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  • From: Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu>
  • To: Rolf Furuli <furuli AT online.no>
  • Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Tense and aspect; was: "The use of "
  • Date: Wed, 22 Apr 2009 10:46:58 -0400

Rule number one: The less we define the better off we are.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Apr 22, 2009, at 10:00 AM, Rolf Furuli wrote:

Dear Stoney,

When we discuss linguistic issues, we may define
our concepts differently. And that need not be a
problem as long as the other part clearly
understand our definition. So, you are free to
define tense as you have done below. Another
question is whether the definition is precise
enough to give good results in the study of
languages. To borrow a viewpoint from the natural
sciences: If a hypothesis is so general that it
can explain everything, it explains nothing. A
scientific hypothesis should be falsifiable, that
is, it should be possible to think of situations
which, if they occurred, would prove the
hypothesis to be wrong. And similarly in
linguistics; if definitions are so subjective or
general that there are no controls to use in
order to distinguish between what falls inside
and outside the definition, such definitions are
not helpful in linguistic research. I am afraid
your definition belongs to this group.

My definition, on the other hand, can be used to
falsify, and as far as dead languages are
concerned, it can be used to find whether there
are particular verb forms that uniformly express
a particular time reference. Based on my
definition, the test is very simple. Applied to
WAYYIQTOL it goes like this: If WAYYIQTOL
represents past tense, we will expect that it
always has past reference, except in situations
which linguistically can be explained as special
cases (such as hypothetical conditional clauses
etc). If we find a reasonable number of
WAYYIQTOLs with non-past reference, the
hypothesis that WAYYIQTOL represents past tense
is falsified. Can you apply your definition of
tense in a similar way to Hebrew and get
linguistic results? In that case, please explain
how.

I suggest that you read the book "Tense" (1986)
B. Comrie. There you will find a definition
similar to mine.


Best regards,

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo



Rolf :

'It is important to distinguish between tense and time/temporal reference.
All languages have different means to signal whether an action is past,
present, or future. But first when the temporal reference is an intrinsic
part of a verb form, can we say that a language has tense. Therefore, tense
is defined as "grammaticalized location in time".'

This seems to be unnecessarily restrictive. Isn't simpler and more
productive to treat 'tense' as a component of the utterance, a component
which may be realized either grammatically or lexically — or, redundantly,
both — or even (as often in English, and I am beginning to suspect in
Hebrew) left unmarked?


Stoney Breyer
Writer*
Touchwood Creative | www.touchwoodcreative.com
3200 Locust Street, St. Louis, MO. 63103
tel: 314-421-9878 x103 | fax: 314-421-6276
stoneyb AT touchwoodcreative.com
*ein Mann ... dem das Schreiben schwerer fällt als allen anderen Leuten.
-Thomas Mann

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