Meaning of "used to would" double modal?

[Mark Mandel]

I agree with your intuition on these constructions with "think (that)": here
"would" makes a difference. But that doesn't apply to the original example,
"lies I used to (would) tell". The difference is that having a belief
(thinking (that)) is a state, not iterable, while lying (telling a lie) is
an action that can be either one-time or iterated, but is not continuous.

"I used to would think that the moon was made of green cheese" is
ungrammatical for me and I can't judge nuance in it. Evidently you have it
with a different sense of "think" than in the primary reading of "I used to
think (=believe) that the moon was made of green cheese". So ISTM that here
the addition of "would" functions to force an iterable sense on the verb.
Can you provide any examples where "used to" and "used to would" give
different meanings without affecting/forcing the readings of other parts of
the sentence?

m a m


On Fri, Nov 13, 2009 at 11:34 AM, <RonButters at aol.com> wrote:

> I sense a difference between
>
> I used to think that the moon was made of green cheese.
>   (= It was formerly my belief that ...)
> AND
> I used to would think that the moon was made of green cheese.
>   (= From time to time the thought crossed my mind that ...)
>
> The unmarked interpretation of the former is continuous.
> The unmarked interpretation of the latter is iterative.
>
> I used to would = It used to be (the case) that I would
> I used to = It used to be (the case) that I
>
> cf.
>
> I used to could = It used to be (the case) that I could
>

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