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In my grammer book try+to+infinitive and try+ing have a

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medanova
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In my grammer book try+to+infinitive and try+ing have a [#permalink] New post   27 Nov 2010, 10:44
In my grammer book try+to+infinitive and try+ing have a slight difference in meaning.
try+to+infinitive is used to say that we attempt to do something:
I tried to lock the door, but the key was broken.
try+ing is used when we test something to see if it improves a situation:
I tried taking some medicines, but the pain didn't go away.

In the Manhattan SC book the usage with ing is not recommendable.
Does anyboy know some gmatical rules about the usage of the verb try?
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Re: In my grammer book try+to+infinitive and try+ing have a [#permalink] New post   29 Nov 2010, 13:37
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medanova,

There's a slight difference in meaning of which you need to be aware, but you can use either "try + to" or "try + -ing" depending on the context:

"I tried to take some medicine." --> Here, I attempted to take the medicine, but I failed. Maybe it slipped out of my hand.
"I will try to attend the game, but I can't promise." --> Here, again, I might not be ABLE to attend the game. Maybe I'll be stuck in traffic.

Summary: "Try + to" means you are uncertain whether it will actually happen or not.

"I tried taking some medicine." --> Here, I actually took the medicine, but it didn't work. Maybe I took the wrong medicine, or I didn't take enough.
"I will try attending the game, but I can't promise I'll like it." --> Here, it is certain that you will attend the game but not sure whether something else will happen as a result of that.

Summary: " Try + -ing" means you will complete the action, but the result of doing so is unclear.

Does that help?

Brett
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medanova
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Re: In my grammer book try+to+infinitive and try+ing have a [#permalink] New post   29 Nov 2010, 15:29
well that's a perfect explanation. Thanks a lot. I would also like to know if the gmat uses this difference in the meaning in the tests. Should I be aware of it for the exam?
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Re: In my grammer book try+to+infinitive and try+ing have a [#permalink] New post   29 Nov 2010, 15:32
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It's a very minor issue, and I think that you are now officially as aware of it as you need to be. :-)

If you're given a choice between the two (doubtful), just make sure your answer choice doesn't change the meaning from the original.
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Re: In my grammer book try+to+infinitive and try+ing have a [#permalink] New post   30 Nov 2010, 13:25
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Good discussion here, guys - and great explanations, Brett. I hope I'm not hijacking your post but just wanted to point out one thing about "changing the meaning of the original" since that comes a lot in student questions.

There is no "incumbent" status to answer choice A - they're not going to change the meaning and assume that you "know" to keep the original intact. In fact, it's quite likely that they randomize the answer choices so that a question on which you see A as saying "that of X...." I might see that same answer choice at D with a different choice A.

What you're really looking for is an ILLOGICAL meaning - if you see two different meanings of a sentence in multiple answer choices, the way that one of those will become a decision point is if one is not a logical meaning of that sentence.

For example, in this discussion you might see two sentences:

1) I will attempt running the marathon

2) I will attempt to run the marathon

Sentence 1 is illogical - it guarantees that you're running the marathon, as Brett notes about the -ing form of running, but then "attempt" is a verb on its own...what are you going to attempt while running?

Sentence 2 is logical - the attempt is at running the marathon. "To run" is conditional so it works with "attempt", and the meaning is intact. Just because the illogical meaning came first doesn't mean we have to stick with that meaning - if it's not logical, it's the incorrect meaning and we'd choose #2.
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Re: In my grammer book try+to+infinitive and try+ing have a [#permalink] New post   23 Oct 2022, 08:03
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