|
|
 Wed Jul 19, 2006 11:03 am About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
I 'll return the book to you as soon as I finish it.
That's my two cents, FangFang  |
|
 Pamela
I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 14 Mar 2006
Posts: 1234
Location: RF
|
|
| Wed Jul 19, 2006 13:57 pm About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
Hi FangFang
I agree with Pamela. I prefer:
A) I 'll return the book to you as soon as I finish it.
I think it depends a bit on the nature/meaning of the verb used. "Finish" refers to a definite point in time. I think I'd be much more likely to go for the present perfect using, for example, the verb "read":
I'll return the book to you as soon as I've read it.
Amy
_________________
Amy
.
ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English |
|
Yankee
I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 16 Apr 2006
Posts: 7832
Location: USA
|
 |
|
FangFang
I'm here quite often ;-)
Joined: 18 May 2006
Posts: 369
|
|
| Wed Jul 19, 2006 14:04 pm About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
| FangFang, I think Amy cleared up the situation about your question |
|
Pamela
I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 14 Mar 2006
Posts: 1234
Location: RF
|
|
| Wed Jul 19, 2006 14:08 pm About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
| I think tense has to be the same in the same sentence. |
|
cooliegirly
I'm here quite often ;-)
Joined: 24 Jul 2005
Posts: 256
|
|
| Wed Jul 19, 2006 14:19 pm About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
Hiii, friends
Here, i give you other easy sentences____let's compare them with each other.
1) It will warm up a little bit on Sunday as the cold front passes.
2) I will come directly I have finished.
3) When we have(have had) our dinner, we'll go to the concert together.
Now the question is ,the present tense and the present perfect tense can be both used in Time Clauses. Usually we prefer the former , but how to tell their differences??? |
|
FangFang
I'm here quite often ;-)
Joined: 18 May 2006
Posts: 369
|
|
| Wed Jul 19, 2006 15:02 pm About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
| FangFang wrote: | Hiii, friends
Here, i give you other easy sentences____let's compare them with each other.
1) It will warm up a little bit on Sunday as the cold front passes.
2) I will come directly I have finished.
3) When we have(have had) our dinner, we'll go to the concert together.
Now the question is ,the present tense and the present perfect tense can be both used in Time Clauses. Usually we prefer the former , but how to tell their differences??? |
Well, then you want to make the right choice based on the meaning of the particular word. For instance, in example 3, when someone starts their sentence with "when we have our dinner", in the next part of the sentence they will most likely to talk about something that happens during the dinner. I'm not sure if you can say "When we have had our dinner, we will go to the concert together." but if I were the person who made the question, I would use after instead of when. |
|
cooliegirly
I'm here quite often ;-)
Joined: 24 Jul 2005
Posts: 256
|
|
| Wed Jul 19, 2006 15:23 pm About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
Hi FangFang, regarding your sentences above I want to say that
Present Simple is used in adverbial clauses of time and condition after the conjunctions till, until, after, as soon as, as long as, if, unless and etc.expressing a future action
Present Perfect is used in adverbial clauses of time after the conjunctions when, till, until, before, after, as soon as to denote an action completed before a definite moment in the future. |
|
Pamela
I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 14 Mar 2006
Posts: 1234
Location: RF
|
|
| Wed Jul 19, 2006 15:32 pm About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
| FangFang wrote: | Here, i give you other easy sentences____let's compare them with each other.
1) It will warm up a little bit on Sunday as the cold front passes.
2) I will come directly I have finished.
3) When we have(have had) our dinner, we'll go to the concert together.
