The grammar of the english verb phrase part 23 pps

IV. The present and past time-spheres 147
IV. The present and past time-spheres
2.33 The conceptualization of ‘time-spheres’
English tenses appear to reflect a mental division of time into past and nonpast. The
main evidence for this is that all tenses carry either a past or a nonpast (present) tense
morpheme. There is no future tense morpheme. We will represent this division of time
as involving two time-spheres: a past time-sphere and a present time-sphere.
In English, the use of tenses implies a conceptual division of time into two
‘time-spheres’: the
present time-sphere and the past time-sphere. (Note that
a time-sphere is a length of time and should not be visualized as something
spherical (round).)
The claim that English speakers conceptualize linguistic time as divided into
two, not three (viz. past, present and future), time-spheres is based on several
observations. Firstly, all the tenses make use of an inflectional tense morpheme
which expresses either past or nonpast.
17
There is no inflectional future tense
morpheme in English: the future tense is formed with the help of the present
tense form of an auxiliary (will), i. e. a ‘free’ morpheme rather than a ‘bound’
one. Thus, will do (which realizes ‘PRESENT ϩ will ϩ do’) contains a present
tense inflectional morpheme, and would do (which expresses ‘PAST ϩ will ϩ
do’) contains a past tense inflectional morpheme. Secondly, it is in keeping with
this that the future tense use of shall and will has developed from their use as
forms expressing present nonepistemic modality (more specifically, some kind
of volition). Thirdly, in order to temporally relate a situation time to a future
situation time, English uses the same tense system as it uses to temporally relate
a situation time to t
0
: compare I am ill with [Next time, he will pretend that]
he is ill, and He has left with [I will do it when] he has left (see 7.6.2). This

means that English treats a future situation time which functions as a starting
point for the temporal location of other situation times as a ‘pseudo-t
0
’. This
accords perfectly with the view that the post-present is a portion (‘zone’ Ϫ see
2.35) of the present time-sphere. (Note that this argument is not refuted by the
observation that the present tense can also refer to the past, viz. in the ‘historic
present’ use. The point is that in [Next time, he will pretend that] he is ill and
[I will do it when] he has left, the forms is and have left cannot be replaced
with will be and will have left, respectively, while a historic present form can
17. If the tense form consists of more than one verb form, the tense morpheme is always to
be found in the first auxiliary (the so-called ‘operator’ of the tense form).
148 2. Towards a theory of tense and time
always be replaced by a past tense form. This means that the use of the present
tense with future time reference is normal and obligatory in the above exam-
ples, whereas the use of the present tense with past time reference is special
and optional.)
2.34 Defining the time-spheres
The past time-sphere lies wholly before t
0
, while the present time-sphere includes t
0
and extends either side of it for an indefinite amount of time.
2.34.1 The
past time-sphere is conceived of as a timespan of indefinite
length which lies wholly before t
0
and is disconnected from t
0
. The absolute

tense locating a situation time in the past time-sphere is the preterite (past
tense). (As explained in 2.41, an absolute tense is a tense that relates a situation
time directly to t
0
and not to another orientation time.)
I left the house around midnight. (Left locates its situation time in the past time-
sphere, which is defined in direct relation to t
0
.)
2.34.2 The present time-sphere (or nonpast time-sphere) is conceived of
as a timespan of indefinite length which includes t
0
.
2.35 Present time-sphere zones
The present time-sphere is conceived of here as containing the present zone, which
coincides with t
0
, the pre-present zone, which leads up to t
0
, and the post-present zone,
which begins immediately after t
0
. To locate a situation in one of these zones, we use
the present tense, the present perfect or the future tense (or a futurish tense) respec-
tively.
The zero-time (t
0
) is taken to divide the present time-sphere into three zones.
The portion of the present time-sphere that precedes t
0

is the pre-present
zone
; the portion that coincides with t
0
is the present zone; and the portion
that follows t
0
is the post-present zone (or ‘future zone’). It should be stressed
that these three zones follow each other without overlap. This means that the
post-present starts from t
0
but does not include it, and that the pre-present
IV. The present and past time-spheres 149
leads up to t
0
but does not include it. (In 5.2 it will be shown that the latter
claim does not run counter to the observation that the present perfect receives
a ‘continuative’ interpretation in We’ve been living here for six weeks now.)
To locate situations in these three zones we use the present perfect, the
present tense and the future tense (or a ‘futurish form’ Ϫ see 2.9), respectively.
Each of these tenses shows present (nonpast) morphology.
I have already spoken to John. (Have spoken is a present perfect tense form locating
its situation time somewhere in the pre-present zone.)
I am very happy with her. (Am locates its situation time at t
0
.)
I{will / am going to} be there tomorrow. (Not only will be but also am going to
be locates the situation time in the post-present. As noted in 2.13, the situation time
is the time of the actualization of the predicated situation, not the time of anticipa-
tion of that actualization.)

