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Nicolas123 Posted 14 years ago
Grammar

Quantification and temporal value

Hello,

Please could any one of you help me analysing this sentence:

Things are only getting worse.

How many events we have in this sentence. One event? And what is its temporal value: past time or present time?

  

Top answer

There's one main event, or, more accurately, process: the process of "getting worse". Within that main idea you have multiple events, each of which is worse than the previous one. It is present time.

— CalifJim

  • There's one main event, or, more accurately, process: the process of "getting worse".
  • Within that main idea you have multiple events, each of which is worse than the previous one.
  • It is present time.
  • The process is going on at the moment this sentence is uttered.
  • CJ
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3 Answers
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There's one main event, or, more accurately, process: the process of "getting worse".
Within that main idea you have multiple events, each of which is worse than the previous one.
It is present time. The process is going on at the moment this sentence is uttered.

CJ
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For this following example:
Publishing books is getting slammed by the internet.
Could we say that we have multiple events, each one is stronger than the previous one?
Does the present continuous in this sentence express a persistent activity instead of temporary one .
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nicolas123Publishing books is getting slammed by the internet.Could we say that we have multiple events, each one is stronger than the previous one?
No. Just multiple slamming actions. 'slammed' is not the comparative of an adjective like 'worse' is, so the idea of "stronger than the previous" (increasingly strong) doesn't apply here.
nicola
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