English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

user227867

12:04 AM

I am having the flu. My nose sucks.

Mitch

2:52 AM

@WillHunting shameless pandering usually prevents starring but potential self referential sarcasm for the win!

user227867

10:34 AM

@Tonepoet My copy of the AHD has arrived! It is HUGE, lol.

tchrist

10:56 AM

2

Q: Shall: In Present Tense

http://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/Shall Shall is primarily in the present, and in our mother tongue was followed by a verb in the infinitive. I've been doing some research to figure out how shall would be considered to be in the present tense (as opposed to in the future te...

@Tonepoet He's using your dictionary but doesn't believe it.

Tonepoet

11:15 AM

@tchrist Hmm, interesting.

tchrist

It’s of course perilous to talk about modals being in a “tense”, but if you must, the verb shall will have to be in the present tense of that verb, and should in its past. It’s kind of like asking what tense ought is in, though, as the right answer is confusing.

Because there's no longer any connection from owe to ought in people's mind, having become very close to a modal itself. It doesn’t take third-person singular inflections, does not accept other modals, etc. But like modal need and dare, it rarely takes a bare infinitive complement, preferring a to-infinitive except sometimes in negation or inversion.

So the present–past pairs can/could, may/might, will/would, shall/should are probably better considered as lying outside any formal tense system, at least where backshifting isn't involved.

Nobody ever asks about durst.

Tonepoet

11:34 AM

@tchrist I've noticed Webster makes an allusion to that in his etymological notes regarding could when researching answers before:

"The past tense of can, according to our customary arrangement in grammar; but in reality a distinct word, can having no past tense. could we receive through the Celtic dialects."

tchrist

I wonder how I should improve my answer.

Tonepoet

@tchrist I think part of the issue is that we're satisfied with past participles like dared over preterit tense verbs like durst.

Tonepoet

11:57 AM

@tchrist I can't help but think this person is one of those conservative bible scholars I was trying to tell you folk about when I wrote this highly downvoted answer that seems to bewilder everybody. I can't really think of another reason somebody would refer to Noah Webster's dictionary while using an Authorized King James Bible quotation and treating it as if it was contemporary.

@tchrist As such if Early Modern English can exemplify this, you may want to use biblical quotations and other examples from 1611ish. Further citation might make your answer more persuasive too of course. Finally, since this person turned to Noah Webster, it might help to get inside Noah Webster's head regarding grammar, by reading relevant portions of his final work on the subject An Improved Grammar of the English Language.

user227867

@Tonepoet Old folks will have difficulty reading the small font in the AHD.

Tonepoet

@WillHunting Hmm, that's strange. The first edition prided itself on the large print for easy readability.

user227867

@Tonepoet The fifth edition has print smaller than the NOAD. I am sure of that.

user227867

I think I have bought all the books I want for 2016. I am happy. I am going to take a nap now and recover from this flu.

user227867

@Tonepoet I ordered it from Amazon and it did not come shrink wrapped. The binding is not as good as NOAD but it is alright if you handle it with care. Maybe Amazon gave me a copy returned by another customer. But it still looks new and I will keep it. The cover is white cloth and I like the rough feel which provides good grip.

Tonepoet

12:12 PM

@WillHunting It's probably their way for compensating for the fact that they dedicate the page margins to pictures. You've got to fit everything into the bound pages somehow.

user227867

@Tonepoet Remember, the AHD really has the best definitions among all English dictionaries! =P

user227867

I am going to sleep. Good night!

Tonepoet

Yes, I was just about to mention that too. To have longer definitions and more pictures in the same number of pages something has to be shrunken down.

@tchrist Worth further note though is that Noah Webster said in his definition of Tense that "The English language is rich in tenses, beyond any other language in Europe." which is a far departure from the present theory that English only has two tenses, so it's possible that you're talking about something else entirely.

tchrist

12:28 PM

@Tonepoet The many modals and the inherent duality each can provide (epistemic vs. deontic sense) allows for much more nuance than a simple past-present opposition ever can.

Tonepoet

@tchrist I'm not going to lie: I'm not really half the expert I should be in visiting this website. The only time I hear about epistemic and deontic sense is when people are trying to explain that Can may infringe upon May's turf.

tchrist

@Tonepoet Does that mean I should have used the Koine Greek version of his verse to demonstrate an actual future tense instead of its Latin translation the Vulgate? I thought Latin would be more generally accessible.

terdon

16 hours ago, by MetaEd

@Mitch Get on my lawn.

