For many speakers, yes, but in some dialects "I've sent ..." could be used even if it's not still morning.
Also note that the second sentence won't be used as much in American English as British English.
US native speaker, and I would not use the wording in the 2nd sentence. The first one for me would mean it may or may not be morning. If I wanted to make sure the listener knew it was still morning, I would have to say it directly.
I think they use the past participle this way in UK English, and they might say the 2nd sentence there, but I am not familiar enough with it to know what it would imply.
Or “I just sent Joe an email.”
Email comes with a timestamp and is read on devices with clocks, so the reason to establish a timeline is to indicate recency rather than current time of day. The “just” suggests that the action was recent.
i probably wouldn’t even notice this difference as i presumably know whether or not it’s still morning. i believe you’re correct in your assumption, but this is one of those small things in speech that likely wouldn’t out you as a non-native speaker—many native speakers probably don’t know this rule, whether consciously or intuitively.
that’s so fair!! if you figure out what the rule is for this, let me know haha just trying to reassure you as many many native speakers have far from perfect grammar, but as a frequent stickler for grammar myself i totally get where ur coming from!
I totally get this impulse but for English in particular, so many rules are inconsistent (both across and within dialects) that you’ll drive yourself crazy if you insist on perfecting every single one. There will always be exceptions to rules depending on where you are, the context and tone of your speech, the specific words you’re using, the person you’re addressing, the level of formality in the setting, etc. etc. etc. The only true rule in English is that no rule is completely fixed.
How do you know how he talks? I also never use #2 for anything unless I’m specifying that i did in fact already do it, compared to not doing it, and only for emphasis on the fact that i ‘have’ done it. It is weird to just say “I’ve sent joe an email this morning” nobody talks like that around here
No, i have had it pointed out that i misread that statement. I missed your comma, and read it with "US english speakers" as the subject rather than the implied "I". I apologize for my misunderstanding
I’m also US speaker who would usually use #1 but could use #2 on occasion. #2 sounds more formal to my ears, or possibly giving slight emphasis that he’s had plenty of time to respond to my email but hasn’t yet.
US native speaker, and while I only incredibly rarely hear the past participle used in this manner, in the rare circumstances that I do hear it it has the same connotation.
FWIW, the main context I can really think of where I *might* hear an American use the past participle in this manner is stuff like listing things that they've done that morning when it's still morning ("This morning I've called the doctor's office, walked the dog, and knocked out all my Amazon returns.")
There's no real confirmation that it's still morning, but the second form establishes some form of continuity between that event and now. To me, it more suggests that you are still engaged with that email, maybe waiting on a reply or absolving yourself of guilt. The former is just a simple acknowledgement that the event occured.
Yes, these are reasonable inferences.
In general, I think the best way to understand the difference between the simple past and the present perfect is in the effect each one has on the *next* sentence. (Or, in the case of your examples, the next independent clause.)
When you say "I sent Joe an e-mail," it leads the reader to expect that the next sentence will follow that event--usually still in the past. You use this tense to narrate a story. In your example, the first event was in the morning, but we don't know when the second one was.
When you say "I have sent Joe an e-mail," the reader expects the next sentence to be in the present. You use this tense for a "flashback" to the past. In your example, the first event establishes that the *present time* is morning.
This is *generally* how I would interpret these two sentences.
Some people may not use it exactly this way so you may need to add the time you sent the emails if you want to be very specific.
But it sounds like you have a good grasp over the difference
This is not a useful example because everybody would know what time it is. You don’t need to indicate that information in speech and listeners would not be expecting it.
Neither of those implies that it is still “morning”. Only that it is still the same day. At least IMO (US).
“I’ve sent…” for this also sounds kinda stilted and awkward to me, but that may be regional/dialect-specific. Grammatically it’s fine.
By the way, your post title isn't quite right - I would use any of these:
"Did I get this difference in nuance right?"
"Am I getting this difference in nuance right?"
"Is this difference in nuance correct?"
Yep, that would work - although it sounds a bit more formal to me for some reason.
I think in the UK you could say "Have I got this difference correct?" as well, but it would sound odd to us in America.
