Search results for 'tag:Present tenses tag:Numbers' matching tags 'Present tenses' and 'Numbers'

Re: What this error is called?

Avangi — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 01:24:57 GMT

Hi,

I'd say "agreement of subject and verb." It becomes more complicated when you ask a question, because you have to worry about the person, number and tense of the principle verb (to mean) and also the person, number and tense of the auxilliary verb (helping verb) to do.

It means nothing.

It meant nothing.

"It" is third person singular. It means is correct present tense. It meant is correct past tense.

When you ask the question, use the bare infinitive of the principle verb "to mean." In your examples, it doesn't change.

The agreement is done by the auxilliary verb. It does. It did. What does it mean? What did it mean?

To be more specific about your error, you failed to use the infinitive form of the principle verb, mean. You used the simple present and past of both the principle verb and the auxilliary verb. You might call it an error in verb formation. (I guess you'd have to say the agreement of subject and verb is correct.)

- A.

reporting on permanent, on-going, or relevant content

Anonymous — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 22:51:00 GMT

Hi,
1. Would you say if a person is reporting on a content that is permanent, on-going, or relevant in content nature, the reporting word could be both present and past and also, do you feel both present and past tenses are OK in the that-clause?

He said/says his house is/was in Chicago.
He said/says his favorite hobby is/was playing chess.

2. Do you feel all three ar OK? Or just the modal 'would'? I think this deals with intentions and am not sure an intention can be said to be that of on-gong in nature.

His utterance: "I want/will go to the party tomorrow"

He said that he will/would/wants go to that party tommorrow.

3. we are not sure if his house is in Chicago for some reason for a number one exam ple, would you say, what I would call a reporting word should be in present tense?

His utterance: "My house is in Chicago"
He says his house in Chicago at yesterday's party.

Re: Present tense and past tense- is/ mean

bhikkhu1991 — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 10:10:42 GMT

Hello Marius Hancu,

I would like to sincerely thank you for your kind reply. The reason why I did not continue with my previous post is to try to comply with the rules of this forum. In Rule 6, it sipulates:

6) Posts may be removed for any number of reasons; please keep your posting on topic and relevant to the thread you are in. If you wish to start a new discussion, or change the subject, please post a new thread in the appropriate forum.

I hope that my explanation will clear your doubt.

I also hope that what you have taught on how to stress 'is, mean and wish' is correctly applied here.

Thank you.

With best wishes.

Re: grammar questions!

Clive — Mon, 19 May 2008 22:05:24 GMT

Hi,

Generally speaking, it's not great grammar to start a sentence with 'so' like this. However, people sometimes do it.

(1) So all too often, we find in situations of conflict that religion, instead of encouraging people to move beyond their own trauma and own fears, tends not only to support it, but even to exacerbate it and feed on in it.

So, all too often, we find in situations of conflict that religion, instead of encouraging people to move beyond their own trauma and own fears, tends not only to support it, but even to exacerbate it and feed in it.

The it's seem to refer to conflict. I think you should say 'them', and refer to the trauma and fears.

Please check comma usage.

(2) So, in the final analysis in this rather long, convoluted response to your question, I have no other answer other than the great gift that the Almighty have given us.

Should it be Almighty have or has? Please check S-V agreement. Say 'the Almighty has'.

(3) So, food is the biggest thing, and as human beings started living in the caves or whatever we have, << say this some other way in society as human beings [it is for food that they] then come out and then they go. So the world is constantly reappearing the way it is now.

Actually, this whole sentence needs rewording. I don't know what it means.

Please check comma usage.

(4) We begin to understand the being because the being is alive because it's craving for food.

Can "and" added before " and because it's craving for food." Please advise. Yes, you need 'and'. What does 'the being' mean?

(5) ~~And~~ monks in India ~~were~~ had no pockets at all. No keeping for tomorrow.<<< This is a phrase, not a sentence. Add a verb, etc. No food can be saved or stored for tomorrow.

Check your tenes. Do you want tu use all present tense?

Should it be wore rather than were? You don't 'wear'pockets.

(6) Other religions might advocate kindness to animals, either because they also are creatures of God, according to their theology, as some theistic religions might <<< might what?, or because they are the embodiment of the same spirit as us human beings, as Vedantins might explain, that all life is coming from the same source. You need to make this last part a separate sentence. You have too much information crammed into one sentence, and the grammar is getting messed up.

Can "as us" be substituted with "like us"? No. Please clarify.

(7) When you are to look at the number of cattle that ~~are were~~ slaughtered mercilessly in the wake of the Mad Cow Disease, or Mad Man Disease, whatever you call it, and nobody shed a tear about them. They were raised to die anyway.

