Meaning of perfect tense in conditional sentence

Question

Hi,Do you think it is possible to consider 'will or would + have + p.p.'to be taken separately in semantic comprehension as 'will/would'(futuristic meaning) + 'have p.p'(perfective meaning)?In the sentence, "I will have gone to Paris by Friday.", would it be wrong if I interpreted it as being, 'Probably, by Friday,(which is future time that present 'I' cannot experience now, thus making the aspect or atmosphere of sentence hypothetical.) I will be already(perfective connotation) in Paris.' ?Likewise, in "I would have gone to Paris"I 'would' = I was going to/I was supposed to (future of past) + have gone(perfectiveness)?Thank you in advance.

CalifJim · Accepted Answer

It seems like an over-analytical approach, but it's possible. The important thing is to be able to use the tenses appropriately in writing and conversation. Whatever method you choose to come to an understanding of the tenses is fine as long as it leads to this more important goal.

CJ

C2ran · Answer

CalifJimIt seems like an over-analytical approach, but it's possible. The important thing is to be able to use the tenses appropriately in writing and conversation. Whatever method you choose to come to an understanding of the tenses is fine as long as it leads to this more important goal.

CJ

Hi, CJ

Very nice to see you again!

There are so many things I need to brush up on. but now it is time to work on 'tense'.

I completely understand your sounding a bit worried whethere I am too much concerned with analytical approach that I ignore the importance of performance of the language. However, I find it hard to have an understanding of 'would', which is 'future of past', not to mention 'would have p.p'. I mean the concept, itself, is not absorbed easily, at least for me. Anyway, I researched a bit about this and found out the Wikipedia posted 'Future perfect' and it shocked me when I realized the writer of the post had had a idea similar to mine.

A portion of introduction reads, ' It is a grammatical combination of the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_tense, or other marking of future time, and the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_(grammar), itself a combination of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tense and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_aspect.'

Besides, explaining the feature of time reference of English future perfect tense, he took the below sentence as an example.

If it rains tomorrow, we will have worked in vain yesterday.

It looks very odd at first, assuming 'would' instead of 'will' would fit there, I was baffled by 'will' and 'yesterday' being used together, but, that aside, I think the intended idea expressed by the sentence was quite revealing the point I mentioned in the original above post.

CalifJim · Answer

c2ranIf it rains tomorrow, we will have worked in vain yesterday.

No need to be baffled.

If it rains tomorrow, we will be able to say (tomorrow), "Our work the day before yesterday was in vain."

A point in future time is established as a reference point (will; tomorrow). Then, from that viewpoint, we talk about the past. Putting the two together, you can see that with the future perfect we are talking about what will be the past at a future time. That tense is about "the past of the future".

CJ

Meaning of perfect tense in conditional sentence

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