Talk:Perfect (grammar)

message: In the page Grammatical_aspect right in the begin there is this important note:
"A basic aspectual distinction is that between perfective and imperfective aspects (not to be confused with perfect and imperfect verb forms;..."
But when you click in the first link perfect, (this page here) begins mixing both with:
"The perfect tense or aspect is a verb form that..."
This problem doesn't happens in the imperfect page.
I believe the imperfect page may be used as an example on how to improve here and avoid confusions. Thanks Behco (talk) 15:39, 21 April 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Perfective/Imperfective aspects versus Perfect/Imperfect verb forms 

message: I removed the reference to portuguese because this construction with "ter" or "haver" (have) how auxiliar has iterative aspect. Portuguese does not distinguish present perfect. This is very different from other romance languages.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.0.111.194 (talk) 12:13, 11 November 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Perfect in other languages 

message: 'Perfect' and 'progressive' are not tenses, they are aspects. --Xeon 06:33, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Both are tenses.  Aspect is what we call aspect in Slavic linguistics. --VKokielov 01:13, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: And in general linguistics too.  I think this page needs expanding greatly to increase scope beyond English BovineBeast 21:59, 11 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Headline text 

message: What about "I was eating"? At school they told me that was the perfect tense (past).
:That's imperfect tense. Matt Yeager ♫ (Talk?) 00:43, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tenses 

message: You're right in saying that "I have gone to the cinema" is unclear in meaning. This is because it's a strange thing to say -- the context of when one might actually say this is hard to imagine. "She has gone to the cinema" does, however, clearly tell us that she is not here, and that she is either en route to, or actually sitting in, the cinema now.
:What if the conversation had gone as follows?
:"I bet you've never gone to the cinema."
:"That's not true."
:Might she not continue with precisely those words, "I have gone to the cinema"?
:Similarly for "she," when speaking in "her" presence, consider a precedent:
:Maria told Phoebe Gina had never gone to the cinema, but Phoebe stood up for her: "I happen to know she has gone to the cinema, haven't you, Gina?" Unfree (talk) 09:41, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Not so fast, if you please.  This native speaker of English (American style) am not so provincial as to neglect to wonder whether her present whereabouts would be so precisely determined if that statement were given, even in England, in response to the challenge of "I doubt very much she has ever gone to France." Unfree (talk) 09:54, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: "I've gone to the cinema" - 'the context in which one might say this is hard to imagine'? I can think of two contexts: (1) Experiential e.g. "Many a time in my life I've gone to the cinema and found halfway through that the film was boring". (2) Perfect of Result, e.g. (note left on the kitchen table): "Darling, I've gone to the cinema. Your dinner is in the oven." Kanjuzi (talk) 07:07, 10 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reply to Above - Perfect Aspect with 'go' and 'be' 

message: I am finding the examples very confusing. In particular the supposed present perfect progressive example I have been overcome is the same as the present perfect passive. If this were correct, the same words would have active voice in one case and passive in the other which seems absurd.
I have been overcome is surely only passive voice. 'To be overcome' is always passive. 'To be overcoming' is active and progressive. I suspect that most of the 'progressive' examples are wrong and confuse the active with the passive.
I propose: I have been overcoming for the present perfect progressive. Similarly, past perfect progressive would be I had been overcoming and future perfect progressive I will have been overcoming.
The passive forms of these are quite naturally I have been being overcome and so on. 
I would strongly dispute the claim that formations with 'have been being' and 'had been being' are incorrect. They seem awkward, and do not occur often, but they are grammatically clear and express a meaning which cannot be expressed another way. For example I had not sat down on the bench because it had been being painted or Tomorrow the reservoir will have been being filled for two weeks. 
--Tdent 12:05, 19 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with you and was going to comment along these lines.  I am going to modify the article accordingly.  --Poludamas 05:26, 20 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  confusing / incorrect examples? 

message: I've been trying to understand the difference between these two concepts, and I think I've got it, as far as the present perfect is concerned (as compared, for example, with the pretérito indefinido of Spanish, the passé composé of French, or some other preterite). However, for the other tenses, I fail to see the difference between:
* the past perfect and the plus-que-parfait;
* the future perfect and the futur antérieur;
etc.
They seem to mean exactly the same. I wonder if this could be clarified. FilipeS 23:00, 2 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The latter two are exactly the same. The past perfect is almost the same as the plus-que-parfait, however there is a second pluperfect in French. I believe that the French (normal) pluperfect (the plus-que-parfait) expresses what its form implies, i. e., it is an imperfect (j'avais) of the past (fait du sport) and as such describes a state entered into by some action, which was "in progress" (i. e., the "being in the state" was in progress) when the action of reference (which is in the past) takes place. Hence, "Parce qu'il avait fait beaucoup du sport, il était en vraiment bonne santé" (with a state and an imperfect in the main clause) or also "..., il a pu gagner bien des prix" with a main clause in passé simple.[*] However, if the pluperfect really describes a action in the past and not a state entered into, typically in "après que"-phrases, plus-que-parfait is ungrammatical and passé anterieur is to be used w. r. t. passé simple "après que Julien fut sorti du cinema, sa petite amie lui embrassa", and I believe even passé surcomposé w. r. t. passé compose: "après que Julien a été sorti du cinema, sa petite amie lui a embrassé". [*I'm really unsure whether plus-que-parfait would stay in the subclause, or be replaced by passé anterieur, if you'd construct the main clause with passé simple. You don't learn much about that in schools.]--2001:A61:20E7:E001:2C79:FD42:BDC2:1193 (talk) 01:16, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
thread_title: Perfect vs. perfective

