can you use future perfect to refer to a past event?

[5jj]

Well some of us are losing sight of the meaning of the word 'tense' > Fr. temps > L. tempus, time.
That may be how the word started, but 'tense' today does not mean 'time'. Many writers on grammar state explicitly some words such as, "Time and tense are not the same thing. "time" (consisting of past, present and future) is a concept. "tense" is a grammatical device" Chalker, (1984)

If we accept that the distinguishing feature of the future, with respect to the present, is its later time, then any "way of referring to the future" may be regarded as a tense, by anyone who prefers this simpler definition over others like those espoused by 5jj.
Does that mean that in "I leave for Paris tomorrow", the form of the verb LEAVE is future tense?.

5

[konungursvia]

5

Well there's a difference between not having a future tense and having ways to refer to the future without using any future tense.

It's like saying "look, I just left a bank, and didn't rob it, at all." Wow, how honest you must be, Mr. Customer.

In "I shall leave for Paris tomorrow," the verb is compound: 'shall leave;' it's in what I consider a future tense. Does it really matter if there's a space between the two words?

[5jj]

In "I shall leave for Paris tomorrow," the verb is compound: 'shall leave;' it's in what I consider a future tense. Does it really matter if there's a space between the two words?

Yes, in my opinion.

I shall (will) leave suggests future certainty;
I may leave suggests future possibility;
I am going to leave suggests present evidence of a future situation;
I leave (next Tuesday) suggests a scheduled future happening;
etc.

(My glosses are, I admit superficial)

Is any one of them more clearly a future 'tense' than any other?
If they are all 'future tenses', what do we call them when they do not denote future situations?

[konungursvia]

I think you're confusing form with function. But I won't bother debating it, as you've made up your mind.

To me, you're saying there's no such thing as a democracy because no democracy is perfect.

In my view, (just so readers and students can follow the ideas), when we use the present tense to denote the future, by context, it's metaphorical.

When we use a commonly recognised future form to denote a verbal future, it's a future tense. (And yes, tenses do mean times -- categorially, for verbs.)

But thanks for your view. I've read David Hume, and I can see how easy it is to argue you don't see anything. No one can tell you that you are seeing something.

[dqdqf]

One of the ideas conveyed by 'will' is certainty. Context/co-text tells (/will tell!) us whether that certainty is about the present (1), a time before the present [the past] (2), the future (3), or a future time before a later future time (4).

1. Luke's plane took off two hours ago, so he will be in London by now.
2. Luke's plane took off three hours ago, so he will have landed by now..
3. X will be our new president next year.
4. I will have finished the painting by the time you get back from your mother's (tomorrow).

Thanks again for your help 5jj. So the context is the key, I get it.

Hmmm...would you call "will +have+past participle" future perfect in my Emirates example then? Because by definition (I checked a few grammar books), future perfect only talks about the future. If not, then what kind of structure would this be? I found the following two sentences online, they also refer to the past but written using "will" (and in the future perfect structure).

"As you will have already heard, the gym will be closed today"

"You will have noticed that we no longer have a convertible."

They don't sound odd to me, but I can't explain why they're good. What are your thought on this?

dq

[5jj]

In my view, (just so readers and students can follow the ideas), when we use the present tense to denote the future, by context, it's metaphorical.
English, like many other languages uses present tenses to speak about future happenings. Why is this 'metaphorical'?

When we use a commonly recognised future form to denote a verbal future, it's a future tense.
What qualifies as a 'commonly recognised future form? There are at least five common Ways of Expressing the Future in English , none of which uses an inflected tense-form for the future.

(And yes, tenses do mean times -- categorially, for verbs.)
So how many different tenses are the altogether in the sentences below?

Present tense for past time:
1939. 15 March: Germany invades Czechoslovakia. Hitler claims that German troops were invited 'to keep order'.
Jane tells me you've not been too well since you got back.

Present tense for present time:
My stomach hurts.
And Gray takes the ball upfield again, passes to McNally on the edge of the box.

Present Tense for 'general' time:
Babies normally lose weight in the beginning.
I never drink alone.

Present Tense for future time:
I'm having a drink with Jill after the film.
I leave on the eleventh, but I come back overnight, so I’ll be back here on the twelfth.
The UN General Assembly opens in New York late this month.
Tomorrow is Tuesday.

Past tense for past time:
Freda started school last year.

Past tense for present time:
I was wondering if you had a couple of minutes?
(Assistant, to customer in a dry cleaner’s :) What was the name, please?
They would be here with us if they had the time.

Past tense for 'general' time:
If you were as poor as I am, you’d feel differently.
I wish I had a memory like yours.

Past tense for future time:
Her daughter was going to a summer camp tomorrow.
If I went back on the train tonight, it'd be cheaper.

‘Past Conditional’ for future time
If I had known that Julian was speaking at next week’s conference, I would have gone.

[dqdqf]

Thank you all for your kind help!

[BobK]

...
R: Do you know of a current commonly-used grammar book for ESL learners that presents tense that way?
5. Unfortunately, I don't. The writers of these books seem to be be ignoring the thoughts of:

Aitken, Rosemary (1992) Teaching Tenses, Walton-on-Thames, Thomas Nelson
Biber, Douglas; Johansson, Stig; Leech, Geoffrey; Conrad, Susan and Finegan, Edward (1999) Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English, Harlow: Longman
Carter, Ronald & McCarthy, Michael (2006) Cambridge Grammar of English, Cambridge: CUP
Chalker, Sylvia (1984) Current English Grammar, London: Macmillan
Chalker, Sylvia and Weiner, Edmund(1993) The Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar, 2nd edn, Oxford: OUP
Christophersen, Paul & Sandved Arthur O. (1969) An Advanced English Grammar, Basingstoke: Macmillan
Huddleston, Rodney & Pullum, Geoffrey K (2002) The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, Cambridge: CUP
Lewis, Michael (1985) The English Verb, Hove: LTP
Palmer, Frank R and Greenbaum, Sidney in McArthur, Tom (1992) The Oxford Companion to the English Language, Oxford: OUP.
Quirk, Randolph, Greenbaum, Sidney, Leech, Geoffrey and Svartik, Jan (1985) A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language, London: Longman
Yule, George (1998) Explaining English Grammar, Oxford: OUP.

But, "people find it extremely difficult to drop the notion of 'future tense' [...] from their mental vocabulary, and to look for other ways of talking about the grammatical realities of the Enlish verb".
Crystal, David (2003.196)The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of the English Language (2nd edn) , Cambridge: CUP

Impressive reading list.

(Thus topic's died down, but I just wanted a note for the archives. )

b

[5jj]

Impressive reading list.
It's no accident that my alter ego, whose website I link to sometimes, is known as 'Gramorak' - (grammar-anorak). My bookshelves groan under the weight of pretty well every grammar of note written since 1586 in Britain, as well as some American writers (including Parser's hero, Curme, and a sprinkling of earlier writers such as Dionysius Thrax

(Thus topic's died down, but I just wanted a note for the archives. )

If you are making notes for the archives, remember that the idea that English has only two tenses was put forward quite a long time ago:

Wallis Johannis: Nos duo tantum habemus Tempora in quovis verba, Præſens & Præteritum Imperfectum.

Wallis, Johannis, (1653) Grammatica Linguæ Anglicanæ, Oxford. Facsimile (1969.91), Menston: Scolar Press