Talk:Defective verb

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[edit] I got a question for you experts

"I used to do heroin." The verb "use" in this sense is never used in present. Spanish speakers often try to use it in the present:

  • I use to work monday to friday, nine to five.

(to mean "I work monday to friday, nine to five.") That tense is awkward in enlgish because the 'd' doesn't really make a sound before the 't' anyhow.

So I guess that that is a defective verb right?

Did it use to be allowed in all tenses, and the present tense fall out of use? Or did it start to develop by abreviating some other construction (like "I am used") and never fully develop?

It is debatable whether it's defective, because (according to some sources) it is only a specific sense of the verb "to use", which is non-defective. On the other hand, "used (to)" is specifically mentioned in some grammar books as an auxiliary verb, which would imply regarding it as separate from "to use". The Oxford English Dictionary confirms that "use to" was formerly used in the present tense and in other ways ("using to", etc). Incidentally, it is not quite always in the form "used" even today, because colloquially people often say "did not use(d) to" or "didn't use(d) to" (there is a debate over whether the "d" should be used in these forms - the OED gives both spellings) as the negative. In formal English, though, the negative should always be "used not to". The form "usen't" also exists, at least in Britain, though it is not terribly commonly heard any more. -86.133.48.161 19:18, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
Also, it's pronounced differently from the other use: i.e., used to is normally pronounced something like [ju:stu:] or [ju:stə] rather than [ju:zdtu:]. Cf. I used two pans [ju:zdtu:]. I think Huddleston and Pullum's grammar treats it as a defective member of the auxiliary class.Matve 22:04, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] What if I say that I think you guys are all completely wrong about this?

I have a new model for explaining the behaviour of those modal auxiliaries that circumvents the whole defective verb definition. It is not fit for any article on wikipedia since it is just something I figured out while riding my bike. But I thought some one involved in this page might be interested.

I don't think can, should, will, could, would, might... are defective verbs in the present tense. I think they are all moods and tenses of the only verb in english that is not defective, 'do'. Although 'do' has no meaning, it is very uselful due to its lack of meaning and lack of defectiveness. 'eat' has no conditional tense. But the conditional of 'do' is 'would'. So in order to form the conditional of 'eat', we have to use the relegate 'eat' to the position of infinitive, so that the conjugated verb can be one with a conditional form. 'will' is the future form of 'do'.

Since 'do' is the only verb that has most of these forms, there is no reason to think that in this tense, an 's' is required in the third person.

In current use, 'do' is also one of 3 verbs that accepts inversion and 'not'. The other two are 'be' and 'have', although inversion, and negation of 'have' are limited to certain circumstances in the new world, while they are completely free in England. "I haven't any money"

What do you think guys? I don't know what the history of those modals is. But I think that this model offers a much cleaner explanation of their behaviour than to call them defective. To repeat myself, it is all the other verbs that are defective.

Jackie

In case you're curious: historically, these modals all derive from non-defective main verbs; will and would derive from the present and past of a verb expressing desire, shall and should from a verb expressing obligation, and so on. Ruakh 15:50, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I was actually curious where this came from, and I was curious since I was a kid if there was a relationship between the two kinds of will. But I am not sure if a gramatical model has to be consistent with history, or just as simplest model you can come up with that predicts common usage.

I've thought about this some more, and I think your explanation creates more problems than it resolves. For example, if should is simply a form of do, then why do we say "You should do it" rather than simply "You should it"? Ruakh 19:25, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] got

On the other hand, a new defective verb that is quickly developing in english, especially in the new world, is 'got'. It was the past tense of 'get'. But it is changing into a defective sinonym of 'have'.

I don't got any money. (bare infinitive exists) I got money. (first person use consistent with old definition) He s got money. (reanalize... For some reason the third person 's' comes before this verb instead of after!!!!) He gots money. (hip people move 's' to the other side of the verb in an attempt to make it less defective.)

  • I gots to go. (people who are trying to be hip, but are not very good at it, especially rappers, add new third person 's' when it is not third person.)
  • used to got (there is not full infinitive), must say 'used to have'
  • goted (nope, past tense has not been developed yet either)
  • gotting (nice try, maybe in a hundred years, just stick with 'having' for now)
  • I will got???? (the bare infinitive is not used in all cases either)

Of course, none of this applies in England, where I live currently.

Jackie

That's not exactly standard English, and I'm not sure all of your explanations are completely correct. For example, are you sure that "I gots to go" is due to "people who are trying to be hip," and not simply a normal conjugation in the relevant form of English? Ruakh 15:51, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

No. It is not standard english. But that is why we are fortunate enough to see a defective verb in the making. About the 'I gots', that did actually cross my mind, that there are dialects that add the 's' universally (newfoundland). But I also here it from people trying to sound cool. In any case, "I don't got" is the phrase that is most common, and can be used by all classes and colours of North Americans without making too many people thing that you are "trying too hard". And like I said, "He's got", is now used more like "He sgot", where "got" is a special verb that adds the third person 's' to the front side instead of the back side

I know

you know

he knows (normal everyday third person s)


I got

you got

he sgot (s on the wrong side)


I have

you have

he has (s deletes v)


I am

you are

he is (totally different, but still gets s in there)

Wow, this is almost completely wrong in every possible way. In particular, the idea of having the "s" on the wrong side of the verb is one of the silliest conjectures in the history of amateur linguistics.
First, none of this is new. You can look up citations, but the fact that the negative is "he ain't got" pretty much proves the point, as it takes a whole series of derivations to connect to two.
Anyway, what you spell as "he s got" is normally spelled "he's got." It's just the familiar contraction for "he has got" that's been around for centuries. In most American dialects, it's considered perfectly acceptable for all but the most formal occasions--while the uncontracted form sounds stilted to some people, uneducated to others, and sometimes even both simultaneously.
Of course "I got" and "you got" derive from "I've got" and "you've got" by dropping the nearly-inaudible (in many dialects) 'v' sound.
"He gots" does not involve some heretofore never seen process of English suffix movement. In some dialects (rural whites in the Deep South and in Canada), it's formed by association with "I got" and "you got." In some black English dialects, it has a long history of alternation with "he got," with "gots" expressing current possession ("he gots his guitar with him") and "got" expressing habitual state ("he got brown eyes"). (Compare with the two forms of be, or one form plus absent copula, in many BEV dialects.)
As for "I gots," some BEV dialects carry this distinction to first person (hence, "I gots my guitar"). I can't explain Newfies, but then who can?
"I gots to go" has nothing to do with any of this. The use of "got to" meaning "must" has been frozen as an idiom for many generations (hence "gotta"). --75.36.142.90 11:28, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] login