message: I'm more familiar with the definition of perfect aspect as an action that takes place before a reference action or timepoint. I think there is some resultative aspect than enfasises on the result of an action. 
At least in Spanish the socalled perfect tenses indicate an action finishing before a (absolute) reference timepoint (in the past, present or future). They use to appear with a time reference in Spanish. So the pretérito pluscuamperfecto (plus-que-parfait in French, or pluparfait in English), e.g.
* (yo) había comido cuando tú llamaste 
means something likes "I had already finished eating when you called", or the futuro perfecto (french future antérieur) 
* habré comido cuando llegues ("I will have eaten when you come") 
implies the ending of a future action before a second, future event takes place. That's probably the reason of the anterieur denomination in French: the action is anterior to a second event. Spanish has also a pretérito anterior, also a perfect tense, almost equivalent to the pluscuamperfecto, the only diference being that the pretérito anterior takes place immediately before the reference event. 
I would say that the perfect aspect is a relative aspect (a past action relative to a second event, which can be in the past, present or future) while the perfective aspect is not (the action is just complete, with no reference to a second action/event). Xavier 17:08, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Perfect in Spanish 

message: The perfect is neither aspect nor tense, but rather a conflation of the two--at least in the opinions of some who know what they're talking about. Even if we have a legitimate dispute on this, I don't think we should prejudice the issue by using "aspect" in the title of the article. Any suggestions on what would be better? Just fudge the issue by calling it "perfect (grammar)", maybe? kwami (talk) 08:24, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree; just call it "Perfect_(grammar)" and have a disambiguation page.  How does an editor rename a page? Eldin raigmore (talk) 16:48, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Since there hasn't been any objection over the past few months, and since the article formerly at perfect tense seemed to duplicate some of the information from here and was wrong about the rest, I've made that a redirect, as well. I don't think there's really any reason to have a disambig page, though. There's already perfect (disambiguation). —Gordon P. Hemsley→✉ 20:10, 17 June 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  It is definitely taught as a tense in any Latin course. Tomgg (talk) 03:18, 30 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: neither aspect nor tense

message: "Perfect" may not be an aspect.  It's open to debate. Some think it's a tense; some think it's a mood; some think it's an aspect; some think it depends on the language. Eldin raigmore (talk) 16:46, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: For clarity, I have changed 'The perfect is a verb form' to 'The perfect tense or aspect' is a verb form, to make it clear that it is regarded by some people as a tense and others as an aspect. Kanjuzi (talk) 15:20, 10 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Perfect" may not be an aspect. 

message: "Anterior" is never correctly used as a substitute for "perfect". 
"Anterior", often called "relative past" is a "relative tense"; the other two "relative tenses" are "simultaneous" ("relative present") and "posterior" ("relative future").  
The difference between "past" ("absolute past") and "anterior" ("relative past") is that, the past-tensed verb is about a situation which took place prior to the speech-act, while the anterior-tensed verb is about a situation which took place prior to some other, more-topical (or more-focal) event which is also being spoken of.  Similarly, the difference between "future" ("absolute future") and "posterior" ("relative future") is that, the future-tensed verb is about a situation which will take place after the speech-act, while the posterior-tensed verb is about a situation which took place, or takes place, or will take place, after some other, more-topical (or more-focal) event which is also being spoken of. And, the difference between "pressent" ("absolute present") and "simultaneous" ("relative present") is that, the pressent-tensed verb is about a situation which overlaps in time with the speech-act, while the simultaneous-tensed verb is about a situation which overlapped, or overlaps, or will overlap, in time, some other, more-topical (or more-focal) event which is also being spoken of.
In English, and in several other languages, the perfect (better-called "retrospective" IMO) encodes that the retrospective verb concerns an event which was/is/will be anterior to some other, more-topical or more-focal time, but whose effects were/are/will be still relevant at that time; and it is upon these effects that the speaker wishes to call the interlocutors' attention.
So, while, at least in some languages (English among them), everything "perfect" is also "anterior", it is not the case that everything "anterior" is also "perfect".  They aren't synonyms at all, though they are related terms for English and some other languages.
Eldin raigmore (talk) 17:00, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: (Note: We had a discussion about this on some other page, and agreed to restrict 'anterior' for relative tense. — kwami (talk) 21:00, 17 June 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Anterior" is never correctly used as a substitute for "perfect". 

message: Would it be worth explaining that the word 'perfect' is used to mean 'past' because past events are complete/final/unalterable?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Paul Murray (talk • contribs) 02:28, 24 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Etymology 

message: This article is all very well as far as it goes but it's too English-centred. It needs a section on the various uses of the Perfect cross-linguistically, such as those described by Comrie. Among others we might mention:
*Perfect of Result: "I have cleaned the car"
*Perfect of Present State, e.g. in some languages (e.g. Swahili) "he has put on" = "he is wearing"
*Experiential Perfect, e.g. "I have visited the USA three times"
*Inferential Perfect, e.g. "(judging from the evidence) this wall has been built before the Mongol invasion"
*Perfect in Reported Speech (found in Turkish, Persian, Bulgarian etc.) "I was told that this mosque has been built in 1582"
Perhaps someone well qualified or with access to good books can add such a section. Kanjuzi (talk) 23:14, 7 October 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Various meanings of the Perfect 

message: In the lede paragraph sentence, , 
Please change "my" to "the speaker's".
The use of "I" in the example sentence is just that: an example sentence, therefore, not Wikivoice; but the text in parentheses IS Wikivoice, thus "my", nor any first person pronoun, should not be used. 2600:1702:4960:1DE0:48C0:967D:8F03:E2B1 (talk) 23:57, 3 April 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: ★Ama TALK CONTRIBS 20:52, 25 April 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 3 April 2022 

message: Idk 2603:8000:1E00:4BE6:79D3:1A69:7A62:4D8F (talk) 20:43, 26 July 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Perfect tense