I forgive you

[Nightmare85]

Hello,
It seems I still don't know when I need to use will and when not.

Scene:
Someone made a big mistake, a few days later he comes to me and apologizes.
A few seconds later I say:
Okay, I forgive you.

But now I'm confused if I should use a will:
Okay, I will forgive you.
(I'm forgiving you sounds strange.)

Currently, my mind is completely messed up with this "Simple Present or will-Future" issue :-(
(It's because I cannot hear the difference between I and I'll, unfortunately...)

So, you can probably expect many more similar questions :-(

Cheers!

 

[sarat_106]

Hello,
It seems I still don't know when I need to use will and when not.

Scene:
Someone made a big mistake, a few days later he comes to me and apologizes.
A few seconds later I say:
Okay, I forgive you.

But now I'm confused if I should use a will:
Okay, I will forgive you.
(I'm forgiving you sounds strange.)

Currently, my mind is completely messed up with this "Simple Present or will-Future" issue :-(
(It's because I cannot hear the difference between I and I'll, unfortunately...)

So, you can probably expect many more similar questions :-(

Cheers!

I would prefer present perfect (Okay, I have forgiven you.)to express that the action of forgiving is complete.
Or will-future to express an instant decision to forgive.

 

[kfredson]

Hello,
It seems I still don't know when I need to use will and when not.

Scene:
Someone made a big mistake, a few days later he comes to me and apologizes.
A few seconds later I say:
Okay, I forgive you.

But now I'm confused if I should use a will:
Okay, I will forgive you.
(I'm forgiving you sounds strange.)

Currently, my mind is completely messed up with this "Simple Present or will-Future" issue :-(
(It's because I cannot hear the difference between I and I'll, unfortunately...)

So, you can probably expect many more similar questions :-(

Cheers!

Thank you for again raising a most interesting issue. I'd never thought about it before.

I would guess that no one would notice any difference between those two sentences, although technically the second version is ambiguous. One might wonder, "Will you only be forgiving me sometime in the future?" However, if you say it with the more natural "I'll" rather than "I will" I doubt whether anyone would notice.

So I would say that "I forgive you" and "I'll forgive you" are used interchangeably.

Perhaps others may disagree. Thanks again for raising it.

 

[billmcd]

Agree w/kfredson. Actually, if you are doing something (in this example "forgiving") at the moment of speaking, you would correctly use present continuous/progressive HOWEVER, the verb "forgive" is a stative (non-dynamic) verb in which case the simple present tense is the default tense. So, "I forgive you" is grammatically correct if you are forgiving at the moment of speaking, but it is commonly used interchangeably with "I'll forgive you".