2.36 Visual representation of time-spheres and zones
The linguistic conceptualization of time in terms of time-spheres and zones can
be represented as in Figure 2.1. In this diagram the time line is represented as
consisting of two time-spheres. The dotted line in the middle of the time line
is meant to represent the fact that there is felt to be a break between the two
time-spheres. (There is a slight but hard to avoid technical problem with this
diagram: it makes the pre-present look as though it is more recent, i. e. closer
to t
0
, than the past. That this impression is false is stressed in 2.39.)
Figure 2.1. Linguistic conceptualization of the time line in English.
2.37 Absolute zones
The past time-sphere is conceived of as consisting of a single zone (the past time-zone).
To locate a situation in the past time-zone we use the past tense. The four zones (pre-
present, present and post-present plus past) that are defined in direct relation to t
0
are
150 2. Towards a theory of tense and time
called the ‘absolute’ zones. The tenses used to locate situations in these absolute zones
are referred to as ‘absolute tenses’.
Whereas the present time-sphere is automatically divided into three zones by
t
0
, the past time-sphere consists of a single time-zone, which is defined as lying
completely before t
0
and as disconnected from t
0
. The past time-sphere and the
three present time-sphere zones together constitute the set of

absolute zones
(or absolute time-zones), i. e. the four time-zones that are defined in direct
relation to t
0
. (Note that ‘zone’ is equivalent to ‘time-sphere’ where the past is
concerned and equivalent to ‘portion of the time-sphere’ where the pre-present,
present and post-present are concerned.) (To a layman, the use of ‘time-zone’
to refer to t
0
may seem odd, because t
0
is conceived of as punctual, but the
concept ‘punctual interval’ is well-established in the literature on tense.)
2.38 Past vs pre-present
Situation times that precede t
0
can in principle be located either in the pre-present zone
or in the past time-sphere, but the choice depends on whether the speaker’s ‘temporal
focus’ is on the present or on the past.
There is a generally accepted intuition that the use of the present perfect in
English implies that the speaker is somehow concerned with the present (see
5.1.3). In our tense model this is reflected in the claim that the time of a
situation referred to by a present perfect is not located in the past, but rather
in the ‘pre-present’. Situation times that precede t
0
can in principle be located
either in the pre-present zone or in the past time-sphere, but the choice depends
on whether the speaker’s ‘temporal focus’ (see 11.1) is on the present or on the
past. This explains why the present perfect is incompatible with adverbials like
yesterday, two weeks ago, etc., which place the temporal focus on the past.

The choice of temporal focus is more important than the notion of ‘current
relevance’, because only the former has to do with the location of the predi-
cated situation in time. Since tense is the grammaticalization of locating a
situation in time by means of a verb form (see 2.1), adverbials of past time are
incompatible with the present perfect, even if there is an idea of current rele-
vance. This is clear from the following examples:
IV. The present and past time-spheres 151
[I know what Paris looks like.] I have visited it several times.
[I know what Paris looks like.] I {visited /*have visited} it several times two years
ago.
18
2.38.1 To avoid any misunderstanding, we would like to point out that a
situation can be viewed as past even when it is represented as contained in an
Adv-time (ϭ adverbially indicated time interval) that also includes t
0
,asinI
had a copious breakfast today. In this case the speaker has the situation time
(which here coincides with the time of the full situation) in mind, which is a
past situation time, even though it is included in a larger Adv-time which also
includes t
0
. Here, as in other cases, the tense form does not relate the situation
time to the Adv-time, but rather to an orientation time (in this case: t
0
, since
had is an absolute past tense form).
2.39 The length of the time-spheres and zones
The present zone coincides with t
0
and is thus punctual. However, the length of the

