciation of can/can't)

[Arnold Zwicky]

rudy troike:

 >Gratitude to Arnold for his enlightening excursion into protasis
 >use of "can't". I'll have to see if I can't come up with a
 >counterexample.

...conveying that you think you can (though your sentence isn't
one).

to clarify two things:

first, 'predictive SEE' requires a negated auxiliary verb.  (subject
to stylistic requirements, this can be either affixal negation or
negation with NOT.) the verb doesn't have to be CAN'T, specifically.
i gave an example with DON'T in it in my earlier posting
  Just see if I don't outrun you!

and it's not hard to concoct a pretty wide range of examples:
  Look at the map and see if we haven't/ have not taken a wrong turn.
  Look at the map and see if we shouldn't turn right at the next
   corner.
  Look at the map and see if we aren't/are not about to drive off a
   cliff.
  Look at the analyst's report and see if we couldn't/could not do
   better by investing in Dialects.com.

second, there is some evidence that the IF of 'predictive SEE'
examples is *not* the IF of the protasis of conditionals, but the
IF of embedded questions (as in "I wonder if pigs can fly.").
in particular, 'predictive SEE', like embedded questions but unlike
protases, is perfectly happy with futurate WILL:
  Try this face cream, and see if you won't be completely satisfied
   by it.
  I wonder if you won't be completely satisfied by this face cream.
  ??Try this face cream, and if you won't be completely satisfied
    by it, we'll give you your money back.
[this last example is fine on a 'refusal' interpretation of WON'T,
but not on a simple futurate interpretation, expressible by a
futurate present: ...if you aren't completely satisfied.]

arnold (zwicky at csli.stanford.edu)