I don't think "login" is such a good example. I use and see expressions like "he logs in every day" quite frequently, and don't see anything wrong with them. It seems like just another phrasal verb. DopefishJustin 23:25, Mar 29, 2004 (UTC)

"log in" is a phrase. "login" is not. Some people consider "login" to be a single-word verb but there are no matching "he logins", "I loginned", or "loginning is difficult". In this respect I guess it could be considered a defective verb. But I'm more inclined to consider it an orthography issue where some people write "login" in place of "log in" but always inflect it as the latter. — Hippietrail 12:43, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Puisse

I don't understand the removal of puisse from the article. According to the log summary, "puisse is a regular subjunctive form frequently used to express wishes, equivalent to "may" in that regard, and not a good example." This doesn't make sense, for two reasons:

  • Puisse is a subjunctive form, not an imperative form. How, then, can it be "not a good example" of a word that's not the imperative form of pouvoir?
  • Puisse isn't really the example here. Pouvoir is the example (of a verb with no imperative), and puisse is one form that one might have expected the imperative of pouvoir to take. If this is a bad example of a verb without an imperative, then why remove only a part of it?

At any rate, I've reverted the removal, because I think it's important to include puisse, for exactly the reason it seems to have been removed: puisse might seem like the imperative of pouvoir, until you think about it for a moment. Simply writing that there's no imperative peux leads the reader to think, "Hey, wait a sec! What about puisse? . . . Oh, wait, never mind."

If my reversion bothers anyone, please reply here.

Ruakh 14:05, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Defective verbs in English

I split the first paragraph of this section into several to seperate the Standard English features from the dialectal/archaic, and to mention the non-defective counterparts to the defective verbs. Used star+italics for all ungrammatical phrases, as the bottom of the page already has. I put the impersonal verbs discussion in a separate section but did not change it.

I left "subjunctive" in the list of missing forms, although I'm not sure that's correct. The past form doubles as the past subjunctive, as is the case with almost all other English verbs. The present, well, maybe "He can" is a subjunctive and that's why it's missing the -s.

sluggoster 03:00, 16 Oct 2005 (UTC-8)

Your changes look good to me.
I've changed to article to read that the relevant verbs are missing present subjunctives, which is indeed the case: you can say, "It is imperative that I be able to use my computer," but not *"It is imperative that I can use my computer." As you say, the ones with past indicatives do use them as past subjunctives as well: "if I could do it" can mean either "if I were able to do it" or "if I was able to do it." Ruakh 20:08, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
First off, "can" may be used in the present subjuncive as in "Catch me if you can" and indeed "It is imperitive that I can use my computer" although "may" is a better choice. The same is true of each other word listed save those which are already in the past tense (must, should, would, could, might, ought, etc.). Therefor it is incorrect to state that defective verbs lack present subjunctives. Secondly, no such construction as "if I was able to do it" exists. Perhaps you were thinking of "if I had been able to do it." --Jr mints 15:43, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
I think it's interesting to note that these verbs weren't defective in Old English, and that their cognates in other Germanic languages still aren't, though. 惑乱 分からん 13:37, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
I think it's interesting that the verb "will" in the archaic sense of desire is not defective. jasonc65

I don't agree with mentioning that "can", "shall" etc don't take the third person "s", since this isn't a defect - it's not the reason why they're defective, and on its own, it doesn't make a verb defective. Also, the use of "should" as the past tense of "shall" is not archaic. If I say, "Am I?" then afterwards I can say, "I asked whether I was", casting both verbs into the past tense; similarly, if I say, "Shall I go?" then afterwards I can say, "I asked whether I should go," again putting both verbs into the past. -86.133.48.161 18:59, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Agreed on all counts. —RuakhTALK 22:31, 18 December 2006 (UTC)
I disagree on the first count. As a defective verb is one which cannot be completely conjugated, the failure of "can" and "shall" to conjugate in the third person (which is regular in Modern English verbs) and their lack of infinatives and participles are precisely what makes them defective.--Jr mints 17:40, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

In the construction "We have been to Paris several times", "to Paris" looks to be a prepositional phrase similer to "in Paris" or "at Paris" showing a state of being. It is possible to frame this construction in the present as in "We are to port of the leading yacht", however, in the case of Paris, Modern English speakers would probably choose "in" because "to" is less descriptive. --Jr mints 18:30, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Beware

Beware is not truly a verb but instead a clause constructed by synthesis of the verb "be" and the adjective "ware." Its present participle is then "being ware", and likewise its past participle is "been ware." The use of "beware" as a verb is limited only by the fact that "be" itself is a defective verb that augments its deficiencies with forms of "am" and "is." Therefor I am taking "beware" out of the list of examples.--Jr mints 16:25, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

You are mistaken: "beware" is truly a verb, as any good dictionary (such as American Heritage, Merriam-Webster, or the Oxford English Dictionary) will tell you. You're right that it comes from "be" + "ware", but it should be obvious that it's no longer that, as you can say, "Beware the Ides of March", but never, *"I'll see to it he's ware the Ides of March". —RuakhTALK 20:35, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
The construction "Beware the Ides of March" employs the imperative sense of the verb "be" as in "Be good", "Be happy", or "Be honest". Also, if you will look up "ware" in any of those fine dictionaries, I'm sure you will see that the construction "I'll see to it [that] he's ware the Ides of March" is quite possible though the Modern English speaker is more likely to say "ware of the Ides of March." The use of "of" has increased in Modern English to counter the loss of the genitive case.--Jr mints 21:24, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
Of a truth! I am wont to use it thusly myself! Thou speak'st wiser than thou art ware of!
We are talking modern English here, correct? The use of ware as an independent adjective is archaic to the best of my knowledge. Most speakers probably haven't thought about the word enough to make the connection with wary, the modern equivalent. Any supporting citations? --RJCraig 22:04, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
You are mistaken; according to the OED, ware never took a directly-construed complement. —RuakhTALK 22:35, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
I never said that "ware" was in common use, though it has been used within this century by authors such as Mary Webb in Precious Bane, written in 1924, and continues to be listed as current with the meaning "aware, conscious" by Miriam-Webster. "Beware" , however, is in common use with the meaning "be aware." As to directly-construed complements, the "ware" I am referring to is an adjective and so may not take any complements. Regardless of all else, you must see that "beware" , though conjoined for many years, still functions in the vary same way that it did apart and therefor works under the conjugations of "be". --Jr mints 23:18, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
Now I think we're both confused. You seem to be confused when you suggest that adjectives don't take complements; many, many take complements of various types (usually infinitives or prepositional phrases), and even if we restrict consideration to simple noun-phrase complements construed directly, consider worth ("it's worth $3"). I'm confused about your argument; you acknowledge that beware and be ware aren't equivalent (since beware is in common use while ware is not, and since beware can take a direct object while ware cannot take a directly-construed complement), but then simultaneously insist that beware and be ware are equivalent, with beware's inflected forms being simply the inflected forms of be plus the adjective ware.
At any rate, I think I'm going to have to fall back on those old mainstays, WP:V and WP:OR. The OED describes beware as a verb without inflections; if you wish to claim otherwise, you'll need to provide a reputable source.
—RuakhTALK 00:12, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
I hope I have not violated the bounds of friendly academic discussion and I'm very sorry if I have offended. But, given the decidedly strange development of the verb, I still think it a poor example of the defective verb in English. Also, perhaps we could continue our discussion of complements elsewhere.--Jr mints 00:51, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
Nope, you've not offended at all. And you might be right that it's a bad example; the problem is, defective verbs are always idiosyncratic somehow, since if they weren't idiosyncratic, they wouldn't be defective. We have to give some example. —RuakhTALK 03:26, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Beware has both a transative and an intransitive form. Perhaps in the intransative sense it springs from "vb. be + adj. ware" and in the transative from "prefix be- + vb. ware". In Old English, "waer" was an adjective meaning "wary, watchful" and "bewerian" was a weak transative verb derived from the same source meaning "guard, watch". In Middle English, "be ware" was used by Wyclif to mean "be wary" and "beware" to mean "watch". In Modern English, Shakespear used "beware" in both senses but sometimes with a mixed meaning. In Henry VI he writes "Priest, beware your beard, I mean to tug it and to cuff you soundly" clearly meaning "watch, guard", and in the heretofor much quoted Julius Ceasar he writes "Caesar, beware of Brutus" meaning "be wary", however, he also writes "Beware the Ides of March" which seems to mean "watch warily, guard against". If the transative form of "beware" is indeed related to "bewerian" then a complete conjugation is as easy as that of "befriend". However, the akwardness with which forms like "bewared" and "bewaring" come to us show that most people think of "beware" in the intransative meaning of "be wary". Additionally, notice the change in pronounciation between the intransative "bE•wAre" and the transative "be•wAre".--Jr mints 06:07, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

In my English the verb has only one pronunciation, accented on the second syllable. No citations or examples more current than Shakespeare? --RJCraig 16:06, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
Try saying "Let the buyer beware!" and then "Beware the Ides of March". Notice how the first "beware" places stress on both syllables whereas the second does so only on the last syllable.--Jr mints 19:21, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, but I say them the same. Do you have a citation of source that says some people pronounce them as you claim? --RJCraig 19:35, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Here are some more samples of "beware" in historical and contemporary contexts:

-In wyclif's Middle English translation of Mathew 10:17, "But be ye war of men, for thei shulen take you in counseilis, and thei shulen bete you in her synagogis", the meaning "be ware" is evident, but in the Authorized Translation of 1611 the verse is rendered, "But beware of men...".

-In the Authorized Translation, Timothy 4:15 reads, "Of whom bee thou ware also, for he hath greatly withstood our words[or, our preachings]". The New Scofield Reference Edition of the Authorized Version renders the same verse "Of whom do thou beware also...".

-Alfred Lord Tennyson wrote in his poem "Pelleas and Effarre", contained in Idylls of the King, "He woke, and being ware of someone nigh, / Sent hands upon him, as to tear him...".

-Noah Webster's 1828 Dictionary lists "beware" as an intransative verb but provides the usage note "This word though here admitted as a verb, from the Saxon,is rarely used as a verb in fact; or if a verb, is now never used except in the imperative mode It is a compound of be and the Old Eng. ware, now wary. Be wary of danger. Hence it cannot be used with did, like a regular verb, nor with be, in any of its inflections, he is beware; for this would be to use the substantive verb twice before ware and wary, is and be. Ben Jonson however has used the word in the third person. He bewares to act. But it has no past tense or participle, and therefore, if admitted as a verb, it is defective,and used only in the imperative mode, or after an auxiliary."

-Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) contains, "Ware, n.[AS. waru caution.] The state of being ware or aware; heed." as well as "Ware, v.t.[AS. warian] To make ware; to warn; to take heed of; to beware of; to guard against."

-Thomas Lovell Beddoe's 1822 play "The Bride's Tragedy" contains "But be you 'ware of compliment akin / to falsehood...".

-In 2000, pop-punk band Ace Troubleshooter released the song "Don't Trust that Girl" on Don't Stop a Rockin' which contains "Hey fellas, be you ware / Don't want to end up like me..."

It is also interesting to google forms such as "beware", "be ware", "being ware", "been ware", "bewaring", "bewared", and "bewares" to see how internet users currently deal with conjugating the verb.--Jr mints 18:52, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

The punk bank lyric example is the only one of any relevance IMO. (But note: it could be conscious imitation of Biblical/religious language.) Everything else you cite is nearly a century old or older. And Webster said it himself: if admitted as a verb, it is defective.
Googling certainly does turn up some interesting things...
Bewared the last time i did that with this ciga boxes, MY gold pen tarnish...
Summary: bewared!! do not buy from osps!!
Caeser bewared a lot of things. He bewared invading armies and plagues, he also bewared poison ivy and running with scissors. Buy the Ides of March?
I have uninstalled [hopefully] their free-ware, having been bewared.
Shall we let the (obviously) barely literate guide us in usage. "Consider the source" still sounds like good advice. --RJCraig 19:35, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
I hope you aren't impugning the general intelect of internet users. What would that mean for wikpedia? English belongs just as much to the illiterate as to the literate, and common usage is, afterall, what dictates dictionary content. But anyway, what I hoped to show was that "beware" is commonly thought of and used in the same sense as "be wary" which is why forms like "bewaring" sound odd even though "befriending" is normal. However, your google examples show something yet different from that. In the first sample, "bewared" is being used not as a preterite but as a combination of "be" and a percieced past participle "wared" so as to mean "be warned". The same apears true of the second as well if they are not both typing errors. This merely shows that many people recognize the "be" constituent of "beware" as the imperative verb. The third does seem to be the preterite of "beware", however, the user looks to be writing in a consciously awkward style for effect, playing on the famous verse. The fourth quote might easily mislead a reader as to the inteligence of the one uttering it. But, I happen to know that the "beware" mentioned is the name of a spyware program. The user writes "bewared" in the same way someone would write "scammed", "hammered", or "hacked". As for Mr. Webster's note, I hope it shows that "beware" is mainly defigned as a verb only because it doesn't fit well elsewhere. Finally, before you dismiss mine earlier post citing Shakespear, I wish you to notice how, in his day, "beware" from "bewerian" and "beware" from "beo waer" were blending meanings.--Jr mints 20:58, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
The form "bewaring" sounds odd because beware is a defective verb. beware may mean the same thing as be wary (semantics) but that doesn't mean it is equivalent in other respects (syntax & morphology). If "bewaring" and "bewared" show anything, it is that people are treating beware as a regular verb.
I don't want to seem like I am dismissing thine earlier post, but let's just fastforward to the end, shall we? Do you have an alternative example of a defective verb in English? --RJCraig 22:23, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
What about one the classic examples such as "shall", "may", or even "be"? They are all quite defective and may be easily demonstrated as such.--Jr mints 22:44, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
I think that edit avoids confusion nicely.:)--Jr mints 23:01, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Preterite Present Verbs

The term "Preterite Present" is commonly and redundantly used to describe the past subjunctive use of the preterite verbs "might", "could", "should", "must", and "ought." However, these verbs are not and have never been anything other than the preterite forms of defective "may", "can", "shall", "mote(rarely used save in "so mote it be")", and regular "owe(through an older spelling)" respectively. Therefor, it is unnecesary and confusing to include these so called "Preterite Presents" in the discussion of defective verbs. Furthermore, as "Preterite Presents" are infact preterites, it is completely absurd to suggest that the lack of forms such as "have musted", "he oughts", "to must", or "to could" makes them any different from regular verbs. For example, observe how the nondefective verb "think" fails to form "have thoughted", "he thoughts", or "to thought".--Jr mints 17:24, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

You seem to be confused. The term preterite present is applied not to could and should and so on, but to can and shall and so on, as in Old English they were preterite forms used as presents. (As you can tell, they have since picked up preterite-ish forms of their own, viz could and should and so on.) At any rate, can/could is a defective verb because it lacks an infinitive (*"He wanted to can leave", *"I had him can leave"), an imperative (*"Well, can!"), a gerund/present participle (*"I'm not canning"), a past participle (*"It's could be him"), and a present subjunctive (*"It's essential that he can leave"). —RuakhTALK 20:40, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
You are correct that "preterite present" was originally applied only to those germanic verbs which do not take a third person singular ending while in the present such as "can" and "shall". Because of their common subjuctive use certain strong proto-germanic verbs spawned separate weak verbs whose present tense was the original preterite tense. It is thought that their original indicative strong conjugations and new subjunctive weak conjugations blended causing the loss of the third personal ending. Examples of preterite-present verbs in Old English are indeed "cunnan(pres. cann)" and "sceal". However, if you read many of the articles related to English grammer on wikipedia including the page on "Preterite-present verbs", you shall see that "preterite present" is now used to refer in a general way to modal auxiliary verbs many of which are actually subjunctive as in the case of "could" or "should" when used to refer to a present or future action. I agree with the inclusion of verbs like "can" and "shall" which are in fact defective. But, trying to show that their preterite tenses fail to function as present tenses shows nothing and increases confusion on this topic. Also, as I think I said under 5.1, "can" may be used in the present subjunctive.--Jr mints 22:38, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm confused. Everything you say makes sense, except for your claim that can can be used in the present subjunctive, but then I don't see what in the article that you're objecting to, as the article doesn't seem to say anything that disagrees with anything you say, again excepting your claim that can can be used in the present subjunctive. —RuakhTALK 00:15, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
Oh! I see. The problem seems to be a very fundamental disagreement about what constitutes a description of Modern English. The article takes the view, as I do, that Modern English can be described without reference to its history (though history can be useful in explaining why it's a certain way), while you seem to take the view that Modern English must be described in terms of its history. E.g. for all intents and purposes, ought is its own, defective, verb; but since it historically was a past tense of owe, you say that it's still a past tense of owe, and apparently must be viewed as a special sense of owe that's only used in this archaic preterite form but has a present-tense sense. I don't know how to resolve this disagreement. —RuakhTALK 00:26, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm sorry that my first post was so obscure. Even if you disregard "ought" and "must" as preterites, I take exception with the suggestion that the absence of "to should" is an indication of defect. For "should" is indeed the preterite of "shall" and cannot be expected to fulfill the same roll as its present tense. "Shall", however, is defective for that reason. I think the issue would be much easier to understand if the defectiveness is approached from the basic form of the verb rather than the past subjunctive. As for "ought" and "must", they may be fossilized fragments, but that doesn't change what they are or how they behave. Trying to squeeze them into the roll of present verbs obviously creates more defects than it solves.--Jr mints 01:39, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
Ought is not used in the present-sense at all, but in a past subjunctive or past indicative sense, which is why it may refer to past, present, or future actions in one form. The past indicative "ought" is used in "We have left undone those things which we ought to have done; And we have done those things which we ought not to have done." The past subjunctive refering to the present is used in "You ought not to wake granny from her sleep with your loud music." And finally, the past subjunctive refering to the future is used in "My parsel ought to arrive in the next week or so." If "ought" had truly become its on present verb, this would not be possible. In truth, "ought" continues to be used as it always was even if none understand why it is so.--Jr mints 22:04, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Redefinition of Linguistic Terminology"

Here is the list of problems and how I hoped to adress them with my earlier edit of the "Defective verbs in English" segment:

1. The first sentence is inspecific in describing English to have "few" defective verbs. At the very least, this is a weak starting sentence. I re-worded it to show that "few" is in reference to older languages which were allowed to change more before becoming literarily standardised.

2. The second sentence implies that modal auxiliary verbs are defective e.g. "can, may, will, must, and so on." Modal auxiliary verbs are not defective. Only the preterite-present auxiliaries and "will" are defective. I detailed which auxiliaries were defective and why.

3. Sentences 3 and 4 state that "in Standard English" the listed verbs lack "infinitives, participles, imperatives, or present subjunctives." The first problem with this is that, according to the Wikipedia article "Standard English", "There are no set rules or vocabulary for 'Standard English' because, unlike languages such as French, Spanish or Dutch, English does not have a governing body ... to establish usage." And so I removed the Pedagogal and independantly-researched proscription of "Standard English." The second problem is that, while it might be argued those forms are lacking, it is equally likely that such forms are "missing" not because they are impossible but merely for "semantic reasons"(see "Impersonal verbs in English" segment). I re-wrote the sentences to explain that, because of their use as auxiliary verbs, they were not likely to appear in certain forms but that their true defect was apparent in the lack of a third-person conjugation.

4. Sentence 6 is non-tangential to defective verbs and is implied in the fact that the verbs are defective only in the third person. I removed it.

5. Sentences 7 and 8 present themselves as self-supporting facts while making the patently subjective pronouncement that "must" may not refer to future time. These sentences, if tangential, do not add much helpful information about English defective verbs. They were removed.

6. The second paragraph is entirely subjective and independant research. It was removed

7. The segment does not adress the defective verbs in English which have necessitated suppletion, "be" and "go". These verbs have no past tenses of their own and instead draw upon the past tense of an unrelated verb. Sentences were added to adress "be" and "go", and "was" and "went".--66.191.239.22 05:30, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Some of the "problems" you point out are indeed problems. Others are not. Standard English exists and can be described, whether or not there's a specific governing body that gives it a specific set of rules, and in Standard English, the modal auxiliaries do not have infinitives, gerunds, present or past participles, imperatives, or subjunctives. It's pretty obvious that these forms are not missing for semantic reasons, in that people simply use periphrastic forms when necessary, e.g. using forms of "to be able" to substitute for missing forms of "can". (By the way, this isn't suppletion. It may become suppletion someday, but it hasn't yet.) The modal auxiliaries are not defective in the third person; they just have surprisingly irregular third-person forms, due to their origins as ancient preterites. (It's quite possible to conjugate e.g. "may" in the third person: "He may".) Of course the verb "must" can refer to future time, but it doesn't have a future tense: we can refer to future time using any of "I must wash the window", "I have to wash the window", and "I will have to wash the window", but only the last of these is explicitly future tense, as the other two are present tense and can refer to present or future time. (I'll grant that this could be explained better, though, and acknowledging that in some sense English doesn't have a future tense.) The verbs "be" and "go" are not defective, only suppletive. —RuakhTALK 16:06, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
Again, according to the Wikipedia article "Standard English", "There are no set rules or vocabulary for 'Standard English'". This means that any prohibitory "descriptions" such as "they do not have infinitives" must indeed be subjective. These verbs have always possesed the so-called missing forms even though their use as auxiliary verbs predominates in our mutual dialect. If somone should wish to say "This calculus is impossible to can" it is certainly permissable within English grammar though not a common figure of speech. Shakespeare used it that way in his poem "The Pheonix and the Turtle": "Let the priest in surplice white, That defunctive music can" i.e. leave it to priests to understand that defunct music. In the same way that personal conjugations of impersonal verbs seem semanticly unlikely but may still be used with meaning in certain sentences, the auxiliary verbs may indeed be put into forms such as the infinitive and still make sense.
Your observation of periphrastic suppletion in these verbs merely shows that there are more popular figures of speech for these concepts not that the suppleted forms are lacking. "Be" and "go" are not defective because they are supplete but because, as far as anyone can tell, they have never had past tenses.
The absence of a third-person ending in preterite-present verbs and "will" is a defect resultant from the fact that Indo-European languages originally had only the first and second person. While the third person came to have a conjugation in the present, it never did in the past. In stead the first-person preterite was used in the third person. Today, these verbs still lack a third-person conjugation and substitute the first-person. However, this substitution is not always satisfactory. "I will it so" may be said naturally enough but "He will it so" poses some discomfort in the indicative mood. The reason this defect is not as noticeable with the other verbs is that they usually appear in the subjunctive mood which regularly lacks a third-person ending.
You are correct to say no verb in English has an explicitly future tense. This is because Germanic languages have never had the future tense. In stead, English uses either the present indicative or the past or present subjunctives. "I will have to", "I must have to", "I will", "I have to", or "I must" all potentially refer to future actions. "I will have to", and "I must have to" both imply that "have" is presently contrary to fact and so lend a sense of futurity.--66.191.239.22 19:03, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
You raise a lot of extremely good points, and I expect this article will be improved a good deal before this discussion is done, but there are a few points on which you seem to laboring under misapprehensions.
Firstly, you seem to be having difficulty distinguishing between English as it is today and English's ancestor languages as they may have been centuries or millennia ago. "Go" is not a defective verb. It's a suppletive verb. Presumably this suppletion arose because there was once a defective verb "go" (albeit maybe not with quite that form — I guess I should say, there was once a defective verb that is cognate with the modern verb-form "go"); but there is no longer such a defective verb, because it adopted he preterite of the verb "wend" (or a verb cognate with the modern verb "wend"). There is now a single, non-defective verb "go", whose preterite is "went". (There's also a single, non-defective verb "wend", whose preterite is "wended", but that's not really relevant.) A similar thing is true of "be", though there it's complicated by the fact that a few separate old verbs contributed forms (I think "be", "being", and "been" are from one verb, "was" and "were" are from another verb, and "am", "is", and "are" are from yet another), and also by the fact that "be" has more forms than any other verb (since no other verb draws a distinction parallel to that between "was" and "were" or to that among "be", "am", and "are").
Secondly, I'm not sure why you won't acknowledge that there are some facts of Standard English. Now, there are some "facts" that aren't true; for example, preposition stranding, while often maligned, is indeed a component of Standard English. But other facts are true; for example, *"Me went to the store" is incorrect in Standard English. These facts can be described.
By the way, the reason *"He will it so" is incorrect is that the non-auxiliary verb will is conjugated regularly: "He wills it so."
—RuakhTALK 20:08, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

