until recently

Until very recently, I thought (actually still do) that after the phrase "until recently", which apparently indicates that "no longer" "not now though", there should be one of the past tenses (either past simple or past perfect). To my utter astonishment, I have lately come across the present perfect being used in some cases (even in rather formal texts and also in an exercise). Where is
the truth? Is it out there?
If I am mistaken, please enlighten me...

As for me it seems to be rather obvious that after "until recently" Present or Past Perfect tense should be used. Just like in sentences with "recently" alone. "Until recently" indicates a point in time when sth changed because before it had been different for a certain time (not mentioned). That is why one should say "Until recently I have thought..." with reference to nearest past that has its results in present time.

i need a work !!! do you know sth abaut it? i mean in england

still I am not convinced

To me the phrase 'until recently' means a period that comes before the time descrbed as 'recently'. In other words 'until recently' excludes 'recently' and therefore the usage of present perfect is a no-no. Maybe some people feel that 'until recently' actually includes 'recently' which would warrant the usage of present perfect tense. If you take the meaning of 'until' as 'up to the time of' it is not illogical. I think the usage of a particular tense hinges on the intended message:
Until recently I was (not anymore)
Until recently I've been (I still am but..)

> If I am mistaken, please enlighten me...

Your utter astonishment meets my utmost amazement on this ;) I don't think you are mistaken here and the only rationalization I can come up with is that the incorrect usage (to me) of present perfect is caused by ...a shortcut people take to express their intentions (not to say this shortcut is a thought-out thing). Let's say you are a fan of a particular brand of a dishwashing detergent. You've been happy with it and you've used it for a long time, and you'd rather not part with the brand if you didn't have to. Now, you hear this brand is toxic and bad for your skin but you've never experienced any bad effect yourself. You are unsure, a little sceptical about the news but naturally worried. So you 'suspend' (not give it up yet) your using of that detergent until it's been cleared and go trying to find out the truth asking around and that's where the 'shortcut' happens: 'Until recently I've been using this and that but I heard..., and it's to say that you don't use it anymore (until recently), but you actully didn't give it up either (have been). The message is 'uncertainty' and all in one sentence (the shortcut). The longer and proper (to me) route to express the same would be something like: 'Until recently I was using this and that and actually I still do, but not at this moment because I heard..'

>Until very recently, I thought (actually still do)...

The same here..a state of suspension and uncertainty. Why don't you use a shorcut next time and say: ' Until very recently I've thought..(still do but) ' ;))

And lastly, where's Mg when you need him, huh?

In other words 'until recently'
>excludes 'recently' and therefore the usage of present perfect is a
>no-no.

I think the usage of a particular tense hinges on the
>intended message:
>Until recently I was (not anymore)
>Until recently I've been (I still am but..)

The longer and proper (to me) route to
>express the same would be something like: 'Until recently I was using
>this and that and actually I still do, but not at this moment because
>I heard..'
----------------

Until recently, nobody has said so many words and made so little sense.

I suggest you put your thinking cap on.
You have just said, "I have lately come across..."
I have just said, "You have just said, ..." My saying and yours took place in the past, didn't they? Why the present perfect then?

>I have just said, "You have just said,

Actually you have just said: 'nobody has said..'.

> Why the present perfect then?

Beats me why you use it. If you don't care for it, don't use it. Write down your own rules to follow if you like. I try to work with what has been handed down to me and I happen to like it this way.

>so many words ..

Having a lazy Saturday is all.

>'..and made so little sense

Make more, answer the post.

>Make more, answer the post.

I just did (or I just have). You didn't notice?
I repeat:
How come you have no qualms about saying "I have (past participle)... lately, " "I have (past participle)...recently," but somehow feel uneasy when it comes to "Until recently, I have (past participle)..."? Any way you look at it, both "lately" and "recently" are in the past.
"Until recently, I have thought…" is fine, and so is "Until recently, I thought..."

>How come you have no qualms about saying "I have (past participle)...
>lately, " "I have (past participle)...recently," but somehow feel
>uneasy when it comes to "Until recently, I have (past participle)..."?

I feel uneasy not because of a grammar rule but because it confuses me, I just don't get the message:

This is a scientific piece from the net with two instances of usage of 'until recently'. The first is confusing (do they have the tools now, or not? I don't know) and the second just clumsy (I'd say 'until now'/'by now').

"On land, scientists know where elk or bears roam, what their daily habits are, how far they go from home, but UNTIL RECENTLY we haven't had the tools to study daily movements of marine fishes," says Richard Starr of the University of California Sea Grant Program. "You have to have this information to understand the value of a marine reserve – it would do no good to block off a section of the ocean and then have all the fish swim out of the area."
"Until RECENTLY, scientists have pieced together the movements of marine fish from isolated data points..
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2004-02/s-bia021004.php

Compare:
1. Recently I used condoms.
2. Until recently I used condoms.

