'there have...'

Question

Hi,Please have a look at this:These questions above may be easy as they look, but there have yet to be satisfactory answersIs it wrong?Many thanks,Nessie.

Mister Micawber · Accepted Answer

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These questions above may seem easy, but there have yet to be any satisfactory answers.
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Nessie000 · Answer

Thank you very much, MM

But then 'there have' is not wrong? I thought only 'there is/are' is acceptable...

Mister Micawber · Answer

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The grammar eludes me as much as it does you, but it is certainly natural English; I cannot find a reference to it at the moment, so I will call it a fixed phrase.

'Have/has yet to be' = 'have/has not yet been'. Ms Google gives me 5,420,000 hits for "have yet to be".
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CalifJim · Answer

nessie000there have yet to be satisfactory answers

Basic sentence:
There are answers.

Add an auxiliary:
There have been answers.
There had been answers.

Add a modal:
There will be answers.
There should be answers.
There may be answers.

Add a semi-modal:
There used to be answers.
There have to be answers.

There have yet to be answers is a variant of the last-cited example.

The addition of yet creates an idiom meaning remaining to be found.

The answers have yet to be found. = The answers remain to be found.
There have yet to be answers. = There are answers that remain to be found.

CJ

Anonymous · Answer

Actually, the insertion of "yet" in "there have [yet] to be" breaks up the verb phrase so that "have" changes from an auxiliary to a principal verb, with the infinitive "to be" changing from a principal verb to the complement of (now new) principal verb "have", and actually functioning as a noun.

Compare:

1. You have to go home. "have" auxiliary, "to go", principal.

(You must go home.)

2. You have yet to go home. "have" principal, "to go" complement.

(You possess as an item in your life's agenda, it has been 'given' to you, to go home).

The proof of this is:

1. The semantic is intuitively, fundamentally, different.

2. "have" in (1) uses a devoiced fricative, whereas in (2), it is voiced. The devoicing mimics the detraction and thus abstraction of its meaning from "have" (principal: "possess") of (2), to the mere 'semantic shell' that is "have" (auxiliary: implied-only compulsion without accompanying notion of destiny and control by an all-powerful being, 'fate', or human authority) of (1).

NB: Those who contend that the fricative is simply devoiced as a result of phonological constraints, viz. it is followed by a devoiced stop (t), are wrong: in "I have tomatoes", the fricative is still voiced. In fact, if "yet" is left out of (2), and the fricative of "have" is nevertheless purposely voiced, although not a common construction, the sentence still maintains its 'destiny' meaning, by virtue of the voicing of the fricative and thus the retaining of "have" as principal verb.

JD

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