Seriously Misleading Misrepresentations In Exercise 4: Causative Mental And Verbal Clauses

Martin, Matthiessen & Painter (2010: 147-8):

Analyse the following clauses as verbal or mental, including Sayer, Receiver or Inducer, Senser roles as appropriate. For example: 

1. They tried to convince them that resistance was futile.

2. He’d have liked Data to take charge.

3. He satisfied them that victory was possible.

4. She failed to teach them that Tokens were Subject in the active.

5. She implored them to leave.

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[1] This exercise is seriously misleading because it misrepresents verbal clauses as causative mental clauses. (Consequently, there are no Inducer participants in the clauses to be analysed.) Cf. Halliday (1994: 145-6):

In SFL Theory, the difference between the two example clauses is that the first is an imperating verbal clause, whereas the second so-called "causative mental" clause is an indicating verbal clause. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 305):

The two example clauses are thus:

As can be seen, the imperating verbal clause projects a command, whereas the indicating verbal clause projects a statement realised in indicative mood.

In the exercise, the indicating verbal clauses that readers are misled to analyse as causative mental clauses are 1, 3 and 4:

[2] To be clear, of the remaining two clauses, 5 is the only example of an imperating verbal clause:

Clause 2, on the other hand, is neither an imperating verbal clause nor a "causative mental clause" (i.e. indicating verbal clause). Instead, it is only genuine mental clause, but not a causative, and with no Inducer. It is simply a desiderative mental clause projecting a proposal: