The aorist!!
Jon Robertson
jmrober at pop6.ibm.net
Tue Nov 24 03:21:27 EST 1998
With regard to the seeming similarity between the aorist and perfect
tenses, while there certainly is some overlap I think a major
difference can and should be maintained. It seems to me that the
perfect is best seen as describing a "state" (much like Porter and
surely others have stated), while the aorist gives the "simple" (or
"snapshot") view of the action itself. According to this view, then,
the perfect would be much more interested in the state of the subject
and less in the aktionsart. The aorist would be an aspectual choice
of the speaker/writer to refer to the action in the most general way
available.
Okay, shoot me down now! : )
Jon Robertson
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