Search results for 'tag:Simple past tag:Present tenses' matching tags 'Simple past' and 'Present tenses'

Re: there had to be

CalifJim — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 06:57:38 GMT

pructus
âThere had to beâ .. Is it simple past tense as an indicative or is it a present tense as a subjunctive?

My subjunctive scouts have returned empty-handed.

Consider that a true subjunctive in a main clause is not found in English, certainly not the past subjunctive. It's the simple past indicative tense.

there had to be

pructus — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 05:55:11 GMT

Following is from âHarry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkabanâ. The situation is that Harry Potter failed in the Quidditch game for the first time.

Harry put his face to his knees, his hands gripping his hair. Fred grabbed his shoulder and shook it roughly.

âCâmon, Harry, youâve never missed the Snitch before.â

âThere had to be one time you didnât get it.â said George.

âThere had to beâ .. Is it simple past tense as an indicative or is it a present tense as a subjunctive?

Re: A few more sentences I thought about...

CalifJim — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 20:25:55 GMT

YSchneider
To me it sounds kind of odd!

Then use the other one! Nobody's going to notice any difference anyway!

The imperative can't influence anything in the past, so I associate a present tense, or a present perfect tense, with an imperative.

You see, the simple past puts an imaginary wall between you and the event you're talking about. The present perfect doesn't. So if I want to command someone (please tell me!) I don't see any reason to put a wall between what happened (someone was hurt) and my command. If I want to be told -- right this minute! -- about someone who is hurt -- exclamation mark and all -- then certainly it's because I think I can still do something to help the injured party. This is not ancient history we're talking about!

Compare, noting the "wall" || :

Ken fell and hurt himself while he was out of town last week. || He's OK now.

Ken has fallen and hurt himself! Quick! Call a doctor!

Re: This small clip consists of different pictures spliced together...

Avangi — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 07:32:18 GMT

Jackson6612
I believe it's splicing of the pictures/frames which make the coin look as if it were moving on its own. The clip shows the coin moving. It does not make the coin look as if it was.
What do you say?

This strikes me as a philosophical question. Suppose we place a coin on an inclined table which has been fitted with an electric vibrator. We mount a videocamera above, looking perpendicularly at the table top, with no visible reference to the true horizontal. We turn on the vibrator and the camera and record what happens.

In this case it would be fair to say the image makes the coin look as if it's moving under its own power. The coin and the image are both real. But to someone who has not been privy to our setup, the image does show the coin moving under its own power.

But if the coin exists only on the animator's drawing board, the image may well show the coin flying to the moon. To the animator, it's a series of drawings; to the final viewer, it's a movie of a coin flying to the moon. In the movie, the coin "really" flies to the moon.

1: What is your answer to the question which I posed in my previous e-mail to Y. Liat? I think these are both fine

2: What is your answer to the question which I posed to Y. Liat in my previous e-mail?

What is the difference in meaning between the following sentences? Or which one is more correct in the above context? In the first sentence present perfect is used and in the second one present indefinite. How would it affect the meaning it is put between read and ''somewhere?

1: I have read somewhere, perhaps...

2: I read somewhere, perhaps...

I don't think "it" would add anything, so better to leave it out.

I like the present perfect. It seems to allow that you've read it on more than one occasion. "Read" as present tense doesn't work for me. "Read" as simple past is okay, but doesn't seem as positive as the present perfect.

- A.

Re: Present Perfect (americans)

Yankee — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 22:04:32 GMT

As is the case with British English, whether an American uses the simple present or the present perfect often simply depends on how the speaker is viewing a past activity. That said, when either tense is possible according to the "usual rules", I think there is a noticeable tendency for Americans to choose the simple past tense more often than our British cousins would. There are also a few well-known examples of American usage that probably drive some (but hopefully not all) Brits crazy. For example: "Did you eat yet?" and "I already did that."

The problem with quite a few of your sentences is that there isn't enough context in the sentences themselves (they're very short) and/or not enough broader context with them to say for sure which tense might be more likely in AmE. In a few of your sentences, you haven't really given what I think would be typical wording, so there really isn't much point in trying to say which tense would be used. For example, I can't imagine a doctor asking a patient in his office whether or not the patient had broken his/her arm. And I doubt that the sentences "I've changed my address!" and "I changed my address!" would be used to tell someone I had moved to a new address, so I would need more context there before I could give further input.

It may well be the case (but I don't know this for a fact) that in some cases where a Brit would definitely use the present perfect because there is an effect on the present, we might choose instead to use the simple present tense. If I take your broken arm example, an American might choose to say "I broke my arm last week" (focus on the past event) or "My arm is broken (focus on the current state -- the bone is not yet healed).

Maybe someone else will have some input for you.

Re: which one is correct

Avangi — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 08:59:20 GMT

poci_wasiats
there were several studis [ had / have ] described that term. waaht are the differences?

There are several studies which have described that term.

There were several studies which had described that term.

Sometimes we use "studies" to describe the research process, and sometimes to describe the report of the reasearch and of the conclusions.

When speaking of the report, we'd use the present tense. There are several studies available on that subject. ('The reports continue to exist.)

Since you use the past tense "there were several studies" the reasearch work has been completed. My choice would be simple past for what they did.