To me the 1st is bad, the 2nd good. The 'until' word makes whole lot of difference to me. It carries a message of discontinuation; the action stops
there and is the past. You can say that on a timeline the action doesn't make it past the first point of the 'recent' period.

Now compare:
1 Recently I've used condoms
2 Until recently I've used condoms

If you accept what I've written above, then the 2nd can't be right, can it? The 1st one is clearly correct.
You say there's no difference between 'until recently' and 'recently'. For whatever it's worth compare the polish versions of these two:

Porownaj:
1 Niedawno palilem marihuane
2 Do niedawna palilem marihuane

If I heard the 2nd one I'd understand the person quit. So it would translate into the past perfect. If I saw it written in the present perfect I'd be confused.

Pieprzycie oboje, może być każdy czas mający jakiekolwiek zaczepienie w przeszłości, prosty, złożony, ciągły, w zależności od rodzaju czynności, a także od tego, na co kładziesz akcent.

>może być każdy czas ..

Tutaj nastepny (pierwszy lepszy) przyklad z netu. This guy uses the present perfect instead of using simple past which forces him to write an additional sentence 3 lines down to fix it (I am no longer to do this). He should have started with: 'Until recently I was able to open because that in itself contains the other sentence.

Until recently I have been able to open "My documents"- double click on a picture or file and then be able to click on: file-send-page by email. Then I could send from my isp address to my hotmail and yahoo accounts. I am no longer able to do this. I am not sure what or how it was changed. I have windows 98, internet explorer 6, and outlook express. Can you tell me what I can do to restore this feature? Any suggestions or advice would be greatly appreciated

http://www.askmehelpdesk.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.cgi?board=email;action=display;num=1[tel]

>Pieprzycie oboje,
We do, left and right! Welcome to Sgt. Pepper's Club.

No i co? Facet pisze, że do tej pory jak sobie kliknął to mu sie otworzyło i używa Present Perfect dlatego, ze nadal może klikać ( ma na co i ręki mu nie urwało), ale mu sie nie otwiera. Gdyby użył Simole Past, akcent byłby położony na to, ze teraz nawet kliknąc nie może ( bo np nie ma juz tej ikonki). I takie tam...
Drugie zdanie, nie ma charakteru wyjasnienia i nie jest niezbędne. Jest tylko potwierdzeniem, wzmocnieniem wypowiedzi.

Ok. I must admit that now I am convinced that in such sentences Present Perfect tense shouldn't be used, contrary to what I wrote a few posts above. My conviction is based on a native speaker's opinion. I asked her about it and she said that sentences with 'until recently' suggest rather that the event/action or whatever actually stopped; there is no premiss to use Present Perfect tense and indeed it causes slight confusion if it is used.

Greetingz

i think the problem is that it is perfectly OK to use either of the two tenses with "recently"(but only Pres.Perf. is possible with "lately"),and people transfer this freedom of choice to sentences with "until recently" even though Pres. Perf. makes little sense there. I wouldn't use Pres. Perf. with "until recently" either.

Easy you may say "until recently I have thought that ......" cause you didn't erase thinking from your mind but you merely changed your point of view.

>... Pres. Perf. makes little sense there.

The present perfect makes perfect sense here.

The present perfect ITSELF does not assert that the verb action/state holds throughout the interval up to (and inclusive of) the speech time.

We can prove this point quite easily.
Simple example:
(1) I have been sick.
(2) I have been sick three times.

Even a modification by an (any legitimate) adverbial doesn't change the fact:

(3) Since 2000, I have been sick. (doesn't assert I am sick now)
(4) Since 2000, I have been sick three times. (ditto)

The temporal adverbial must be powerful enough to impose the reading of continuation up to the speech time.
If I replace "since" with "ever since":

(5) Ever since 2000, I have been sick twice. (5) is a contradiction and therefore impossible.

How does all this relate to "until recently" as a modifier?

"until recently" is NOT a positional adverb.

You have no grammatical and semantic reason to disallow " Until recently, ."

Correction:
>You have no grammatical and semantic reason to disallow " Until
>recently, ."

should read "You have no grammatical OR semantic reason to disallow " Until recently, ."
The "OR" is important.

The Present Perfect tense is used in your examples (1), (2), (3), (4) precisely because the sentences (not the verbs) refer to periods continuing up to the present and that is because they contain temporal adverbials with "since". "Until recently", on the other hand, necessarily EXCLUDES the present, hence the conclusion that it should not be used with verbs in the Present Perfect tense. At this point I can only repeat what I have said above: the admissibility of using both Pr.Perf. and Sim.Past in sentences with "recently" has probably led to people using both tenses in sentences with "until recently", altough only Simple Past is logically possible there. Having said that, I am far from criticizing people for using the other tense with "until recently". There's more than a fine line between saying "Do he like apple?" and "have been... until recently".

