tense and time (part2)

[Xui]

I'm with you there Xui, that is nearly very well expressed!

Isn't the Lewisite view of tenses a little bit like claiming that the word "blue" does not actually mean blue because we say "I feel blue" and "I saw a blue movie?"

Thanks.

[Xui]

The remoteness is hard to define, because it claims it gets rid of time. We people don't have a concept about timeless things. I don't think it can be defined at all, within our understanding.

[Stephen Jones]

Tut-tut Xui, a Chimaman without a sense of the timeless. What is going to happen to all my misconceptions about the mystery of the Orient?

Nobody is claiming that the idea of distance gets rid of the idea of time. What is being claimed is that time is sub-sumed by the idea of distance. That is to say that distance in time (the past) is merely one kind of distance.

I do think that Woodcutter is making the same mistake as Larry in talking about a core meaning. Larry claims that the core meaning should be distance because of Occam's razor, whilst Woodcutter will have no truck with any of this teleology and claims that if tense = time is good enough for the French, Spanish and his dictionary, then it can jolly well be good enough for the rest of us.

Personally I always associate 'core' with 'rotten to' and think life gets much simpler when you do away with the shibboleth of core meanings altogether.

[Xui]

That is to say that distance in time (the past) is merely one kind of distance.

If you call distance in time as the past, how then do you call the present?

What I am saying is, merely this kind of distance (past and present), if you insist to call it so, is enough, unless you have proven otherwise.

[Xui]

When we are asking Lewis' fans to explain "distance" and prove the need of "distance", it is obvious that we are not asking for more vague new terms only. We have understood and admitted it is vague enough. We are asking if you can make it a little bit clearer, with examples.

When you make it clearer, perhaps we are patching just the same thing to the conventional grammar!

[Xui]

Tut-tut Xui, a Chimaman without a sense of the timeless.

Nobody is claiming that the idea of distance gets rid of the idea of time.
============================

First you are teasing me not having understood a sense of the timeless, but in the next moment you explain you are not getting rid of the idea of time. I am afraid there is some confusion here.

If you are not getting rid of the idea of time, why shall a Chinaman need a sense of the timeless?

Xui

[JuanTwoThree]

Xui, let's leave the past in narrative for another day. Your argument seems to be that we use the past in narrative because.................. that's what we do. I haven't got time for such impeccable logic. I'll stick with my explanation that it seems a reasonable convention that the writing down took place after the action, even when the action never happened.


Your second comment perplexes me. Pasting huge chunks of intermediate grammar is not the reason WHY I use the form "came" in combination with tomorrow.

Those grammar books are written because of how I (amongst others) speak and write. It's not the other way round. I hadn't read an English grammar book before I was thirty.

So I repeat: What the hell is that past simple doing next to "tomorrow" in terms of any conventional understanding of "past"?

I really don't want another gobbit of pasted grammar that I could have written myself. And for all you know I did.

"So it is just a form and lacks of any meaning. I suspect you don't know about this" . Of course. Nobody in their right minds, choosing between the two of us, would bet on me being the one who didn't understand more about English verbs. How silly I must look.

[Xui]

Xui, let's leave the past in narrative for another day. Your argument seems to be that we use the past in narrative because.................. that's what we do. I haven't got time for such impeccable logic. I'll stick with my explanation that it seems a reasonable convention that the writing down took place after the action, even when the action never happened.

I am sorry but I can't remember I have talked about narrative things lately. I am afraid you have to quote something to ring the bell.

===============

So I repeat: What the hell is that past simple doing next to "tomorrow" in terms of any conventional understanding of "past"?

Do you know what is the Subjunctive? Something not true: "if I am you". Something we suppose happens but we actually don't know. Something imaginary: "If the world disappears tomorrow". Something cannot be explained with logic, so too is the tense in it. If we deliberately use a wrong tense, using Simple Past to relate Tomorrow for example, it further attracts your attention to the unreality. It means the chance for it to happen is small or zero, according to the concept of the speaker.

There is another substantial reason: English native speakers have prescribed the use of the subjunctive this way. We non-native speakers have to follow. Because it is about the form, we have to obey and there is little place for argument. However, if you think you can explain it with reason, like distance theory, then we can argue.

If I am wrong, please tell me in your opinion what is the Subjunctive. If it is only a kind of distance, then please tell me how to express the Subjunctive in English.

Xui

[JuanTwoThree]

Yes, I can see how difficult it must be to keep track . Yesterday : "Sometimes I don't quite understand you. Even a child knows we use Simple Past to relate a story".

Anyway:

"I am" is not subjunctive. "I be" is subjunctive.


"I was" is not subjunctive. "I were" is subjunctive (or is it?)

The past subjunctive (term as used by Thomson and Martinet and others) is exactly the same as the past simple except that in all persons the past subjunctive of "be" is "were". Nothing wrong with that: the bare infinitive is the same as the imperative but nobody complains.

So, according to this approach all these are past subjunctive:

I wish it were still summer.

It's time you went.

I'd rather you didn't

If only you spoke

If I came tomorrow

In other words all those uses of the past simple that simply didn't happen in the past.