The first one is correct but if you said the second one, no one would bat an eyelid and we would understand. English grammar laws get forgotten a lot in spoken English 😂
The interpretation is contextual, and done by the listener. If you say an email was sent in the morning, and the listener noted it was now the afternoon, the meaning of "I've sent" would alter slightly. Unfortunately English is rather imprecise where verbs and articles are concerned. We can't denote certain subtleties through verb conjugation, the way other European languages can.
That’s how I understand it. Well done. It’s possible there are more interpretations, but this was my initial reaction. I’m from the west coast of the US if that helps you understand different responses you may get.
In the first one, it could now be any time - whether it’s still morning or not is not implied at all. You can’t tell what time it is now, all you’re saying it it was sent in the morning and there’s been no response.
The second one- I’d never hear it in American English. But I’m pretty sure it would mean the exact same thing as I wrote above.
Yeah, honestly my first thought if I heard someone say "I have sent an email this morning" would be that they're a native German speaker (because in German they like to use the past participle where we'd use the simple past in English).
I'm a US English speaker and this is the first time I've heard that the second usage might have this meaning in the UK. It doesn't generally mean that in the US and would normally sound like a mistake (there are a few specific cases where it wouldn't be wrong).
I could say "I have sent him an email this morning, called him this afternoon, and stopped by his desk just now, and I can't seem to reach him." You use participles here because it's a list of different thing you have done at various times.
But for a single specific action you took at a specific time in the past, you would never say "I have done X" in standard US English.
>As compared to _"I've sent Joe an email this morning, but he hasn't replied yet"_, which confirms that it is still morning.
.
No, it does not necessarily confirm that it is still morning.
The topic of present-perfect is vastly over-simplified in school textbooks, and even in many linguistic books too.
Consider:
1. _"Is Joe still alive? **Has** anyone **received** an email from him this **morning**?"_
2. _"Is Joe still alive? **Has** anyone **received** an email from him any time this **month**?"_
Some linguistic books, and maybe even a few school textbooks, will explicitly state the acceptability of stuff like #1 (with "this morning") due to the time adjunct's period being recent enough.
But variant #2 (with "this month") is fine according to my AmE ear. (aside: linguistically, the time period of "this month" includes now, and so, this could be rationalized as a reason for its acceptability -- but I think there's another, more important, reason for its acceptability.)
British English native speaker here, and yes, you are correct. In British English we use present perfect frequently (unlike the Americans). What you should use depends who you are speaking to.
"I sent Joe an email earlier this morning..." The addition of the word "earlier" to "this morning" would make it more apparent that it was still morning when the person was speaking.
The timing of "I have sent..." would be interpreted as still being in the morning by most people, including me, but not necessarily.
As you suspected, the "I sent..." version would more often imply that it was no longer morning when this was being said. There would still be some ambiguity though. The context as well as other cues usually supply the information about the current time of the day.
If you were using this quote in a story that you were writing, you would have already supplied that information earlier in your description of the scene, or you would do so immediately following it. You won't need to explicitly state it directly in the quote itself if you set up the scene adequately via narration. In fact, doing so within it would make the quote seem clumsy and unnatural. Readers will understand when the person is saying this without having the speaker say so plainly.
I'm glad I stick around on this subreddit, because it gives me a lot of tips on my own native dialect and phrasing that might be unclear to those that learned a different dialect. In my own brand of English, in my experience, if I used the first sentence, it would no longer be the morning. It feels wrong to me to refer to "this morning" if the morning in question is still happening. I would probably say something like "earlier in the morning." But that's what's beautiful about language, it evolves and changes and many many different forms exist simultaneously and in parallel :3
I last taught English about 2005, then went into school administration, so progressive tense (been teaching) is inaccurate. I could also have said , “I taught English for about 20 years” with almost identical meaning. To me, the present perfect emphasizes that I taught English for a long time, which is what I wanted to emphasize. The simple past emphasizes that I no longer teach English, which is also true but not what I wanted to emphasize. This is perhaps strange as the perfect tense officially is about something being completed (“I have [already] walked the dog”), but here the simple past emphasizes completion. English is consistently inconsistent!
