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Anonymous Posted 20 years ago
Linguistics Studies

Mega Verb Phrase: "would have had to have been eating"

0Just trying to get my head around this long verb phrase; can anyone help me break it down into its elements?02br
02br
00Working backwards, I can see that "have been eating" is the present perfect continuous form.02br
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00Presumably, the preceding "had to" is just a periphrastic modal meaning the same as "must".02br
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00What, then, is the "would have" element? A conditional modal? But if so, it surely wouldn't fit the ordererd pattern for verb groups: MODAL, PERFECT (have), PROGRESSIVE (be), PASSIVE (be), MAIN VERB, because "had to" is a modal as well. And you can't have two modals, in a verb group, surely? Also, where (in the above pattern) does the "have" that follows "would" fit in?02br
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00Many thanks for your time.02br
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00Alex 0-
  

Top answer

I presume that you have gone onto the wrong track. There literally exist 2 verb phrases here. What I mean is that one is given 'inflection' (ie.

— Randy_Tam

  • I presume that you have gone onto the wrong track.
  • There literally exist 2 verb phrases here.
  • What I mean is that one is given 'inflection' (ie.
  • ) To make it down to earth, the phrase (actually the entire Agreement Phrase, SPEC exclusive), disregarding peculiarities in tense and aspect assignment, resembles: have to eat.
  • What appears 'larger' is not the semantic features of the Verb Phrase, but actually the functional features of it.
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13 Answers
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I presume that you have gone onto the wrong track. There literally exist 2 verb phrases here. What I mean is that one is given 'inflection' (ie. Subject Agreement + Tense + Aspect) and the other only given 'Tense' (and all that goes with it: Tense, Agreement with Object, etc.)

To make it down to earth, the phrase (actually the entire Agreement Phrase, SPEC exclusive), disregarding peculia
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AnonymousJust trying to get my head around this long verb phrase; can anyone help me break it down into its elements?

Working backwards, I can see that "have been eating" is the present perfect continuous form.

Presumably, the preceding "had to" is just a periphrastic modal meaning the same as "must".

What, then, is the "would have" element? A c
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hi, Im Sandy, and im learning english, im from mexico, in my class we are trying to understand how to use "would have had" and when i have to use it, can you help me to resolve this question??? thank you so much...
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Alex,

Here's the mistake.
because "had to" is a modal as well
It's sometimes called a 'semi-modal', because it is like the modal must in meaning. Nevertheless, its grammar is exactly the same as for any non-modal verb, like want, like, or prefer.

would have wanted to have seen
would have liked to have been invited
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I'm curious about how this phrasing: "would have had to have been," differs from the phrasing: "would have to have been." I know that the additional "had" changes the sentence in some form or another, but I can't quite figure out how--or what different meanings the two phrases carry.

Could you provide an explanation and an example of how two similarly worded independent clauses would dif
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It would seem that you'd use the past perfect form "had to" when the action preceded another action. Example: "The movie started at 8:00, but my stupid brother-in-law booked a table in a restaurant for 7:00. To get to the movie on time, we would have had to have been eating at 7:00, not just sitting down at our table." Here, the eating precedes seeing the movie.

In the case of "would h
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Hi there,

Anyone help me about use of have had and world/should/could/might have had.

Thanks,
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1font00"Simply put, it's just "too much verb". Simplify it to 01span00"01font00he would have had to be eating02font00" 02span00or 01span00"he would have to have been eating"02span00
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Personally, I'm not the best person to rely on when it comes to English grammar. I believe that "I would have had to have eaten" is correct. I would have had to eat would imply something different.
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Your explanation is nearly correct, CJ..however,
this is the breakdown:
would = subjunctive modal
have had to= perfect tense of the modal replacement(or "semi-modal", if you prefer), "have to"
have been eating= perfect progressive

The point is not that this is "too much verb" but what the CONTEXT of the sentence is:

In reference to a (surmised) acti
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