"Heard me [infinitive]" vs. "heard me [present participle]"
"Heard me [infinitive]" vs. "heard me [present participle]"
- At that time, you wouldn't have heard me talk about it.
- At that time, you wouldn't have heard me talking about it.
- At that time, you wouldn't have heard me condemn it.
- At that time, you wouldn't have heard me condemning it.
Which one of the above sentences are incorrect and why?
Solution 1:
None of them are incorrect.
English sense verbs, unlike most complement-taking verbs,
can take either gerund or infinitive complements.
- I saw/heard him leave/leaving.
This is most common with long-distance senses, of course;
-- She smelled him leaving is a fairly unlikely (though not ungrammatical) thing to say.
It may be (and undoubtedly some people interpret it this way, though others don't)
that
- I heard him leaving.
means something like (and may be a variant of)
- I heard him while he was (in the act of) leaving.
while
- I heard him leave.
means something like
- I heard the noise produced by his leaving.
Not a whole lot of difference here, and for all intensive purposes they're synonymous.