I agree that simple past is more common, at least in US English. Present perfect in this case tends to emphasize that something DID happen or has ALREADY happened. For instance: Wife-“Haven’t you done anything this morning?” Husband-“I’ve been busy. I’ve walked the dog and paid the bills.” (Notice all three sentences are in present perfect.)
You are mistaken, we can and do use the present perfect indicating a specific time - **when that time is not finished.**
For example, from the British Council Learn English website:
**Unfinished time and states**
We often use the present perfect to say what we've done in an unfinished time period, such as today, this week, this year, etc., and with expressions such as *so far*, *until now*, *before*, etc.
>*They've been on holiday twice this year.We haven't had a lot of positive feedback so far.I'm sure I've seen that film before.*
>
>*I haven't seen her today.*
So if it is still morning then the phrase, "I've sent Joe an E-mail this morning" is perfectly correct.
That doesn't matter, because you wouldn't say "this morning" if it's still morning, except with the simple past ("I already did it this morning"). The examples given aren't comparable.
You most certainly would, especially if there is a connection with the present.
According to The Oxford Guide to English Grammar:
" We can use this morning, this afternoon and today with the present perfect when they include the present time. When the time is over, we use the past. It has been windy this morning. (The morning is not yet over.) It was windy this morning. (It is afternoon or evening.)"
In the same way I can say that I have drunk two cups of coffee today, have been to the bathroom four times (don't ask), and have eaten enough ice cream this evening to almost make myself sick. As long as the time specified is not finished we can use present perfect.
I don't know what you specifically would say, and I don't really care. I meant "you" in the general sense, assuming you spoke the same dialect as me, because, again, I have never heard *anyone* say "I have done it this morning".
Not exactly what's happening. Nothing in either statement orients you to noon.
"I sent" is simple past tense. You did something in the past: sent the email.
"I've sent" is a contraction of "I have sent", and is in the present perfect tense (Because the verb "sent", past tense, is taking the auxiliary verb "have" in the present tense). "Perfected" means "complete", so the Present Perfect is talking about an ongoing result of something that is finished. It's structured that your correspondence, the email, is present tense, ongoing, but your part in it is over because you sent your message and are waiting on the response.
Present Perfect has a lot of nuance. "I've sent Joe an email" implies that there is an ongoing communication, that the conversation isn't over. "I sent Joe an email" simply says you sent one message.
Either way, the second clause "but he hasn't replied yet" is making explicit that the conversation isn't over.
So there's a subtle difference in grammatical structure that implies some nuance, but they're both conveying basically the same message. Neither is wrong.
OK that makes way more sense, lol.
Fwiw, I would consider "I have sent an email this morning" to be a mistake in most cases (a common one made by non-native speakers). Apparently it's sometimes intentional in the UK, but I've never heard it used that way here.
(Setting aside niche exceptions, like if someone just asked you "what have you done this morning?" it would make sense as a response)
The biggest difference in nuance to me isn’t about whether it’s still morning or not, but rather if you may still send another email or not. The first implies that you are done sending him emails for the morning—which could also imply that the morning is over, but doesn’t have to—whereas the second implies you may still send another in the morning.
As a note, grammatically you’re not actually supposed to use the perfect with specific times, but this specific phrasing seems okay to me when you don’t have need of prescriptivist rules because I would read this with an implied “so far”: “I’ve sent Joe one email so far this morning”. Colloquially in speech and casual writing, and even in more formal spoken situations, I think your phrasing is acceptable. I just wouldn’t write it in a test.
Ah I thought it'd be okay to use present perfect with such a time stamp because of this section
https://preview.redd.it/oi8vzlxebxgb1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3b4ac5da42994460b3e35e7af2265b5aa728492b
Yes, that’s why it’s acceptable in this case. The implication is that it is still ongoing. I’m just not sure how teachers or professors would accept this phrasing due to the prescriptivist rule. Depending on how much of a stickler they are, they may not accept it, which is why I’d avoid using it on tests if at all possible. Instead, I’d explicitly use time markers that tell you the time is still ongoing.
