Cambridge Grammar of English Hardback with cd-rom a comprehensive Guide

OTHER IMPERSONAL CONSTRUCTIONS

148

It-constructions

148a

Anticipatory it is frequently used in passive-voice clauses with or without an

explicit agent to create an impersonal structure. This enables writers/speakers to

distance themselves from assertions (

Û

also 146d Hedging and impersonal

constructions

):

286 | Grammar and academic English

Cambridge Grammar of English

---

It has generally been accepted by scientists that models with fewer parameters

and which make predictions are better models. 

(compare the more direct: scientists generally accept …)

It is argued that in the latter two cases, the default-like character of one of the

affixes is attributable to the properties of the relevant inflectional subsystems,

not to the predispositions that children bring to the language-learning task.

(compare: I argue that …)

See also the next example below in 

148b Existential there

.