Now the question is ,the present tense and the present perfect tense can be both used in Time Clauses. Usually we prefer the former , but how to tell their differences??? |
Hi FangFang
In addition to keeping the meaning/nature of the verbs in mind, you also need to keep the precise meanings of words/phrases such as as soon as, as, after, and when in mind. They all have different meanings.
| Quote: | | 1) It will warm up a little bit on Sunday as the cold front passes. |
The present perfect doesn't work here for a couple of reasons:
a) "Warm up" happens at the same time as "cold front passes". The word "as" indicates two actions in progress simultaneously, without any sense of completion.
b) With the present perfect, the meaning is totally different:
It will warm up a little bit on Sunday as the cold front has passed. --> I would understand "as" to mean "because" in this sentence. And the warming up will happen after the cold front is gone. There is no sense of the two things happening at the same time.
| Quote: | | 2) I will come directly I have finished. |
There is something missing from this sentence, so let's add "after":
2) I will come directly after I have finished.
In this sentence both simple present and present perfect are possible. It depends on the meaning you assign to the word finish. You might use the present perfect if you see "finish" as more a procedure of finishing (for example) a pile of unfinished work (Maybe you are in the middle of trying to finish the work at the time you use the sentence.) But, the word "after" already indicates completion, so you don't need to use a perfect verb form. You could say "finish" or also "am finished"
| Quote: | | 3) When we have(have had) our dinner, we'll go to the concert together. |
Cooliegirly is exactly right about this one. Only "have had" is logical here. "When we have had our dinner, we'll go to the concert together." That means "First we'll have (and finish) dinner. After dinner we'll go to the concert together.
If you say "When we have our dinner, we'll go to the concert together." that means that "eating dinner" and "going to the concert" will happen at the same time!
.
Amy
_________________
Amy
.
ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English |
|
Yankee
I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 16 Apr 2006
Posts: 7832
Location: USA
|
|
| Wed Jul 19, 2006 15:32 pm About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
| ok...well it just sounds awkward to me if you say when we have our dinner, we will go to a concert. |
|
cooliegirly
I'm here quite often ;-)
Joined: 24 Jul 2005
Posts: 256
|
|
| Wed Jul 19, 2006 15:48 pm About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
Hi Cooliegirly,
Oops, I should have written that I agreed with everything you wrote about using 'after and when'. The thing I didn't agree with you about was the 'when + have had' combination.
Your feeling about the usage of when is right and that's why you would need the present perfect in the 3rd sentence.
Amy
_________________
Amy
.
ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English |
|
Yankee
I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 16 Apr 2006
Posts: 7832
Location: USA
|
|
| Thu Jul 20, 2006 4:03 am About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
Nice job! Yankee , in the second sentence it is ok without "after" . Thanks a lot, everyone!!!  |
|
FangFang
I'm here quite often ;-)
Joined: 18 May 2006
Posts: 369
|
|
| Thu Jul 20, 2006 6:45 am About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
| FangFang wrote: | | Yankee , in the second sentence it is ok without "after" |
| Quote: | | 2) I will come directly I have finished. |
Hi FangFang
Three points regarding sentence 2:
a) Because the word directly is not a conjunction, sentence 2 needs a conjunction that ties the clauses together.
b) If you add "after" to the sentence, the word "directly" modifies "after". It means "immediately after".
c) If you add (e.g.) "when" to the sentence, it becomes unclear what you're trying to do with the word "directly".
- "I'll come directly" is OK as a single sentence. "Directly" modifies "come" and that sentence would mean "I'll come now (without any delay or detour)."
- "I'll come directly when I've finished" just sounds strange. Adding "when I've finished" doesn't make much sense combined with the idea of "I'll come now".
And "directly" cannot be used to modify "when" in the sentence.
Amy
_________________
Amy
.
ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English |
|
Yankee
I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 16 Apr 2006
Posts: 7832
Location: USA
|
|
| Thu Jul 20, 2006 7:44 am About tenses: finish vs. have finished |
|
|
Hiii, Yankee:
I say that because i read some notes as follows(from an english grammar book)
"some adv ,like directly and immediately can be taken as a conjuction ____as soon as:
Immediately he arrived , he started telling us what to do."
But i think you are right , specially when you emphasize the meaning/nature of the verbs . |
|
FangFang
I'm here quite often ;-)
Joined: 18 May 2006
Posts: 369
|
|
|
| Colloquial sentence: too complicated grammar forms? | Meaning of the song: " La isla Bonita" |