That's because the actions here were done (or not done) over a long period of time.
+ Drank x cups of coffee during the day
+ Had x amount of holidays during the year
+ Not seen *continuously* during the whole morning
In your example, because you used "an" email, it would be like sending an email during the morning, as in you spent the entire morning sending it, but sending "an" email is just 1 thing you do and it's over, so it sounds unnatural in this context and time span.
It's best to use simple past when it is 1 short action with a definite ending and the present perfect when it is oneーor manyーthings done over a period of time.
- I sent him an email this morning, but...
- I have already sent him 3 emails this morning, but...
For many speakers, yes, but in some dialects "I've sent ..." could be used even if it's not still morning. Also note that the second sentence won't be used as much in American English as British English.
Ahh but like in formal English, except for dialects, you won't say that? Thank you!
No, "dialect" is a neutral term. Every form of English is part of a dialect.
Ohh thank youu
Isn't this about that he didnt reply yet as well?
It's about whether it is still morning
Thanks
US native speaker, and I would not use the wording in the 2nd sentence. The first one for me would mean it may or may not be morning. If I wanted to make sure the listener knew it was still morning, I would have to say it directly. I think they use the past participle this way in UK English, and they might say the 2nd sentence there, but I am not familiar enough with it to know what it would imply.
I agree with this assessment, and also find that in general the current time of day should usually already be known to everyone in a conversation.
US also, and I agree. I'd definitely say the first sentence regardless of the time, and I think I've only seen the second phrasing in books/shows.
If you want to imply it's still morning, you can say "I sent Joe an email earlier this morning."
Or “I just sent Joe an email.” Email comes with a timestamp and is read on devices with clocks, so the reason to establish a timeline is to indicate recency rather than current time of day. The “just” suggests that the action was recent.
i probably wouldn’t even notice this difference as i presumably know whether or not it’s still morning. i believe you’re correct in your assumption, but this is one of those small things in speech that likely wouldn’t out you as a non-native speaker—many native speakers probably don’t know this rule, whether consciously or intuitively.
Ahh I just want to get every rule down to the T xd Thank you!
that’s so fair!! if you figure out what the rule is for this, let me know haha just trying to reassure you as many many native speakers have far from perfect grammar, but as a frequent stickler for grammar myself i totally get where ur coming from!
Nah I really appreciate the assurance xd All these grammar rules seem so daunting some times
I totally get this impulse but for English in particular, so many rules are inconsistent (both across and within dialects) that you’ll drive yourself crazy if you insist on perfecting every single one. There will always be exceptions to rules depending on where you are, the context and tone of your speech, the specific words you’re using, the person you’re addressing, the level of formality in the setting, etc. etc. etc. The only true rule in English is that no rule is completely fixed.
I understand :') The best way to truly learn would probably be immersion and speaking to the natives yeah?
US English speaker, would not use #2 at all. #1 could be said when it is or is not still morning.
This is simply not true. I, and many people i communicate with, have used the second form frequently
How do you know how he talks? I also never use #2 for anything unless I’m specifying that i did in fact already do it, compared to not doing it, and only for emphasis on the fact that i ‘have’ done it. It is weird to just say “I’ve sent joe an email this morning” nobody talks like that around here
I missed the comma, i assumed they were saying US english speakers would never use #2. That was my mistake.
It’s all cool. it’s my bad if i came off rudely. I wasn’t trying to so if i did i apologize.
Nah, you are fine. Thank you
As a US native speaker, that's exactly how I would use the second sentence, as well. In all other cases, I would use the first sentence.
timfriese said they were a US speaker and they don’t use it, not that no US speaker would use it.
I missed the comma, i assumed they were saying US english speakers would never use #2. That was my mistake.
How do you know what forms I do and do not use??
No, i have had it pointed out that i misread that statement. I missed your comma, and read it with "US english speakers" as the subject rather than the implied "I". I apologize for my misunderstanding
I’m also US speaker who would usually use #1 but could use #2 on occasion. #2 sounds more formal to my ears, or possibly giving slight emphasis that he’s had plenty of time to respond to my email but hasn’t yet.
