guesses, conjectures

Question

Hi all,

I want to ask that how it is said in spanish to express guesses like "he must be in home at the moment" or "they have must reached home by now"? Is it made by using "deber+infinitve" or what?

Answer 1

Great question.

It's common to use the future for that; it's called "the future of probability".

For example, to say "he must be at home right now", you would say "estará en casa" or "they must have reached home by now" "habrán llegado a casa".

I hope this helps.

Answer 2

In addition to mountaingirl's excellent translations, you can also say, Ha de estar en casa ahora "he must be at home right now," and Ya han de haber llegado a casa "they must have reached home by now."

Answer 3

to express likelihood (not certainty) using the verb deber ,you have to add preposition de.

example :

he must be at home right now = Él debe de estar en casa en este momento.

debe estar en casa en este momento you are implying obligation, not probability.

Answer 4

Thank you mountaingirl and gfreed, it really helped. And I am a bit glad that it has the same usage as my mother tongue(Turkish).

I doubt that if it was made by deber+infinitive or tener que, now it is better, despite I still have ambiguity about deber+infinitive or haber+de+infinitive. Thank you again.

Answer 5

Tener que, hay que, deber can be used. Also read section 2B of this article on using the future tense for conjecture or "must".

Future tense in Spanish