As a native speaker of "English as it is today", I find your claim that I have trouble distinguishing my language from that of other centuries or millenia absurd and non-constructive. It is a patronizing way of saying that my understanding is misguided without presenting and defending your own logically. Please don't.

As for "go", how has the adoption of another verb's preterite made it any less defective? "Went" is no more a conjugation of "go" than "traveled" is. The same is true of "be" and "was".

Lastly, my objection to "Standard English" is that it is anything but. Everyone who talks about it has their own subjective measure. In reality English has always been as rich with diversity in vocabulary and expression as there are numbers of individual speakers. The only facts in English are the linguistic developments recorded in the past. All else is subjective, depending on the surveyor's point of view as a current speaker. Therefor, if no precedent for a rule can be found, it is not a rule but an opinion just like the preposition-stranding "rule". My edit covered only historicly observable and explainable facts without venturing into the realm of unprecidented opinions.

By the way, "wills", as the third-person indicative of "will", is no more a word than "goed" as the preterite of "go". Websters lists "will" as the "1st & 3rd sing. pres. indic." with no reference to "wills". "He will it so" is indeed the correct form but again only serves to illustrate "will"s defectiveness in the third person.--66.191.239.22 04:48, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

If you're going to keep making claims based on the history of English and its ancestor languages rather than on Modern English — claims that are obviously absurd to anyone who's spent even a little time studying Modern English — then I can apologize for sounding patronizing, but I can't apologize for the statement itself: it's true, and it needs to be said. —RuakhTALK 14:32, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

You're going to have to explain your disagreement with my claims if you want me to respond.--66.191.239.22 23:15, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

The Dutch suppletive verb "zijn"/"wesen"(see Dutch conjugation), which is the same as English "be"/"was", is considered defective because "zijn" and "wesen" rely on eachother to complete their conjugations. It is even listed on this page. Why then shouldn't "be" be mentioned?--66.191.239.22 20:18, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
I don't speak Dutch, but it seems like zijn and wesen are somewhere between two defective verbs and one suppletive verb; they're two separate verbs in that there are various moods/tenses/aspects/etc. where both exist (i.e. they have partly separate conjugations), but one suppletive verb in that when one doesn't exist, people freely substitute the other. That's not true of English be or go, each of which has one single conjugation. —RuakhTALK 21:06, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
You must admit that the distinction you're drawing is more dependent on point of view than any real text-book definition. While you are quite right that English speakers have no problem understanding that "was" is used as a past tense of "be" or "went" of "go"; for the sake of thoroughness, freely disseminated understanding, and those who have always wondered what-the-heck was up with those verbs; I think that "be" and "go" should at least be mentioned, if only sepparately, like Impersonal Verbs, as a topic tangent to Defective Verbs.--66.191.239.22 17:52, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
I'd be O.K. with a section discussing suppletive verbs; specifically, it would be nice to explain how defective verbs can evolve into suppletive ones, giving zijn/wezen as an example of something in between that might be partway through this process. But I must really insist that such a section clarify that suppletive verbs are not normally considered defective. —RuakhTALK 19:45, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
That would be good enough for me. Though I'd just like to know why you are so ardent in your desire to clarify that they are not normally considered defective. What catastrophy should betide if we were to be slightly technical and describe a suppletive verb in terms of a family of interrelated verbs? Afterall, don't you think people understand the use "be" and "go" well enough. If people reading this page understand what subjunctives and infinitives are, then I don't think an explaination of suppletive verbs' defects will shatter anyone's understanding that their different forms are insepparably linked in English.--66.191.239.22 05:02, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