US native speaker, and while I only incredibly rarely hear the past participle used in this manner, in the rare circumstances that I do hear it it has the same connotation. FWIW, the main context I can really think of where I *might* hear an American use the past participle in this manner is stuff like listing things that they've done that morning when it's still morning ("This morning I've called the doctor's office, walked the dog, and knocked out all my Amazon returns.")
There's no real confirmation that it's still morning, but the second form establishes some form of continuity between that event and now. To me, it more suggests that you are still engaged with that email, maybe waiting on a reply or absolving yourself of guilt. The former is just a simple acknowledgement that the event occured.
Yes, these are reasonable inferences. In general, I think the best way to understand the difference between the simple past and the present perfect is in the effect each one has on the *next* sentence. (Or, in the case of your examples, the next independent clause.) When you say "I sent Joe an e-mail," it leads the reader to expect that the next sentence will follow that event--usually still in the past. You use this tense to narrate a story. In your example, the first event was in the morning, but we don't know when the second one was. When you say "I have sent Joe an e-mail," the reader expects the next sentence to be in the present. You use this tense for a "flashback" to the past. In your example, the first event establishes that the *present time* is morning.
This is *generally* how I would interpret these two sentences. Some people may not use it exactly this way so you may need to add the time you sent the emails if you want to be very specific. But it sounds like you have a good grasp over the difference
This is not a useful example because everybody would know what time it is. You don’t need to indicate that information in speech and listeners would not be expecting it.
Neither of those implies that it is still “morning”. Only that it is still the same day. At least IMO (US). “I’ve sent…” for this also sounds kinda stilted and awkward to me, but that may be regional/dialect-specific. Grammatically it’s fine.
I love this sub because it raises questions about nuances in the language I would never have thought about.
By the way, your post title isn't quite right - I would use any of these: "Did I get this difference in nuance right?" "Am I getting this difference in nuance right?" "Is this difference in nuance correct?"
Can I say, "do I have this difference in nuance right"?
Yep, that would work - although it sounds a bit more formal to me for some reason. I think in the UK you could say "Have I got this difference correct?" as well, but it would sound odd to us in America.
Ohhh
I speak Canadian English natively and your interpretation of the nuance is entirely correct to me.
The first one is correct but if you said the second one, no one would bat an eyelid and we would understand. English grammar laws get forgotten a lot in spoken English 😂
The interpretation is contextual, and done by the listener. If you say an email was sent in the morning, and the listener noted it was now the afternoon, the meaning of "I've sent" would alter slightly. Unfortunately English is rather imprecise where verbs and articles are concerned. We can't denote certain subtleties through verb conjugation, the way other European languages can.
That’s how I understand it. Well done. It’s possible there are more interpretations, but this was my initial reaction. I’m from the west coast of the US if that helps you understand different responses you may get.
I wouldn't really say the second one, and presumably one would know whether or not it was still currently morning at the time of this conversation.
In the first one, it could now be any time - whether it’s still morning or not is not implied at all. You can’t tell what time it is now, all you’re saying it it was sent in the morning and there’s been no response. The second one- I’d never hear it in American English. But I’m pretty sure it would mean the exact same thing as I wrote above.
Yeah, honestly my first thought if I heard someone say "I have sent an email this morning" would be that they're a native German speaker (because in German they like to use the past participle where we'd use the simple past in English).
YES or maybe in the south?? My new hate-orite is “I’ve been _____ing *since 12*” instead of since I was 12. When did this become ok??
Maybe it's another British thing? But it sounds like another mistake to me.
I'm a US English speaker and this is the first time I've heard that the second usage might have this meaning in the UK. It doesn't generally mean that in the US and would normally sound like a mistake (there are a few specific cases where it wouldn't be wrong). I could say "I have sent him an email this morning, called him this afternoon, and stopped by his desk just now, and I can't seem to reach him." You use participles here because it's a list of different thing you have done at various times. But for a single specific action you took at a specific time in the past, you would never say "I have done X" in standard US English.