'When' introduces a subordinate clause, but you have no main clause.

Should it be "They were raised"? If you want to talk about the past, yes.

(8) Sometimes we have been animals too, or even worse. For this reason, a being who today is an animal might once have been a human being, or by exercising moral powers, that some animal may be reborn in the future as a human being. You need to make this last part a separate sentence, and say it in a more understandable way.

Technically speaking, aren't people animals?

Should it be "that same animal"? Yes.

(9) You can think of a story here which you can be seen <<< what does this mean? on TV. A beautiful story about an elephant, narrated in the Jaina scriptures, illustrates the moral capacity ascribed to higher animals by the Jains.

Should it be "which you can see it on the TV's" Still wrong. perhaps you mean 'which you can see on TV'?

(10) ~~And~~ this is a story which is based on the sacred texts. ~~And in~~ this story appears in the canonical Bhagavati Sutra, which purports to preserve the words of the last tirthakara Mahavira

Should it be " And this story appears"

(11) There, Mahavira is asked about the war between the king of Magadha and some independent kings, which it is now agreed was a historical event, a war in which 48,000 people died.

Should it be "which is now agreed" Yes

(12) Thanks you very much or Thank you very much

Please advise which one is correct (~~Thanks~~ or Thank).

Best wishes, Clive

A question about Style

Ant_222 — Mon, 12 May 2008 20:56:47 GMT

Hello everybody!

Probably, you already know of my infamous venture âthe translation of an adventure game called Star Heritage.

Below I'll repeat part of my answer to Huevos, whom I shall thank for accidently reminding me of the problem that I now ask you to help me with:

Â«I have tried to preserve the original (Russian) way of narraion, which is done:

1) From the first person perspective,
2) In the past tense,
So most of the time it looks pretty much like a diary.Â»

...Such is the most of the narration, but the descriptions of various items â those which you'd get in response to the "examine" command in traditional text adventures â are provided in the Present tense. Keeping the player envolved, this doesn't sound unnatureal in Russian, but...

Is it acceptable in English?

EXAMPLE (no, it's not from the game I just thought it out):

> GO NORTH
I easily went down the hill and found myself in(on?) a gloomy lowland. Only the strained buzz of moscitoes making their way through the thick, moist air disturbed the silence. They were the only creatures here, but that was more than compensated by their number.
> examine mosquito
Nothing unusual, except for the very long proboscis, probably useful for some animals covered with fur
> examine air
The air is extremly moist and smells of decaying plants.

Re: Condtitional tense

Yankee — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 14:07:01 GMT

Avangi
Hi Amy,
So this will yield to the same analysis?: If I'm on vacation, the last thing I'll worry about is whether I've closed the fridge! What tense do you call, "I'll worry"? Do I need will be whether?
Thanks, - A.

Hi Avangi

To me, the word 'if' is used like 'whenever' in your sentence, and the word 'will' is used to indicate a habitual or repeated action (i.e. in that sentence, you are saying it is not your habit to wonder about things such as closed doors while you are on vacation). No, as I'm sure you know, the word 'will' is not necessary in your sentence. Removing 'will' would simply present what you (don't) do as a fact.

Do you actually like the present perfect in your sentence? Is that a wording you would actually choose? I can see using the simple past tense (i.e. whether I closed the door), but the present perfect still rubs me the wrong way. I can also see rewording it to "whether the door is closed" -- i.e. the simple present tense of 'be' followed by the adjective 'closed' (the current state of the door).

Using 'will' to build a future tense is often called "the will-future". However, the word 'will' is used in a number of ways in English, and we also have other ways of of referring to the future (e.g. the simple present tense, the present continuous, be going to).

The word 'if' can be used instead of 'whether'. I used 'whether' in Anon's sentence so that the conditional IF part of the sentence would be more obvious.

Re: Techical Report Writing

Clive — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 18:55:28 GMT

Hi,

So it is simple present okay for report writing?

No. Very generally speaking, a report should normally use past tense, because it is reporting past events.

eg Heat was applied to the chemical. At 40 degrees, it ignited.

eg When I searched the robber, I found he had a gun in his pocket. I arrested him.

However, again generally speaking, I would use present tense if I were describing something that I am looking at.

eg a graph, as in your example. This graph shows sales figures for the last 5 years.

You can, of course, mix the two tenses, eg This graph shows the number of TV sets that we sold in the last 5 years.

Best wishes, Clive

confused about 'would'

New2grammar — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 08:10:33 GMT

I know 'would' carries many meanings. My problem is sometimes I find it difficult to tell which meaning the speaker uses. I think I understand its hypothetical usage, and in some contexts, its politeness usage. Below is a post that has several woulds I have trouble interpreting. I also copied a post on would by CalifJim for reference.

