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  1. You could imagine sentence (a) (being??) uttered by someone consulting their diary and seeing that tomorrow's page is blank.

  2. I can imagine him (being??) really angry.

  3. I can't imagine elephants (being??) able to fly.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/imagine says the verb "imagine" is sometimes followed by the ing-form of another verb: She imagined herself sitting in her favourite chair back home. So my question is: do we need "being" in (1) (using the passive voice), (2) and (3) (both using an adjective)?

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  • She imagined herself sitting on the bench and reading. Yes, it is an action verb.

  • She imagined herself being rich. Yes, it is an adjective.

Now, do you "need" being with the adjective?

Let's just put it this way. It is more elegant as in English we'd talk about being rich or being poor or being smart, etc. So, in a sense, it is incomplete without it.

Now, in speech, you might drop it or for other literary reasons....

By the way, the verb imagine and see and work this way.

"He saw himself at the helm of a sailing vessel in the 15th century, but it was only a dream."

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