Form follows function

James A. Crippen james at UnLambda.COM
Thu Apr 5 19:01:09 UTC 2001


On Thu, 5 Apr 2001, Martin Jansche wrote:

>
> On Thu, 5 Apr 2001, Tibor Kiss wrote:
>
> > Where can I insert an adverb between a series of auxiliaries in English,
> > i.e.
> >
> > (1) John has often been asking strange questions.
> > (2) John has been often asking strange questions.
> > (3) John often has been asking strange questions.
> >
> > I assume that (2) and (3) are bad. What do the experts say? (ok, I can find
> > all the answers in Pollock (1989), but I don't want to go into that.)
>
> That may depend on the adverbs and the semantics (tense, aspect) of
> the VP.  It may also help to have as the highest auxiliary a form that
> does not cliticize to the subject.  I don't see anything wrong with
> the following two sentences, but that's just me:
>
>   (2') John has been often asked strange questions.
>   (3') John often has been asked strange questions.

Personally I can even take the following, but I don't think it's exactly
what he's thinking of:

(4) John has been asked strange questions often.

My brain really wants to hear an adverb in final position end with '-ly'
but it accepts 'often' anyway.  (Meaning that I almost hear 'oftenly' if I
think about it.)

'james

--
James A. Crippen <james at unlambda.com> ,-./-.  Anchorage, Alaska,
Lambda Unlimited: Recursion 'R' Us   |  |/  | USA, 61.2069 N, 149.766 W,
Y = \f.(\x.f(xx)) (\x.f(xx))         |  |\  | Earth, Sol System,
Y(F) = F(Y(F))                        \_,-_/  Milky Way.



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