Your analysis is good. Context will determine if you're using the expression as an excuse to break off what you're doing. If you're calling the people you expect to meet, then you would (1)tell them the truth. You can say, "I'll be about five minutes late," or "I may be a little late." If you're speaking to someone who is about to make you late for an appointment, the expression would(2) mean, "Hey, I'm gonna be late if I don't split right now!" If you just say, "I'm gonna be late," you probably would(3) have already tipped the person off that you would(4) need to end the conversation soon, and as you suggest, you would(5) still expect to be on time if you left immediately.

1) I don't thing politeness is the intended meaning here. To my ear, it carries the meaning of preference.

2) would here means possible? I have zero confidence in this one.

3) it doesn't look like hypothetical usage to me because the if clause is in present tense

4) and 5) should follow the same reasoning for #3, whatever that is.

Please help! Thanks in advance!

CalifJim's explanation on would
Yes. I thought maybe that's what you were referring to.
would in an if clause is possible when the would or the entire if-clause is part of a formula of politeness. if you would be so kind is a typical example of if with would in a "politeness phrase". This formula is equivalent to please. This sort of if-clause does not even have to be classified as a true conditional even though it contains the word if.

The phrase would like as a polite way of saying want, and it too can appear in an if-clause. Note that the idiom would like counts as a present tense for purposes of tense combinations. That is, it may combine with the imperative or the future. The idiom would rather has the same property.

If you would like to have dinner with us tomorrow, please call and let us know before noon.
I'm sure that if he'd like to go with us, he'll tell us. (If he would like to go, he will tell us.)
If you'd rather wait until tomorrow, [just say so / I'll understand].

if-clauses that are part of an indirect question structure are also exempt from the rule about combining if and would:

I wonder if he would object to this procedure.
I don't know if I would agree.
We had not decided if we would go along with the plan.

With the exception of the indirect question structure, which is quite common, these are just a very, very small number of situations where if and would occur in the same clause. The main rule for 99.99% of cases is 'never' to place if and would together!

Re: improvement of sentence

Goodman — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 23:02:55 GMT

Ant_222 wrote:
No help from your last post, but after re-reading our little conversaton over I have come up with a reolutionary hypothesis! The problem is that there're two possible omisions: 1. There are time when... (and one has to use present tenses, as I argued) 2. There are times which... (and that seem to be your case, right?) Plus the "from" from your original sentence ("you can recollects event from"), I didn't interpret it correctly, having ascribed it to the following "(from) years ago", which I hope is incorrect. Hope I have now understood you. My incorrect understanding of your sentnce was this: There're times _when_ we can recollect events that took place long ago but what we ate last evening is forgotten. â It does sound ridiculous, one may hear it form a person periodically suffering some memory problems. While you sentence says: "There are times _which_ we can recollect events from..." I should have understood it much quicker! Thanks! P.S: Does the number of 2's in your spelling of my nick indicate the level of excitement?

1. There are time when... (and one has to use present tenses, as I argued) - When is always relating to time, not "which".
2. There are times which... (and that seem to be your case, right?) No! You are actually making a case bigger than it need be.

"There are times" and "it happens sontimes" are general adverbial clause often follwed by the main sentence body. They are often expressed in present time; except when specified by the verb tense. i.e. if I say "There are times you don't feel like getting up in the morning". I am making a general statement.

If I said "When I was working for XYZ, I hated my work so much that there were days when I felt like calling in sick". I am referencing to pthe past and this context definetely required past tense.

Oh, about the extra "2" on your logon name, My typing fingers have a tendency of misfiring sometimes!

Re: improvement of sentence

Ant_222 — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 22:28:39 GMT

No help from your last post, but after re-reading our little conversaton over I have come up with a reolutionary hypothesis!

The problem is that there're two possible omisions:

1. There are time when... (and one has to use present tenses, as I argued)
2. There are times which... (and that seem to be your case, right?)

Plus the "from" from your original sentence ("you can recollects event from"), I didn't interpret it correctly, having ascribed it to the following "(from) years ago", which I hope is incorrect.

Hope I have now understood you.

My incorrect understanding of your sentnce was this:

There're times _when_ we can recollect events that took place long ago but what we ate last evening is forgotten. â It does sound ridiculous, one may hear it form a person periodically suffering some memory problems.

While you sentence says: "There are times _which_ we can recollect events from..."

I should have understood it much quicker!

Thanks!

P.S: Does the number of 2's in your spelling of my nick indicate the level of excitement?

EDIT:
This separation of "which" and "from" in "which we can recollect events from" is the culprit. Not long ago one would put it more simply using "wherefrom"...