Is this a tense or what ?

[Xenon]

Hi everybody !

Maybe that's a wierd question but I'm kind a curious. Is this a tense or what ?

"The senat has been informed that the jedi was destoyed in a mining disaster"

And this part "Has been informed" - tense ? And if so, what does that mean ?

 

[emsr2d2]

Hi everybody! (Don't put a space before an exclamation mark.)

Maybe that's a weird question but I'm kind [STRIKE]a[/STRIKE] of curious. Is this a tense or what? (Don't put a space before a question mark.)

"The senate (or perhaps you meant "senator") has been informed that the Jedi was destroyed in a mining disaster."

[STRIKE]And this part[/STRIKE] What tense is "has been informed"? [STRIKE]- tense ?[/STRIKE] [STRIKE]And if so,[/STRIKE] What does [STRIKE]that[/STRIKE] it mean?

Please note my corrections above.

I have capitalised "Jedi" because the only word I know that is spelled like that is the word from the Star Wars franchise. If that's what you meant, then it must be capitalised. If you were talking about only one Jedi, then "was destroyed" is correct. If you were talking about all of them, it should be "were destroyed".
If you weren't talking about the Star Wars Jedi, please explain what you meant.

Piscean has explained what tense/voice/verb form this is. Have you studied the passive voice yet?

 

[emsr2d2]

I did a bit of Googling and found the following HERE.

The Empire subsequently fabricated a cover story for the Imperial Senate that Jedha was destroyed in a mining disaster.

As you can see, Xenon, your piece should have used "Imperial Senate" and "Jedha". I'm glad I was right about it being related to Star Wars though.

 

[Xenon]

I was relating to a movie Star Wars Rogue One.
Here is a link (there is a fragment I mentioned) 2:40.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHeNsynAMgE

So the fragment "has been informed" means that the senate know the actual situation or that he was informed just a moment ago (or something like that).

I pretty love the star wars lore
It helps me learn something about using some tenses.

 

[jutfrank]

It just means that the Imperial Senate knows about the situation.

Note that the Senate is not a person but a group of people (or aliens).

(Side note: I'm now wondering if you can refer to non-Earthling individuals as 'people'. I can't quite recall whether they do this in Star Wars.)

 

[jutfrank]

I'm now wondering if you can refer to non-Earthling individuals as 'people'.

I've just spent quite a long time thinking about this excellent question and the semantics of the words person/people. It may have something to do with the fact that I'm trying to avoid doing some actual work.

1) Imagine that last night you had Yoda, Chewbacca, Admiral Ackbar, and Jabba the Hutt round for a dinner party. Would it sound right to say that four people came to your party? I think it would.

2) What if you had also invited C-3PO? Now, he may not be the wittiest of dinner guests but it would seem politically incorrect to discount him as a person, wouldn't it? I mean, he is at least 'person-like'.

3) Also (bear with me), what if R2-D2 turned up unexpectedly just as you were finishing dessert, bearing a rather welcome bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon and some after-dinner mints? Would it sound right to ask whether there's room for another person? Although he (she?) is not particularly person-like, it would seem rude to count 3PO as a person but not R2, don't you think?

Before you dismiss these questions as trivial and academic, may I remind you that they are ones that will likely need to be addressed in coming millennia.

 

[emsr2d2]

Now that's a dinner party I want to go to! ;-)

I think I would refer to Yoda, Chewie, Ackbar and Jabba as beings and to C-3PO and R2-D2 as droids.

 

[jutfrank]

Now that's a dinner party I want to go to! ;-)

I thought you might. If it does ever happen, you're definitely invited too (as long as you bring a bottle of Cab Sav and some After Eights). ;-)

I think I would refer to Yoda, Chewie, Ackbar and Jabba as beings and to C-3PO and R2-D2 as droids.

That makes sense. So if you were to come, I'll say that there was one person, four beings, and two droids.

 

[emsr2d2]

I thought you might. If it does ever happen, you're definitely invited too (as long as you bring a bottle of Cab Sav and some After Eights). ;-)

Cab Sav and After Eights? Is it 1973? And I'm only coming if the Cantina Band are playing in a corner!

(Sorry, OP - we've gone a bit off-topic! Feel free to inform the Imperial Senate.)

 

[Glizdka]

Not a teacher
------

I'm now wondering if you can refer to non-Earthling individuals as 'people'. I can't quite recall whether they do this in Star Wars.

The Three-Fifths Comprimise showed that the definition of a person can depend on quite a lot of things. Apart from the question of whether a machine can be sentient and have free will, there are other things to take into account, such as if we deem them as equal to ourselves.

A funny thing happens in Polish (not sure if it's analogous in English). It's common to refer to pets as who, not what; someone, not something; and other untranslatable words that are meant to be used with people, not their counterpats meant for animals. The same doesn't apply to wild or stray animals, just your home pets. Maybe there's some sense of having a relationship with the being, befriending them, being emotionally attached.

I'd say both 3PO and R2D2 deserve being called people. Especially 3PO feels like a person. He's funny, adorable (in his own annoying way), and perfectly relatable.

Good question. You're right this question will need to be addressed, but I'd say much, much sooner than in coming millennia.

 

[jutfrank]

The Three-Fifths Comprimise showed that the definition of a person can depend on quite a lot of things.

Right. The philosophical notion of personhood is a messy area. In the context of slavery, it relates to legal rights (whether slaves should have the right to vote, for example) but in the context of ethics, it's fundamentally about whether a being has moral agency. Nobody ever denied the fact that American slaves had moral agency—the question was regarding their rights.

In the Star Wars universe, it's pretty obvious that Jabba the Hutt has the capacity to act morally, which would count him as a person, in the ethical sense. Even though he's not a very nice, um, person, we wouldn't feel good about torturing him because we would intuitively understand that he is subject to our own moral act of torture.

I don't think this is true for droids though, however intelligent they may be. It's hard to imagine R2-D2 going to trial for murder. And you would certainly feel much worse about torturing Chewbacca than you would C-3PO, even though 3PO is fluent in over 7 million languages and Chewie just one.

Anyway, what we can say is that in the legal and ethical senses, the notion of personhood is not fundamentally related to the human species. There are many philosophers who would even count your pet hamster as a person, given that it deserves some level of legal protection. And although I've never heard of anybody talk of legal protection for machines yet, I agree that with the rapid progress of complexity in AI, it may be something we need to think about before the end of the century.

 

[emsr2d2]

I fail to see why something would need to be considered a person in order to deserve legal protection.