While we continue to discuss the suppletive verbs and third person endings, for the sake of productivity, let's turn to the rest of my edit. You mentioned earlier that you approved some of my points. Specificly, what parts of the edit are you OK with?--66.191.239.22 16:41, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm O.K. with everything that doesn't redefine "defective verb" to include "modern verb-form that's cognate with an ancient defective verb". —RuakhTALK 21:06, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
Does that mean you agree that preterite-present verbs are defective in the third person? And do you also agree that the second paragraph should be removed?--66.191.239.22 21:58, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
No, sorry, I don't agree that preterite-present verbs are defective in the third person. (Sorry, I thought your argument for their defectiveness was that they were cognate with ancient defective verbs — you seemed to be saying something about Proto-Indo-European having lacked third-person conjugations.) And I wouldn't say that the second paragraph should be removed — I think it's informative and useful — seeing as it's not cited, and I don't know of any sources that characterize these phrases quite this way, I can't really object to your removing it. —RuakhTALK 01:46, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
Let me explain the preterite-present verb this way. As it says in that article, it comes from an old preterite form that has acquired a present meaning. So “he can” has the same form as “I can” for the same reason that “he ran” has the same form as “I ran.” “Will” is a little different: Historically it is not a preterite present, and in Old English the 1st and 3rd persons had distinct forms: “ic wille” and “he wile.” This very irregular 3rd person has been regularized in Modern English: to “he wills” when used as a transitive verb and to “he will” when used as an auxiliary verb (on analogy with other auxiliaries). --teb728 02:56, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
Thanks. I actually understand preterite-present verbs (though it's always nice to be sure we're all on the same page); I just don't see that the strangeness of their third-person forms constitutes defectiveness. (What makes those verbs defective is the fact that they're lacking various forms, not that fact that some of the forms they have are weird.) —RuakhTALK 14:02, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
I was agreeing with you, replying/explaining to the anon. That's why I didn't indent another level. --teb728 18:34, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
Oh, sorry! —RuakhTALK 19:45, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
I do want to remove the second paragraph because it does not demonstrate that other forms are ungrammatical only that they are not popular expressions. People don't speak so much with words as they do phrases. As such, they will invariably choose an established phrase rather than coin one of their own regardless of it's grammatical integrity. Additionlly, the istance of "be" followed by a dative phrase with an implicit motion is not limited to the perfect tense e.g. in the infinitive: "I'll be half-way to the mall by the time you get that old car started", present indicative: "When I'm to the point of needing your help, I'll let you know", or imperative: "Be back to your house by mid-night, Cinderella, or everyone shall know who you are."--66.191.239.22 17:28, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
Here is my original edit with a few extra sentences for clarification. If you look through it more carefully this time, I think you will find that most of the issues we talked about are infact already adressed. Please offer critique.
English has comparatively fewer defective verbs than some, more-aged Indo-European languages. Defects have primarily resulted from non-regular preservation of verb forms in popular figures of speech. The chief example of this tendency are the conglomerate verbs "be" and "go". The preterites of these verbs have faded from memory in favor of more popular turns of phrase i.e. "was" in stead of "be"s preterite and "went" in stead of "go"s preterite. These interloping preterites in turn have become seperate from their original present tenses "wes" and "wend" respectively. Today both "be" and "go" are firmly linked to their adopted preterites and may be considered irregular yet fully conjugating verbs. The other main source of defective verbs in English is the family of preterite-present verbs. These verbs; "can", "may", "shall", "wit", "mote", and sometimes "owe" and "dare"; all originated from the preterite tenses of lost verbs. Owing to the fact that English preterites have never had a third-person conjugation, preterite-present verbs lack personal endings in the third person, though "owe" and "dare" have been regularized in some figures of speech. Aditionally "can", "may", "shall", and "mote" have, for the most part, been preserved only in auxilliary use and as such no longer regularly appear in the infinitive mood, participial or perfect forms. The verb "will" also lacks a third-person ending and behaves the same as a preterite-present when use as a modal auxiliary. It has however been regularized in some figures of speech.
While it does not discuss the suppletives in their own section, neither does it say that they are defective. Rather, it says that they are the chief example of a tendency which has resulted in defective verbs such as the modal auxiliaries. Also note that third-person endings were not described as a defect per se, only mentioned in passing just as in the original article. The mood and tense defects are described but not in terms of grammatical and ungrammatical but rather, more accurately, in terms of common use.--66.191.239.22 05:37, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
I am sorry for not replying sooner, but 66.191.239.22’s new version is hardly better than his original.
Even after reading his disclaimer, it is only with difficulty that I can see that he does not actually label “be” and “do” as defective. If there is really a tendency which has resulted in defective verbs, he should use those verbs as examples rather than “be” and “do,” which did not result in defective verbs.
For the modal auxiliaries he also puts mistaken emphasis on their lack of 3rd person -s forms. Even after reading his disclaimer, it is only with difficulty that I can see that he does not describe it as a “defect per se.” I agree that the original article also puts excessive emphasis in this regard, but the new version increases this emphasis. If the article mentions 3rd person -s forms at all, it needs to make it clear that the modal auxiliaries are not defective in this regard. Failing to do so would confuse readers about what a defective verb is.
The main thing for the article to say is that modal auxiliaries are defective because their infinitives and participles are obsolete. Neither the original article nor the new version says that very well. --teb728 02:43, 3 August 2007 (UTC)
OK then, how about this:
The most commonly recognized defective verbs in English are the class of preterite-present verbs, can, may, shall, wit, mote/must, and sometimes owe/ought and "dare", plus the irregular verb will. Though these verbs were not originally defective, in most varieties of English today, they occur only in a modal auxiliary sense. However, unlike normal auxiliary verbs, they do not regularly conjugate in the infinitive mood. Therefor, these defective auxiliaries do not accept eachother as objects. Additionally, they do not regularly appear as participles.
It is short, states precisely how these verbs are defective, and directs the reader to other helpful articles rather than attempting to adress sundry other topics in one article.--66.191.239.22 17:32, 4 August 2007 (UTC)
Pretty good. But although dare was originally a preterit-present and can be used as a modal auxiliary, it has become totally regular, “he dares to go.” And more significantly for this article, it is not defective: It has an infinitive, “I don’t dare go,” a gerund, “my daring to go was fortunate,” and both participles, “a daring escape” and “I have never dared to do that.” The same is true of owe.
And although wit was also a preterit-present verb, I am not aware that it has ever been a modal auxiliary. And insofar as it is used at all in modern English, I am not aware of any missing forms: It certainly has an infinitive, “to wit” and a present participle, “an unwitting mistake.” I am going to remove dare and owe and wit. --teb728 23:25, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Try and . . ."