Get on May's lawn?

Matt E. Эллен

I just saw my ubuntu upgrade saying I had a download speed of 2PB/s, which is physically impossible over my 3G connection... or over any connection

M.A.R.

12:43 PM

Who else is getting a lot of chat timeouts these days?

Chat is on and off for me

Whenever you see a message, it means it's on.

Tonepoet

@tchrist I doubt foreign language will help. You see, there's a philosophy called King James Onlyism wherein some people believe that the King James version of the bible is the only valid version, even over the original scripts. You might want to go back to the King James bible sources if that's necessary.

M.A.R.

Actually, when it's off, I get to see the messages y'all post, but can't send messages.

Matt E. Эллен

@M.A.R. I've been getting more than before recently, but I put that down to a crappy connections trying to do lots of things at once. Still, I wouldn't call the amount "a lot"

M.A.R.

@MattE.Эллен LET'S DOWNLOAD THE WHOLE WORLD

And other worlds, even

Matt E. Эллен

@M.A.R. ALL OF IT! NOW!

M.A.R.

12:47 PM

Ugh, America takes up too much space, as usual.

Let's delete America first.

Matt E. Эллен

have we tried lossy compression? maybe if we compress it with with 50% jpeg compression it will fit

M.A.R.

Nah, they're too ~~fat~~ obese

Matt E. Эллен

the same can be said for the western world in general.

Tonepoet

@tchrist However as a buddhist, I can't honestly say I know much about bible versions, so looking further into the matter of Koine Greek, that might be suitable if you can quote direct and/or divinely inspired sources such as Paul....

terdon

1:29 PM

@MattE.Эллен 3G connection? Ubuntu phone?

tchrist

1:53 PM

@Tonepoet That sort of thing would necessarily be off topic on ELU.

Mitch

@WillHunting Does it have 'pawky', 'gavelock', or 'dossal'?

@tchrist Because I durst not goes before I would.

Tonepoet

@tchrist You asked me which source material might be the most convincing to quote, and I am merely appealing to the presumed psychology of the person you are trying to convince. I am not suggesting that you write much, if anything about the bible or any particular manner of using the proposed evidence, and the question itself is about English.

Matt E. Эллен

2:12 PM

@terdon no, I've plugged my htc desire into my laptop

terdon

Ah, OK. I thought you had some sort of fancy machine with an integrated 3g chip.

Tonepoet

@tchrist Anyway, it might help to point out that the first paragraph is discussing what shall originally meant in the Anglo-Saxon language, more-so than what it means in modern English. I suspect the root confusion has to do with the ambiguity of the word "primarily" which has a definition closer in meaning to "originally" in Noah Webster's dictionary than "mainly" as it is more commonly understood today.

Matt E. Эллен

@terdon no such luck :D

tchrist

@Mitch Don't inflect the infinitive when using a modal auxiliary.

Tonepoet

2:52 PM

@tchrist Maybe the opening should explain *why* he should read the rest of the definition, especially if he's having trouble parsing it. Does this give you any thoughts?

It is worth note that here "[primarily](http://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/primarily)" does not mean only, or *perhaps* even *mainly* as modern dictionaries like The American Heritage Dictionary Fifth Edition suggest the word is more commonly used to mean today. Noah Webster's dictionary defines it closer to the now secondary "originally" definition and the examples he gives in that first paragraph are of the An…

Tonepoet

3:21 PM

I think that interpretation particularly helps us to resolve these two statements without contradiction:

"Shall is primarily in the present, and in our mother tongue was followed by a verb in the infinitive, like other verbs." (Obsolete)

" In the present tense, shall, before a verb in the infinitive, forms the future tense;" (Current)

Mitch

3:31 PM

@tchrist How durst you

Robusto

4:03 PM

@RegDwigнt: Do Germans still say "Das ist polnische Wirtschaft" when disparaging the construction or planning that went into an item or enterprise? If so, does it have an offensive feel to the general ear there? Cf. de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polnische_Wirtschaft_(Stereotyp)

user227867

8:45 PM

@Robusto Hello Robusto. You have a nice view outside your house.

user227867

@Mitch I am too lazy to look it up, but you can try the website at ahdictionary dot com

user227867

I think Asics makes the best running shoes, way better than Reebok and Nike.

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English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…