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A concept of time
I myself try to keep separate the notions of tense, aspect, mood, and voice, even though this is problematic in practice as the notions of tense and aspect are very closely tied and often conflated in English and because syntactic tense and aspect do not necessarily correspond at all to semantic tense and aspect in English.
This is most complicated in the "present" tense in English, as verbs corresponding to actions and verbs corresponding to states operate differently in it. For normal usage, actions are always used in what is syntactically progressive aspect in the semantic present tense, and the non-usage of syntactic progressive aspect does not indicate semantic non-progressiveness but rather semantic habitual aspect or future tense, depending on usage. On the other hand, states in the semantic present tense are normally used without syntactic progressive aspect, except one is trying to specifically emphasize the *action* of being in a given state. Also note that the emphatic present for actions is generally semantically habitual or in future tense as well.
Travis,
I understand tenses will be more complicated than what you have mentioned here, if we still study them on one-sentence basis. I have asked people to do an experiment: try to cut out from a paragraph three or four consecutive sentences with different tenses, and talk about the tenses. All we can talk about is the time relations between them, using only the simple notions of "past, present, finished, and unfinished". Try and see if your problems or complications are still there. You may test if I fail to do the explanation with only just a few simple notions.
Even children use tenses. The easier the theory, the more reasonable it is.
The problem is that English tenses and aspects are *not* simple, and they are less simple than their syntactic representation would make them out to be as well. The matter is that semantic tenses and aspects in English do not directly correspond to syntactic tenses and aspects in such, especially in the present tense. For example, while syntactically the tense and aspect structure of English is very close to that of German, except with a progressive aspect added onto it, the actual usage of such is far different from the usage of the same in German, which is rather simple and straightforward all things considered. And as mentioned before, these differences are strongest in the syntactic present tense, due to usage in such being split by actionness versus stateness, combined with the syntactic present tense without progressive aspect being used to specify semantic habitual aspect and future tense, especially but not solely for actions.
These are not things that exist in, say, the German tense and aspect structure, which treats the syntactic present tense very straighforwardly and effectively maps it directly to the semantic present tense. And of course, to try to oversimplify usage as you propose would miss these important details of actual usage in English, which are effectively mandatory in practice. For example "I eat food" has a very specifically different meaning from "I am eating food" in English, which cannot be summed up in the terms that you have specified. Likewise, one cannot easy separate "We are opening" from "We open in three months" in such terms either, especially if one is primarily concerning oneself with the syntactic tense and aspect alone.
>>For example "I eat food" has a very specifically different meaning from "I am eating food" in English, which cannot be summed up in the terms that you have specified. <<
May I ask what the difference is?
>>For example "I eat food" has a very specifically different meaning from "I am eating food" in English, which cannot be summed up in the terms that you have specified. <<
My reply: To sum up, they both are unfinished actions.
www.englishtense.com
The difference between the two is that "I am eating food" is specifying that one is specifically carrying out the action of eating food at the present whereas "I eat food" is just saying in general that one, as a matter of habit, eats food, without any real reference to the semantic present tense at all; this is a very important distinction that is not contained at all in the way that you are attempting to analyze things here. For actions in English there is no actual specification of completion versus noncompletion in the present tense despite the presence of a syntactic progressive aspect, one must remember. Hence, "I am eating food" translates directly to German "Ich esse Essen", even though syntactically the former has progressive aspect while the latter does not.
Travis wrote:
>>The difference between the two is that "I am eating food" is specifying that one is specifically carrying out the action of eating food at the present whereas "I eat food" is just saying in general that one, as a matter of habit, eats food, without any real reference to the semantic present tense at all<<
I doubt that. Decades ago, the late grammarians Otto Jespersen noticed that Simple Present and Present Progressive are often used side by side to refer the same happening. He collected pages of examples. I thought he was wasting too many pieces of papers. Easily, I can also do it now with a searching engine:
Ex: Imagine a box where you are opening each of the triangles. The one on the top opens upwards, the one on the right opens to the right, etc.
Ex: The banners on the header are opening the current page when clicked on in IE. When you click on the banner in mozilla, it opens the correct page.
Ex: In the coming weeks, several other movies are opening based on books. The third Harry Potter movie, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkban, opens on June 4.
Ex: With that kind of love or feeling you are opening the heart. When the heart is opening up, it also opens the crown area in the head.
(To find the web pages of the examples, copy part of example, paste into a searching engine, and search for exact match.)
So, do the two tenses really post the big difference you specified? I don't think so. In any movie, people use Simple Present to say any present thing, and you claim it is used to say "as a matter of habit"? In a war, do you have time to use Present Progressive to brief the complicated situations to the headquarter? During the fight, are you sure soldiers will not use Simple Present at all?
>>Travis wrote:
>>The difference between the two is that "I am eating food" is specifying that one is specifically carrying out the action of eating food at the present whereas "I eat food" is just saying in general that one, as a matter of habit, eats food, without any real reference to the semantic present tense at all<<
I doubt that. Decades ago, the late grammarians Otto Jespersen noticed that Simple Present and Present Progressive are often used side by side to refer the same happening. He collected pages of examples. I thought he was wasting too many pieces of papers. Easily, I can also do it now with a searching engine:
Ex: Imagine a box where you are opening each of the triangles. The one on the top opens upwards, the one on the right opens to the right, etc.<<
Sorry, but no, these are NOT the same tense and aspect-wise. "You are opening each of the triangles" refers to an actual specific action in the semantic present tense, where "The one on the top opens upwards" and "The one on the right opens to the right" refer to two habitual actions which are not actually happening at all in the semantic present.
