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12Those are moods, not tenses.LaC– LaC2011-04-20 13:25:21 +00:00Commented Apr 20, 2011 at 13:25
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4@LaC: Couldn't "I will eat!" be considered a mood and not a tense?Dan– Dan2011-04-20 20:52:32 +00:00Commented Apr 20, 2011 at 20:52
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4There's no difference in the way English grammar treats will/would/shall/should/can/could/may/might/must. However, when teaching English, it's awkward to say that these are all tenses, and it's awkward not to have a future tense. Thus, constructions with "will" are called tenses, and constructions with "would" are sometimes called tenses, and constructions with the other auxiliary verbs above are generally called moods.Peter Shor– Peter Shor2011-04-21 00:43:29 +00:00Commented Apr 21, 2011 at 0:43
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7Now, to answer the question, "tense" refers to the time of the action (in fact, the word "tense" is just a fancy-pants way of saying "time"), while "mood" refers to one of several modes of use (to indicate fact, hypothesis, command, etc.). The two concepts are orthogonal: for instance, "I was" is past tense, indicative mood; "[if] I were [king]" is present tense, subjunctive mood; "[if] I had been [awake]" is past tense, subjunctive mood"; "I see [a cow in the field]" is present tense, indicative mood.LaC– LaC2011-04-21 12:19:15 +00:00Commented Apr 21, 2011 at 12:19
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4@LaC No, ‘If I were’ is not ‘present’ subjunctive! That’s ‘If I be’, and is not now used; see ‘lest I be’ for a contemporary example of the pr subj. ‘If I were’ is where a Romance speaker would use imperfect subjunctive, as in ‘Si (yo) estuviese listo, me iría’ (If I were ready, I’d leave) in Spanish; notice ‘iría’ is in the conditional. What you mislabel past subjunctive is a compound tense, aligning then with ‘Si hubiese estado listo’ which is the pluperfect subjunctive in Spanish, because ‘had been’ has ‘had’ in the imperfect subjunctive and ‘been’ in the participle.tchrist– tchrist ♦2012-02-03 12:45:29 +00:00Commented Feb 3, 2012 at 12:45
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