Breakdown of Ég myndi hafa hunsað ráðlegginguna ef mér hefði þótt útkoman ömurleg.
ég
I
hafa
to have
ef
if
þykja
to find (have an opinion)
myndu
would (plural)
hunsa
to ignore
útkoman
the outcome
ömurlegur
miserable
ráðleggingin
the advice
Questions & Answers about Ég myndi hafa hunsað ráðlegginguna ef mér hefði þótt útkoman ömurleg.
Can I use hefði hunsað instead of myndi hafa hunsað in the first half of the sentence?
In mér hefði þótt, is the verb hefði in the first person to agree with 'me'?
No, it's actually a coincidence that the first-person singular (ég hefði) and third-person singular (það hefði) look identical here. Because the verb þykja (to find/think) takes a dative subject (mér), the verb defaults to the third-person singular. You can see this clearly if you change the subject to 'we': it becomes okkur hefði þótt, not okkur hefðum þótt.
Since they are what I am evaluating, why are útkoman and ömurleg in the nominative case rather than the accusative?
This is a special structural rule for the verb þykja. When expressing an opinion about something, the person holding the opinion takes the dative (mér), but both the thing being evaluated (útkoman) and the adjective describing it (ömurleg) go in the nominative case.
Why is the adjective ömurleg used here instead of ömurlega or ömurlegt?
The adjective has to agree in gender, number, and case with the noun it describes, which is útkoma (a feminine noun). Because þykja requires the evaluated noun to be in the nominative case, the adjective must take the feminine nominative singular form, which is ömurleg.
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