Present Perfect Simple, or Present/Past Simple?

Question

Hello everyone,I've just come across the following sentence written by a non-native speaker of English:"We can express when an event has occurred with respect to other events."While I feel it probably isn't entirely incorrect, I wonder whether Present Simple might be better:"We can express when an event occurs with respect to other events."Many thanks for your opinions!P.

GPY · Accepted Answer

Both tenses are possible. The wider context might suggest one rather than the other.

"We can express when ..." is not very good English in my opinion.

Petusek · Answer

GPYBoth tenses are possible. The wider context might suggest one rather than the other."We can express when ..." is not very good English in my opinion.

Thanks a lot.

As to the bad English, I wonder how that could be amended. The text the sentence comes from deals with the process of thinking and speaking about events and how this is connected with the perception of time. Would something like this be better English?

"We can express the point at which an event occurs/has occurred"?

Reading on, however, I realize point might be too restrictive, because the when may also referer to spans or periods rather than just points -- least, as far as I can understand what the author means...so, perhaps the time would be better...?

Fivejedjon · Answer

We use the present perfect to express a relationship between the moment of speaking and actions, events, process or states that began before that time.

That may be rather different from the original, but it is more accurate.

Petusek · Answer

fivejedjonWe use the present perfect to express a relationship between the moment of speaking and actions, events, process or states that began before that time. That may be rather different from the original, but it is more accurate.

Thanks for your suggestion, but I'm afraid it has little to do with the original sentence or the text, which, quite admittedly, may be my fault. The original sentence says nothing about the present perfect. What the author does seem to imply is that, in various languages, we can employ various strategies to convey the moment a particular event occurs relative to the occurence of other events.

The author, as far as I can understand, uses the when (thus forming an object clause) to avoid having to specify whether the event is durative, punctual etc. Perhaps, it is the word event that causes the trouble here.

I don't know if any of this makes any sense to you the largely imperfect way I'm trying to explain them, but any comments are still appreciated! :-)

GPY · Answer

petusekAs to the bad English, I wonder how that could be amended.

I think I would try to change the verb, possibly to "indicate" or "specify" or something like that.

Fivejedjon · Answer

petusekThanks for your suggestion, but I'm afraid it has little to do with the original sentence or the text, which, quite admittedly, may be my fault.

It's not your fault. I completely misread your question. Sorry.

Petusek · Answer

GPY I think I would try to change the verb, possibly to "indicate" or "specify" or something like that.

I see. That's interesting. I've seen the verb express used in this way before, so I didn't suspect in the slightest that might be the problem. Is it possible it is only used by linguists when talking about the semantics or function of various linguistic structures? Or, perhaps, the texts I remember have all been written by non-native speakers of English.

Since the text deals with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexical_aspect, and, in part, also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_aspect, I've also looked at the relevant Wikipedia articles and found the following sentences (highlighting mine):

"Any event, state, process, or action which a verb expresses—collectively, any eventuality—may also be said to have the same lexical aspect."

"Zeno Vendler (1957) classified verbs into four categories: those that express "activity", "accomplishment", "achievement" and "state"."

(Wikipedia on Lexical Aspect)

"Aspect is a grammatical category that expresses how an action, event, or state, denoted by a verb, extends over time."

"Certain aspectual distinctions express a relation in time between the event and the time of reference."

"[...] the futurity of an event may be expressed through the use of the auxiliary verbs [...]"

"The perfect infinitive can further be governed by modal verbs to express various meanings [...]"

"English expresses some other aspectual distinctions with other constructions."

"[...] each language contains many pairs of verbs, corresponding to each other in meaning, except that one expresses perfective aspect and the other imperfective."

(Wikipedia on Grammatical Aspect)

Apparently, the verb express can only be used like that if the subject (or agent) is non-human, that is if it is the particular language structure that conveys a particular function or meaning. Is that right? So, to (over)simplify things a bit, you could say that people tend to express opinions whereas meaning and function tends to be expressed by words and other linguistic structures, including whole languages.

I'd really like to understand in what ways express is constricted in its use. :-)

Many thanks for your comments!

Petusek · Answer

fivejedjon It's not your fault. I completely misread your question. Sorry.

Never mind. Your trying to help me counts as well. Thank you anyway.

GPY · Answer

petusekI see. That's interesting. I've seen the verb express used in this way before, so I didn't suspect in the slightest that might be the problem. Is it possible it is only used by linguists when talking about the semantics or function of various linguistic structures? Or, perhaps, the texts I remember have all been written by non-native speakers of English.

Sorry, I should have been clearer. There is no problem with the verb "express" in itself. It has the correct meaning. What does not sound good to my ear is the combination "express when ..." as used in the original sentence.

Petusek · Answer

GPY Sorry, I should have been clearer. There is no problem with the verb "express" in itself. It has the correct meaning. What does not sound good to my ear is the combination "express when ..." as used in the original sentence.

Ah, I see. That was my original assumption.

How about "...express a/the time when..." then? Would that sound better?

I've found a few examples of this (although vast majority from before 1900; bold text and highlighting mine):

"Some [verbs] express the time when an action takes place, [...]" (Link https://books.google.cz/books?id=cowiuCr4KAUC&pg=PA75&dq=%22express+the+time+when%22&hl=cs&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi8h6OJ2uLPAhVE2hoKHcFEBkQQ6AEIHTAA)

"German speakers use [...] to express a time when an event occurs." (Link https://books.google.cz/books?id=E7MaCgAAQBAJ&pg=PA34-IA88&dq=%22express+a+time+when%22&hl=cs&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjPhemF3OLPAhVGPxQKHQryDt4Q6AEIGzAA)

I've also found some other expressions:

"Tense concerns when an event occurs within a time frame [...]" (Link https://books.google.cz/books?id=x183CwAAQBAJ&pg=PT116&dq=%22when+an+event+occurs%22+lexical&hl=cs&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwitmfWR3uLPAhWJXRoKHcXUA88Q6AEIJDAB)

"[...] English verbs show when an event occurs by adding this information morphologically." (Link https://books.google.cz/books?id=lUsCbazTICIC&pg=PA115&dq=%22when+an+event+occurs%22+lexical&hl=cs&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwitmfWR3uLPAhWJXRoKHcXUA88Q6AEIYDAJ)

Whence my bepuzzlement!

Once again, thanks for any comments!

EDIT: Now I realize I probably should have made this a separate thread.

Present Perfect Simple, or Present/Past Simple?

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