other zones is purely a matter of how they are conceptualized on a given occasion.
(Compare The elephant has just arrived with The Asian elephant has been worshipped
for centuries.) The interval between a past situation and t
0
does not determine whether
the situation is located in a past time-zone or in a pre-present time-zone. (Compare
The elephant has just arrived and The elephant arrived just a moment ago.)
Except for the present zone, which is by definition conceived of as punctual
(see 2.35), the length of the time-spheres and the zones cannot be defined in
terms of objective time. Everything depends on how the speaker conceptualizes
time. For example, the pre-present can be conceived of either as very short
(e. g. I have just seen him) or as stretching indefinitely far back (e. g. The earth
has existed for billions of years), while the past time-sphere may be conceived
of as distant from t
0
(e. g. Things were different in ancient Rome) or as almost
reaching up to it (e. g. The phone rang a minute ago). It follows that one and
the same situation can often be conceptualized either as lying in the past time-
sphere or as lying in the pre-present (compare I met Ann just now with I have
just met Ann). This is in keeping with the observation (made in 2.36) that the
past time-sphere is not conceptualized as more distant from t
0
than the pre-
18. The constraint that the present perfect is incompatible with a past temporal focus is
typical of English. It does not hold for other Germanic languages, like Dutch and Ger-
man. Thus, the German and Dutch equivalents of *I have seen him yesterday are per-
fectly grammatical: Ich habe ihn gestern gesehen; Ik heb hem gisteren gezien.
152 2. Towards a theory of tense and time
present zone. (The past time-sphere is conceived of as separated from the pres-
ent time-sphere, whereas the pre-present zone forms part of it, but the actual

distance between the situation time and t
0
is immaterial to this conceptualiza-
tion.)
2.40 Present time-sphere tenses vs past time-sphere tenses
The past tense, the past perfect, the conditional tense, and the conditional perfect
typically locate situation times in the past time-sphere. The present tense, the present
perfect, the future tense and the future perfect typically locate situation times in the
present time-sphere.
There are four tenses that typically represent a situation time as belonging to
the past time-sphere. We call them the
past (time-sphere) tenses: the past
tense, the past perfect, the conditional tense (realized as ‘would ϩ infinitive’)
and the conditional perfect (realized as ‘would have ϩ past participle’). These
tenses all involve a past tense inflectional morpheme.
The other four tenses typically represent a situation time as lying in the
present time-sphere. We call them the
present (time-sphere) tenses: the pres-
ent tense, the present perfect, the future tense and the future perfect. These
tenses all involve a present tense inflectional morpheme.
V. Temporal domains 153
V. Temporal domains
2.41 Absolute tenses vs relative tenses
We have seen that an absolute tense relates a situation time directly to t
0
, whereas a
relative tense relates a situation time to an orientation time other than t
0
.
2.41.1 An

absolute tense relates a situation time directly to t
0
. English has
four absolute tenses: the present tense, the absolute past tense,
19
the present
perfect and the future tense. They locate the situation time in the present, past,
pre-present and post-present time-zone, respectively.
A
relative tense relates a situation time to an orientation time other than
t
0
, i. e. to another situation time, an unspecified orientation time (see 2.14.c), an
(otherwise unspecified) time contained in an Adv-time (see 2.14.d) or an implicit
orientation time (see 2.14.e). Thus, the past perfect is a relative tense, because it
relates its situation time as anterior to an orientation time which is not t
0
.For
example, in John said he had worked hard, the past perfect represents the situa-
tion time of had worked hard as T-anterior to the situation time of said. The rela-
tive tense does not itself relate the time of working to t
0
, even though we can
usually deduce that the working, as well as being T-anterior to the time of John’s
saying, is also W-anterior to t
0
. (However, this is not always the case, witness the
fact that the situation referred to by had cleaned is interpreted as W-posterior to
t
0

in He said he would do it tomorrow after he had cleaned the floor.)
2.41.2 While the four absolute tenses are always realized by the four forms
referred to above, it will be argued below that the same forms may sometimes
also have the function typical of relative tenses. This occurs either (in one case,
that of the past tense) because there are two homonymous tenses or (in a
second case, namely when a post-present domain is expanded) because the
semantics of the set of absolute tenses is ‘hijacked’ for use in a relative manner.
2.42 Temporal domain
A temporal domain consists of various orientation times (situation times or not) which
are temporally related to one another. Only the orientation time which establishes the
19. It will be argued in 2.44 that English has two past tenses: an absolute one and a rela-
tive one.