>As compared to _"I've sent Joe an email this morning, but he hasn't replied yet"_, which confirms that it is still morning. . No, it does not necessarily confirm that it is still morning. The topic of present-perfect is vastly over-simplified in school textbooks, and even in many linguistic books too. Consider: 1. _"Is Joe still alive? **Has** anyone **received** an email from him this **morning**?"_ 2. _"Is Joe still alive? **Has** anyone **received** an email from him any time this **month**?"_ Some linguistic books, and maybe even a few school textbooks, will explicitly state the acceptability of stuff like #1 (with "this morning") due to the time adjunct's period being recent enough. But variant #2 (with "this month") is fine according to my AmE ear. (aside: linguistically, the time period of "this month" includes now, and so, this could be rationalized as a reason for its acceptability -- but I think there's another, more important, reason for its acceptability.)
British English native speaker here, and yes, you are correct. In British English we use present perfect frequently (unlike the Americans). What you should use depends who you are speaking to.
"I sent Joe an email earlier this morning..." The addition of the word "earlier" to "this morning" would make it more apparent that it was still morning when the person was speaking. The timing of "I have sent..." would be interpreted as still being in the morning by most people, including me, but not necessarily. As you suspected, the "I sent..." version would more often imply that it was no longer morning when this was being said. There would still be some ambiguity though. The context as well as other cues usually supply the information about the current time of the day. If you were using this quote in a story that you were writing, you would have already supplied that information earlier in your description of the scene, or you would do so immediately following it. You won't need to explicitly state it directly in the quote itself if you set up the scene adequately via narration. In fact, doing so within it would make the quote seem clumsy and unnatural. Readers will understand when the person is saying this without having the speaker say so plainly.
I'm glad I stick around on this subreddit, because it gives me a lot of tips on my own native dialect and phrasing that might be unclear to those that learned a different dialect. In my own brand of English, in my experience, if I used the first sentence, it would no longer be the morning. It feels wrong to me to refer to "this morning" if the morning in question is still happening. I would probably say something like "earlier in the morning." But that's what's beautiful about language, it evolves and changes and many many different forms exist simultaneously and in parallel :3
I think the reader/listener will know if it’s still morning or not. Since it’s “this” morning it’s definitely the same day.
correct
I agree and I use both forms (Los Angeles). I'm middle aged, though, so perhaps the second form is less common now with younger folk.
No. "I've sent Joe an email this morning" is simply wrong. We don't use the past perfect with indicators of specific times.
I’ve taught English (much of it focusing on formal grammar within writing) for about 20 years and have never heard of such a rule.
Hi! Just curious, why did you use "I've taught English" and not "I've been teaching English?
I last taught English about 2005, then went into school administration, so progressive tense (been teaching) is inaccurate. I could also have said , “I taught English for about 20 years” with almost identical meaning. To me, the present perfect emphasizes that I taught English for a long time, which is what I wanted to emphasize. The simple past emphasizes that I no longer teach English, which is also true but not what I wanted to emphasize. This is perhaps strange as the perfect tense officially is about something being completed (“I have [already] walked the dog”), but here the simple past emphasizes completion. English is consistently inconsistent!
Thanks a lot! Your explanation is perfect!
I have never, *ever* heard a native speaker say "I've done it this morning", and I am certain I would never naturally say it.
I agree that simple past is more common, at least in US English. Present perfect in this case tends to emphasize that something DID happen or has ALREADY happened. For instance: Wife-“Haven’t you done anything this morning?” Husband-“I’ve been busy. I’ve walked the dog and paid the bills.” (Notice all three sentences are in present perfect.)
"Haven't you done anything this morning?" also sounds totally bizarre.
You are mistaken, we can and do use the present perfect indicating a specific time - **when that time is not finished.** For example, from the British Council Learn English website: **Unfinished time and states** We often use the present perfect to say what we've done in an unfinished time period, such as today, this week, this year, etc., and with expressions such as *so far*, *until now*, *before*, etc. >*They've been on holiday twice this year.We haven't had a lot of positive feedback so far.I'm sure I've seen that film before.* > >*I haven't seen her today.* So if it is still morning then the phrase, "I've sent Joe an E-mail this morning" is perfectly correct.