Several studied were made / have been made which described that term. You could also use a participial phrase: Several studies have been made describing that term, but that seems to suggest the studies did nothing else.

In the case of your example, "have described" would mean the same thing as "described." "Had described" may only be used if there's an earlier reference somewhere to a past time:

Before the new technology and the new terminology were developed, several studies were made which had described that term

But it seems unlikely anyone would put it this way. They'd probably say, "several studies had been made which described / had described that term."

- A.

Edit. Sorry to drag this on and on, but after sleeping on it I realize there's no way your second version can be correct. The studies were done in the simple past. So the describing of the term must also have been done in the simple past, and cannot have preceded the studies. Anything which takes place in the past perfect must occur before anything which takes place in the simple past.

Re: dared to dream

CalifJim — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 21:36:04 GMT

Interesting. The tense switch did not occur to me as a possible problem. There is certainly no implied if, as in if you (ever) dared to dream (such a situation) -- not to my ear.

I would say it's an abbreviated way of saying situation that you have never dared to dream.

never seems to neutralize the difference between the simple past and the present perfect at times. (The present perfect is usually the "more correct" formulation.)

There is nothing that implies an if in these, for example.

This is a situation [you / we / they] (have) never experienced before.

Henry is good at planning ahead. He often brings up potential problems that [the boss / Kate / the staff / the committee] (has) never thought of.

I (have) never made that statement. It is a statement that I (have) never made.

The same situation does not occur with the past point of view because both the simple past and the present perfect have the same backshift -- the past perfect.

Henry often brought up problems that the boss had never thought of.

______

But aside from the subtleties mentioned above, keep in mind that, in general, the mixing of tenses does not really require exotic explanations. Take the example above:

I (have) never made that statement. It is a statement that I (have) never made.

The 'statement' can be spoken of in a timeless way with the present tense even if certain facts about the statement are expressed in the past. Similarly:

These are the very words he said: blah, blah, blah.

This is the book that I [ read / bought ] last month.

A scar is a trace of something that happened in the past.

Hamlet is a play which was written long ago.

These look like the results of the survey we did last year.

Re: wrong to use past tense?

Mr Wordy — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 01:52:17 GMT

He bought a parrot that the seller said it would repeat every word he uttered. Contented, he went home ~~and~~ but later found it didn't say a word. Furious, he went back to the owner and asked him what had happened. The owner answered that he had not lied (didn't lie OK??) to the man.

The lying (or, in fact, absence of it) happened some time before the answering, so "had not lied" (or "hadn't lied") is correct. You might hear native speakers use "didn't lie" in this context, but it's sloppy (IMO) and you should avoid it.

He went mountain climbing. On the way up the mountain, he saw what looked like a box covered in golden paper in a plastic bag. He thought he had gotten (got OK??) something that is was worth a large sum of money but ended up finding there was trash in the bag.

US usage is "gotten" and UK usage is "got". The following is from a British English perspective. I'm not certain if this explanation is also true in Amercan English (with "got" replaced by "gotten").

"Have/had got", in the sense you're using it, is a slightly tricky one. Literally, "have got" means something like "at some point in the past, I got (received/obtained) something, and I still have it", so literally it's the present perfect. Similarly, "had got" is literally the past perfect. However, this sense is, to varying degrees, suppressed, so "have got" can function almost like a present tense (meaning "have"), and "had got" almost like a simple past tense (meaning "had"). In your sentence "had got" is correct (though I suppose "had found" might be better). It can either suggest that he obtained it some time before the moment you're describing, or it can just mean that he had it in his possession. "He thought he had something..." is also OK and replicates the second sense.

[I edited this a little while after posting it to fix a couple of minor typos that were annoying me.]

Re: Need help over here.

Mr Wordy — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 02:08:00 GMT

1. Well, "had" is the past tense of the verb "have", but I think you're asking specifically about its use as an auxiliary to form the past perfect tense of other verbs:

I played -- simple past tense

I have played -- present perfect tense

I had played -- past perfect (or pluperfect) tense

So, even though "have" on its own is present tense, it forms a past tense with other verbs. If you do a Google search for these tense names then you will find tons of information on their uses. See, for example, http://www.englishpage.com/verbpage/pastperfect.html (this page describes the past perfect; all the other tenses are linked down the left hand side).

"I have played football yesterday" isn't right. "have played football" has the general sense of "played football on one or more unspecified occasions in the past", and it doesn't go with "yesterday", which is a specific occasion. Instead you would say "I played football yesterday".

2. "Never" can be used with a variety of different tenses, depending on when the thing in question wasn't/isn't done or didn't/doesn't happen. A couple of examples:

You never told me that you loved me -- means that you didn't tell me in the past, but you might tell me now (or in the future).

You never tell me that you love me -- means that you didn't tell me in the past and you don't tell me now. In other words, the absence of telling continues up to and including the present.

It's not possible to use the present tense with "never before", so "I never do that before" is wrong. It should be "I never did that before" (or "I have never done that before").

Re: "The belt tightening comes as India's government was criticised by voters and opposition parties for raising the price of fuel more than was expected earlier in the week."

Clive — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 15:59:35 GMT

Hiu,

The present tense suggests the belt-tightening is still going on.

If this all related to events 20 years ago, one would of course use the simple past.

Best wishes, Clive