The origins of this are that, like those cognate European languages which still have a past subjunctive, English once did:

fremman 'do' helpan 'help'
tō fremmanne tō helpanne
present indicative iċ fremme iċ helpe
past indicative iċ fremede iċ healp
present subjunctive hē fremme iċ helpe
past subjunctive iċ fremede ic hulpe
imperative freme help
participles fremmende helpende
fremed holpen

(thanks to

http://www.wmich.edu/medieval/research/ ... lverb.html

for refreshing my memory on this)

Look, fremman is weak (regular) but helpan is strong (irregular)
and you can see that the weak past subjunctive was the same as the past indicative, although the strong past subjunctive was different.

(Isn't it funny that the most modern form of helpan was "Help!")

So when English got much simpler, dropping almost the whole inflection business, this distinction apparently disappeared. But it's a fair enough position that say that using the term past simple to describe the form of the verb after "I wish ........" and the other examples is a bit sloppy.

It's not the "wrong tense" as you think. It's the right tense with the wrong name.

But you've got a point. All that "how things aren't" unreality you mention IS the meaning of the past subjunctive, so it's definitely not just a form.

Nothing Lewisite about any of the above, BTW.

[Xui]

Anyway:
"I am" is not subjunctive. "I be" is subjunctive.
"I was" is not subjunctive. "I were" is subjunctive (or is it?)

I don't know too whether it is or not.

[Xui]

It's not the "wrong tense" as you think. It's the right tense with the wrong name.

But you've got a point. All that "how things aren't" unreality you mention IS the meaning of the past subjunctive, so it's definitely not just a form.

Nothing Lewisite about any of the above, BTW.

JTT, you are correct. I was wrong. I apologize.

Xui

[iconoclast]

Thanks
for the replies that were relevant to 'Tense and Time'.

Apologies
for two parts - the eslcafe server wouldn't take it all, and also disappeared words in italics, bold, etc.

Woodcutter
asserts that I'm out "to prove tense and time are not linked", despite my clearly stating at the start that "to create time reference, Indo-European languages ... use verbphrases and time adverbials" and at the end that "we are now free to consider what connection might exist between verbphrase and time reference. Interestingly, we find that it is a far from arbitrary one. Instrumental in creating the connection between the form of a verbphrase and its "meaning focus" is the non-/perfect and non-/continuous binary symmetry of tense and infinitive formation".

Woodcutter
also states that "a link with time is the fundamental definition of tense". This is self-evidently false. For example, in

They pass by at the same time every day
They pass by in a few minutes, according to the programme

the form 'pass' is present simple not by virtue of being used in "habitual present" or "scheduled future" (or any other) time reference, but because when used as a tenseform 'pass' can be none other than present simple. A definition of tense is always formal, not semantic. Likewise:

present continuous
Ciao! We're leaving
We're leaving tomorrow

present perfect simple
I've lived in Lisbon
I've lived in Lisbon for ten years

present perfect continuous
Look, it's been raining
It's been raining for days

JuanTwo Three
states that "past subjunctive is exactly the same" as past indicative, except for Standard - but not Colloquial - 'was/were'. Not very helpful for students, is it? You must remember that, where subjunctive mood does actually exist, indicative and subjunctive forms may be sung out independently of meaning or use, whereas JTT identifies them as subjunctive and not indicative on the basis that they refer to "things that didn't happen". There seems to be no point in acvocating subjunctive paradigms that in all but a very few instances are "exactly the same" as indicative ones. Ironically, "subjunctive" is no longer an identifiable form - as Stephen Jones points out, it's all but disappeared - but has been turned into a meaning. As the man said:

I wish I wuz a little fish
a-swimmin' in the sea
cuz if I wuz a little fish
how happy I would be-ee

[Xui]

Ex1: They pass by at the same time every day
Ex2: They pass by in a few minutes, according to the programme

the form 'pass' is present simple not by virtue of being used in "habitual present" or "scheduled future" (or any other) time reference, but because when used as a tenseform 'pass' can be none other than present simple.
=====================

I don't quite understand. Do you mean that in Ex1, we use 'pass' because we cannot use other tense? What then about the following Simple Past:
Ex3: They passed by at the same time every day.

Would you explain a little bit more?

Thank you,

Xui

[woodcutter]

Iconoclast, my point about the definition of tense is not deep and philosophical. I'm merely trying to say that for the purpose of clear communication you should bear the dictionary definition in mind, and refer to verb forms when that is what you mean. You have stated that the dictionary definition is demonstrably false so I suggest you talk to the OED or Websters about it. The real argument here is whether verb forms, excluding the third person form or such like, are essentially time governed.

Instrumental in creating the connection between the form of a verbphrase and its "meaning focus" is the non-/perfect and non-/continuous binary symmetry of tense and infinitive formation".

Is this unclear, or I am I too backward to grasp it? That is the problem with railing against overly complex intellectualism - you have to be really on top of the game, and I'm not!

As to core meanings, Stephen, I refer you back to my analogy. "I feel blue" and "I feel sad" are the same. A knowledge of the core meaning of blue is certainly worth something here though. How many times do you teach "blue" in your class? The key thing about a core meaning is that it is the unmarked meaning. In language, however, all things may be twisted into another shape, and familiar patterns take precedence over logic.

Therefore, looking at "They pass by in a few minutes", I have no problem with the old terminology, with the "present simple as future" kind of explanation.

[Xui]

Therefore, looking at "They pass by in a few minutes", I have no problem with the old terminology, with the "present simple as future" kind of explanation.

I have to agree. As I have explained, we actually living in the future anyway. Simple Present stands for something we are sure of. If in a parade we people are waiting, we may say "They pass by in a few minutes".