>>Ex: The banners on the header are opening the current page when clicked on in IE. When you click on the banner in mozilla, it opens the correct page.<<
These are two instances where the time is being specified in practice by the subordinate clause connected to the main clause via "when". That aside, the first sentence's main clause is semantically present, while the second sentence's main clause is habitual (but narrowed in the time such applies to by the "when").
>>Ex: In the coming weeks, several other movies are opening based on books. The third Harry Potter movie, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkban, opens on June 4.<<
This is a slightly different case, as the syntactic present progressive is being used to specify the semantic future here via the use of an explicit time in the future; the following usage of the syntactic simple present here is also being to specify semanic future tense as well here. And yes, I forgot to mention that the syntactic present progressive may be used to specify the semantic future in cases where a future time is explicitly marked.
>>Ex: With that kind of love or feeling you are opening the heart. When the heart is opening up, it also opens the crown area in the head.<<
"It also opens the crown area in the head" could be probably analyzed as a habitual action, in the sense of something something does which is not tied to a specific point in time, which just happens to be tied to the present via "when" being used with a clause with a semantically present tense verb.
>>(To find the web pages of the examples, copy part of example, paste into a searching engine, and search for exact match.)
So, do the two tenses really post the big difference you specified? I don't think so. In any movie, people use Simple Present to say any present thing, and you claim it is used to say "as a matter of habit"? In a war, do you have time to use Present Progressive to brief the complicated situations to the headquarter? During the fight, are you sure soldiers will not use Simple Present at all?<<
For starters, we are speaking about declarative mood here, NOT imperative mood, which is what you seem to be referring to with "In any movie, people use Simple Present to say any present thing", which is a whole different matter unto itself, and to which notions of tense and aspect to not apply in the first place. And yes, for statements regarding *actions*, in the present tense, I do not expect the simple present to be used except when marking habitual aspect or future tense semantically; this is not just a mere matter of usage, but rather is quite fixed grammatically, hence why the English statement "I eat food" is *not* synonymous with its word-for-word German equivalent "Ich esse Essen", which explicitly denotes English "I am eating food." One *cannot* indicate the semantic present tense alone with "I eat food" unless one combines that with a time phrase or a subordinate clause which somehow limits it to the present one way or another, period, which is unlike both German "Ich esse Essen" and English "I am eating food", which are quite explicitly semantically present tense.
Travis wrote:
>>Sorry, but no, these are NOT the same tense and aspect-wise. "You are opening each of the triangles" refers to an actual specific action in the semantic present tense, where "The one on the top opens upwards" and "The one on the right opens to the right" refer to two habitual actions which are not actually happening at all in the semantic present.<<
My reply: How on earth can the thing has habit at all?
Travis wrote:
>>The difference between the two is that "I am eating food" is specifying that one is specifically carrying out the action of eating food at the present whereas "I eat food" is just saying in general that one, as a matter of habit, eats food, without any real reference to the semantic present tense at all<<
My reply: Please look at it closely. When I am specifically eating food, it is then not a habit anymore? Isn't this absurd? If I have a habit of drinking coffee, and when I am drinking it now, it is not a habit anymore? Then you must say, when you are CARRYING OUT the habit, you use Present Progressive. Then what is wrong if we conclude Present Progressive is used to say a habit also? It is very normal, isn't it?
Then you may want to add, when you ARE CARRYING OUT the habit, you don't use Simple Present. Is this true? Then I think I have to say "I am living in Hong Kong", rather than "I live in Hong Kong", because I have been CARRYING OUT the living since childhood.
In the following web page I have explained why grammars collect their Simple Present examples that express habits or permanency, and deliberately neglect many other Simple Present examples in newspapers:
http://www.englishtense.com/newapproach/2_3.htm
Their examples have not only troubled foreign students, but also deep learners. But this is only in the explanation and theory. In reality, I don't think English users will wait for a habit and then use Simple Present to say it:
Ex: "As we CLEAR AWAY the debris of a hurricane, let us also clear away the legacy of inequality," Bush said during a national prayer service with other political leaders.....
In regard to the example, "I eat food" and "I am eating food".
Another Example
Prisoner A. I eat food
Prisoner B. I don't, because I am on a hunger strike, to the end.
A Second Example
Person A. I eat food
Person B. I don't because it wastes too much valuable time.
I obtain all my nutrition by just drinking the right sort of drinks.
This shows that "I eat food" can be different to "I am eating food".
I didn't say Simple Present is same as Present Progressive. I agree no two tenses are exactly the same. But the old way wherein learners explain them is wrong -- this is what I am saying. I have introduced the new way in my humble website.
Using any MEANING to explain a tense, is wrong -- this is what I am saying.
On one-sentence basis, you cannot explain any tense -- this is what I am saying.
www.englishtense.com
Another example
I am undertaking some experiments on the life span of mice.
The first group of mice eats food and drinks water.
The second group of mice drinks this concoction of nutrients.
I am testing my hypothesis that the group 2 mice live longer than
the group 1 mice.
Someone makes the above scenario part of a cartoon.
Representative Mouse 1 (Group One): I eat food
Representative Mouse 1 (Group Two): I don't eat food
Representative Mouse 2 (Group One): You are disturbing my sleep. What are you doing?
Representative Mouse 3 (Group One): I am eating food
Therefore, "I eat food" and "I am eating food" is not the same.
Further to the above:
IF:
Representative Mouse 2 (Group One): You are disturbing my sleep. What are you doing?
Representative Mouse 3 (Group One): I eat food
THEN:
Representative Mouse 2 (Group One): I know you eat food, but what has it got to do with my question??
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