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Latest post Sun, Oct 5 2008 9:21 AM by Anonymous. 6 replies.
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Liliya  +  146948 Tue, 11 Oct 05 10:27 PM

Hi to all members,

I just had regestered in the site and I already  had a question to ask.

I study english as a foreing language and the question is about the english grammar, particularly non-action verbs.One of the definitions for using Siple Past Tence is "....we use The Past Simple  for non-action verbs in the past...".It is not clear enough to me what actually non-action verb means and its application in the Past Tence.Because my english is at intermediate level and my writing is not my best bet I do apologize if any mistakes.

Please, somebody for explanation and thank you in advance for that.

Liliya

Joined on Tue, Oct 11 2005
New Member 03
Vorpar  +  146969 Tue, 11 Oct 05 11:47 PM

My best guess is that non-action verbs are verbs such as "to be".

Present tense: is (plural: are)

Past tense: was (plural: were)

 

Joined on Tue, Sep 20 2005
Santa Barbara, CA
Regular Member 938
Liliya  +  147277 Wed, 12 Oct 05 10:18 PM

Thank you for your replay but I have to admit that I don't understand what is your point of view and I have some doubts about it.Could you be more specific and give some examples.

Lily

pieanne  +  147475 Thu, 13 Oct 05 01:58 PM

Well, there are the copulative verbs (to be, to become, to seem ...); they have a predicate, not a Direct Object or an attribute adjective.

But there are verbs that semantically express a non-action: to stay, to sleep, etc...

What is the context of your "non-action verbs"? Grammar?

 

Joined on Thu, Jan 20 2005
South of France ...But I'm Belgian!
Veteran Member 7,517
I'm glad to help, but I'm not a native! And please excuse my typos...
Liliya  +  147566 Thu, 13 Oct 05 08:05 PM

The question regarding  non-active verbs appeared when I was studying  the usege of Past Simple Tence.What's the meaning of "...We use Past Siple Tence for non-active verbs in the past."I just don't get its application.I am looking forward for any help.I am truly apologize for any spelling or grammar mistakes.

Lily

Anonymous, 3 yr 43 days ago

Lilia I need help on my homework because I have to look up verbs and  

I wish you help me in my homework by liveing me  a email on the computer           

and I wish you get this and you to read this.

love Jose pelaez Daniel

          

            

                                                              

Anonymous, 1 yr 34 days ago
Hi, Lily.
If you've already done grammar on Present/Past Continuous you know that these tences are used to talk about some activity in process.
There are some verbs which can't be used in Continuous because they don't describe any activity, e.g. I have children - I have children at the moment, but I don't do anything. Such verbs are called non-active.
There are two main groups:
1. verbs of thinking and understanding (think, believe, remember, forget, understand, agree, etc..)
2. verbs of seeing, hearing, feeling... (see, hear, feel, love, prefer, like, hate, etc...)
With non-active verbs we use Simple tences instead of Continuous. So we use Past Simple (not Past Continuous) in sentences like: "I loved him" (not "I was loving him"!)

But this grammar is done at intermediate level, so if you are lower don't bother about it yet :-)

Best wishes.
Julia.
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