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The sentence can be given as a grammatical puzzle [7] [8] [9] or an item on a test, [1] [2] for which one must find the proper punctuation to give it meaning. Hans Reichenbach used a similar sentence ("John where Jack had...") in his 1947 book Elements of Symbolic Logic as an exercise for the reader, to illustrate the different levels of language, namely object language and metalanguage.
For example: I was tired because I had been running. By yesterday morning they had already been working for twelve hours. Among the witnesses was John Smith, who had been staying at the hotel since July 10. This form is sometimes used for actions in the past that were interrupted by some event [12] (compare the use of the past progressive as ...
The preterite (Präteritum) (called the "imperfect" in older grammar books, but this, a borrowing from Latin terminology, ill describes it.) The perfect (Perfekt) The past perfect (Plusquamperfekt) In southern Germany, Austria and Switzerland, the preterite is mostly used solely in writing, for example in stories. Use in speech is regarded as ...
Demonstrations of sentences which are unlikely to have ever been said, although the combinatorial complexity of the linguistic system makes them possible. Colorless green ideas sleep furiously (Noam Chomsky): example that is grammatically correct but based on semantic combinations that are contradictory and therefore would not normally occur.
Examples in English are: "we had arrived" before the game began; "they had been writing" when the bell rang. The word derives from the Latin plus quam perfectum, "more than perfect". The word "perfect" in this sense means "completed"; it contrasts with the "imperfect", which denotes uncompleted actions or states.
That used, the above examples can be written as such: If you were to have called me, I would have come. Would he have succeeded if I were to have helped him? The condition clause can undergo inversion, with omission of the conjunction: Had you called me, I would have come. / Were you to have called me, I would have come.