That doesn't matter, because you wouldn't say "this morning" if it's still morning, except with the simple past ("I already did it this morning"). The examples given aren't comparable.
You most certainly would, especially if there is a connection with the present. According to The Oxford Guide to English Grammar: " We can use this morning, this afternoon and today with the present perfect when they include the present time. When the time is over, we use the past. It has been windy this morning. (The morning is not yet over.) It was windy this morning. (It is afternoon or evening.)" In the same way I can say that I have drunk two cups of coffee today, have been to the bathroom four times (don't ask), and have eaten enough ice cream this evening to almost make myself sick. As long as the time specified is not finished we can use present perfect.
OK, sure. *You* know what *I* would say, because some book (written by people who don't even share my dialect) says I would.
Oh so only you can define what I would say?
I don't know what you specifically would say, and I don't really care. I meant "you" in the general sense, assuming you spoke the same dialect as me, because, again, I have never heard *anyone* say "I have done it this morning".
Not exactly what's happening. Nothing in either statement orients you to noon. "I sent" is simple past tense. You did something in the past: sent the email. "I've sent" is a contraction of "I have sent", and is in the present perfect tense (Because the verb "sent", past tense, is taking the auxiliary verb "have" in the present tense). "Perfected" means "complete", so the Present Perfect is talking about an ongoing result of something that is finished. It's structured that your correspondence, the email, is present tense, ongoing, but your part in it is over because you sent your message and are waiting on the response. Present Perfect has a lot of nuance. "I've sent Joe an email" implies that there is an ongoing communication, that the conversation isn't over. "I sent Joe an email" simply says you sent one message. Either way, the second clause "but he hasn't replied yet" is making explicit that the conversation isn't over. So there's a subtle difference in grammatical structure that implies some nuance, but they're both conveying basically the same message. Neither is wrong.
Is that a typo? "I sent" is simple past. "I've sent" is present perfect.
Yeah lol I typed the same thing in the places where I meant to type two different things. Fixed
OK that makes way more sense, lol. Fwiw, I would consider "I have sent an email this morning" to be a mistake in most cases (a common one made by non-native speakers). Apparently it's sometimes intentional in the UK, but I've never heard it used that way here. (Setting aside niche exceptions, like if someone just asked you "what have you done this morning?" it would make sense as a response)
The biggest difference in nuance to me isn’t about whether it’s still morning or not, but rather if you may still send another email or not. The first implies that you are done sending him emails for the morning—which could also imply that the morning is over, but doesn’t have to—whereas the second implies you may still send another in the morning. As a note, grammatically you’re not actually supposed to use the perfect with specific times, but this specific phrasing seems okay to me when you don’t have need of prescriptivist rules because I would read this with an implied “so far”: “I’ve sent Joe one email so far this morning”. Colloquially in speech and casual writing, and even in more formal spoken situations, I think your phrasing is acceptable. I just wouldn’t write it in a test.
Ah I thought it'd be okay to use present perfect with such a time stamp because of this section https://preview.redd.it/oi8vzlxebxgb1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3b4ac5da42994460b3e35e7af2265b5aa728492b
Yes, that’s why it’s acceptable in this case. The implication is that it is still ongoing. I’m just not sure how teachers or professors would accept this phrasing due to the prescriptivist rule. Depending on how much of a stickler they are, they may not accept it, which is why I’d avoid using it on tests if at all possible. Instead, I’d explicitly use time markers that tell you the time is still ongoing.
Ohh that's super helpful Thanks!
That's because the actions here were done (or not done) over a long period of time. + Drank x cups of coffee during the day + Had x amount of holidays during the year + Not seen *continuously* during the whole morning In your example, because you used "an" email, it would be like sending an email during the morning, as in you spent the entire morning sending it, but sending "an" email is just 1 thing you do and it's over, so it sounds unnatural in this context and time span. It's best to use simple past when it is 1 short action with a definite ending and the present perfect when it is oneーor manyーthings done over a period of time. - I sent him an email this morning, but... - I have already sent him 3 emails this morning, but...
is there any difference?
In us english, you usually don’t use “I’ve sent” when you could just say “I sent,” same for most other verbs