In the cited paper, Pullum claims that the constructions; "he tries and gets the paper", "I tried and got the paper", "Trying and getting the paper the is not my job", and "he has tried and gotten the paper"; are ungrammatical. However he also states in note 5 that they are grammatical when the verbs are thought of as independant actions, which way of thinking is always possible. While he does claim that equivalence fails betwene "try and get" and "try to get", he supplies no reason for this theory. Above all, Pullum's opinions are no more grammatical rules than mine or yours and are not intended to dictate grammatical propriety. The most that may be said is that "Try and . . ." is thought by some to be defective. That however, I think, is beyond the simple scope of this article.--24.151.175.5 16:14, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

The paper may be viewed at <http://www.ling.ohio-state.edu/publications/osu_wpl/files/osu_wpl_39.pdf>. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.151.175.5 (talk) 16:30, August 28, 2007 (UTC)

I hate to be seeming to make the argument ex auctoritate, but although you may claim that "Pullum's opinions are no more grammatical rules than mine or yours", the fact is that Geoffrey Pullum is one of the two authors of the Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, the principal scholarly reference work on English grammar, and is one of the foremost scholars of English grammar working today. What you call his "opinions" most would call his "research". If you want to say that there is some dispute over his analysis of the "try and" construction, then it's your responsibility to find a citation of some researcher that disagrees with his analysis; you can't just go and say "The expert's opinions are no more valid than mine; therefore there's dispute." AJD 17:18, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
As Pullum points out in his paper, even grammar texts and OED can be mistaken (particularly on whether the go get construct is archaic). I don’t denigrate his scholarly expertise, but unless he has actually researched the subject, I think that any native speaker of standard English has equally valid intuition on how our language is spoken. As a native speaker of standard American English, I regard the whole try & construct as somewhat nonstandard; I use it (if ever) only in the most informal register. But my ear does not object any more to “he tries & gets the paper” than to “I try & get the paper.” (“He tries & gets the paper” is certainly preferable to “he tries & get the paper.”)
In any case the verb to try itself is certainly not defective. I think that rather than going into a long NPOV discussion, the article should omit mention of the try & construct.
(The anon’s other change, on beware, is certainly wrong: beware lacks finite forms.) --teb728 23:36, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
"Beware" occurs in finite forms consistantly though not commonly throughout the corpus Modern English literature. Therefor "very rarely" is a fair asessment but "never" is plainly wrong. At the very least, you must admit that "never" is oftener subjective hyperbole than fact and ought be used very sparingly in academic language. In this case it doesn't add anything to the article.--24.151.175.5 12:32, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
I think it's fairly essential for this article to mention that verb constructions can be defective even if they center on verbs that aren't. I use "try and __" regularly, and while I might well reply to "I couldn't open the door; there was a sign on it that said it was locked!" with the question, "Well, did you try and open it?", I'd be flabbergasted if the answer I got were either "Yes, I tried and opened it!" (as that would flatly contradict the previous statement) or *"Yes, I tried and open it!" (as that would be ungrammatical). It's possible that other speakers use this construction more freely, in which case I guess it's not defective for those speakers, but unless you can find an example that everyone does agree on, the solution is to clarify, not to omit. —RuakhTALK 00:15, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
I don't think that this article needs to cover all the minutiae of English defective verbs. That should have its own page. Rather, this is merely an article about defective verb(s) in general, providing some basic examples from several languages. In my opinion, the English section is already a mite more in depth than the others.--24.151.175.5 12:32, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
It's true that this article is about defective verbs in general, but obviously where possible it's best to use English examples to clarify the various concepts, since our readers will understand those the most easily. If this article were getting very long, and our coverage of defective verbs in general were suffering due to our coverage of English minutiae, then obviously we'd have a problem; but as it is, it is not a problem to briefly mention of various kinds of defective verbs. —RuakhTALK 18:43, 29 August 2007 (UTC)
If Pullam or you or I (or even most people) wouldn’t use some form of a construct, that doesn’t make the construct defective. It is defective only if the form doesn’t exist. You seem to acknowledge that some people may say “he tries and does” to mean “he tries to do” – and similarly for other forms with inflectional endings; that indicates that those forms exist, and so the “try and” construct is not defective.
If you can’t think of a better example of a defective construct, are you sure one exists in English. Maybe the impersonal “there is” which seems to lack 1st and 2nd person forms? --teb728 09:04, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
It's defective for me at least, in that for me it doesn't exist — not only would I not use it, but if I heard it, either I wouldn't understand it correctly, or I'd consider it flatly ungrammatical. I do acknowledge that some people may say it, but I don't think I've ever heard it, and anyway, I also acknowledge that some people may say "I didn't can do it", but as of right now, that has no bearing on the verb's defectiveness. (Obviously if it becomes widespread, that's another matter. But I would posit that for the vast majority of speakers with the construction "try and __", it's defective.) —RuakhTALK 15:27, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
I was absolutely certain that I agreed with Ruakh. To convince myself, I did a quick Google search for "tries and does." While most instances are obviously ordinary coordinations (especially "tries, and does very well," with or without the comma), or discussions of the ungrammaticality of the phrase, the very first hit reads as follows:
This reads slightly awkward when I think about it (and sounds slightly more so when I read it aloud), but I nevertheless understood it so automatically that it took me a second to realize that it was actually a conjugation of "try and do." Clearly the user is not locked out whenever he tries, and succeeds, at doing anything; he is locked out whenever he tries to do anything. If you follow the link, people responded without having any obvious problem understanding what was intended.
There are also a few ambiguous examples, where the author seems to have thought he was writing the typical "tries and does very well" coordination, but the sentence parses better with the interpretation "tries to do [his/her] best." See ["She is an angel who tries and does her best"] and ["In fact it shows again that Findlay is the vocal asset of the band, no matter how Brian Josh tries and does his best"]. --75.36.142.90 12:06, 1 September 2007 (UTC)