>The Present Perfect tense is used in your examples (1), (2), (3), (4)
>precisely because the sentences (not the verbs) refer to periods
>continuing up to the present and that is because they contain temporal
>adverbials with "since". "Until recently", on the other hand,
>necessarily EXCLUDES the present, hence the conclusion that it should
>not be used with verbs in the Present Perfect tense.

Be specific.

Thare are always two time intervals that accompany a present perfect.
1. The time span period of viewing the event (in this case from 2000 to now, or from my birth to now in "I have been thick.")
2. The interval over which the verb action/state holds.

Which of the two, as you say, is limited by "until recently"? From which is the present excluded by "until recently"?
In "since recently, " the period of viewing the event always continuous up to the present, because that is the nature of the present perfect. Only the verb action/state may stop, which is A-OK.

Look at "I have been sick":
My being sick ended at some point before now, but I still view my being sick at the speech time (the speech time means now).
This is the case in every present perfect sentence not modified by a temporal adverbial.

>In "since recently, " the period of viewing the
>event always continuous up to the present, because that is the nature
>of the present perfect. Only the verb action/state may stop, which is
>A-OK.

Are you talking about "SINCE recently" or "UNTIL recently"?


>
>Look at "I have been sick":
>My being sick ended at some point before now, but I still view my
>being sick at the speech time (the speech time means now).
>This is the case in every present perfect sentence not modified by a
>temporal adverbial.

And "until recently" IS a temporal adverbial, which means that the above has no relation to the case in point.

BTW "I have been sick + temporal adverbial" can have two meanings and you have used it in both without stating this.
"I have been sick since 200" can refer to:
1) a chronic disorder continuing up to the present
2) one bout or recurring bouts of illness (let's call it "on-off Present Perfect")

In speech, the intended meaning is marked by intonation.

However, most importantly, the timeframe of a sentence containing a verb in the Present Perfect tense always refers to a period up to and inclusive of the present, whatever the nature of the action represented by the verb. In sentences without a temporal adverbial, the assumed timeframe is the subject's life (another assumption is that the subject is still alive, but this is again obvious). Accordingly, "I have been sick" means "I have been sick in my life"; "He has been to Paris" means "He has been to Paris in his life" and so on.

>Are you talking about "SINCE recently" or "UNTIL recently"?
Until recently

>>This is the case in every present perfect sentence not modified by
>a
>>temporal adverbial.
>
>And "until recently" IS a temporal adverbial, which means that the
>above has no relation to the case in point.

Nonsense.
Even though there is no time adverbial in "I have been sick," there are two time frames in it. This general statement points out the obvious existence of two time intervals.

BTW "I have been sick + temporal adverbial" can have two meanings and
>you have used it in both without stating this.
>"I have been sick since 200" can refer to:
>1) a chronic disorder continuing up to the present
>2) one bout or recurring bouts of illness (let's call it "on-off
>Present Perfect")

Are you sure you know what "assert" means? I said the up-to now reading was not asserted.
That both readings are available with "since" doesn't change a thing. The up-to-now reading is made possible by "since," but by no means it is asserted by it. Without "since," the "up-to-now" reading is not available.

>Accordingly, "I have been sick" means "I have been sick in my life";
>"He has been to Paris" means "He has been to Paris in his life" and so
>on.

What you are saying changes nothing. The my- life concept is seen as the span from my birth up to the speech time.
What is obvious is that "He has been to Paris" doesn't mean he is in Paris now; actually it means he is not in Paris now without additional modification. Your examples prove my point. The verb interval ended, but the way I view the events from the past at the speech time calls for the present perfect tense. And the aspectual side of the present perfect allows me to do that.

I still can't see why sentences like "I have been sick" justify the use of the Present Perfect in sentences with "until recently".

Is "until recently" similar to "until now" or "until Monday"? if the latter is true, it is logically (that is, with the caveat I have given above) impossible to use the Present Perfect with "until recently".

What reason do you need to speek your own way, mg? Present Perfect fits until recently very well, as there is no rule excluding it from this context, got it?

and there is no rule excluding the spelling of "speek", right?
OK, read what I have written before. I don't have a problem with using either tense with "until recently", but Janski is talking at cross purposes or I can't see a connection between what he says and the problem of "until recently".

>What reason do you need to speek your own way, mg? Present Perfect
>fits until recently very well

Fits 'until recently' my ass, bud

>The present perfect makes perfect sense here.

Then, the following sentences should make perfect sense:
'Until recently the scientists haven't had any idea how to cure cancer'
So what's the sense here?
1. they have an idea now
2. they still have no clue
3. it's impossible to tell

'Until recently I've been working two jobs'
1. quit working two jobs
2. still working two jobs
3. impossible to tell

What's perfect about these sentences? Nothing. Whichever way I look at them their meaning stays the same (nr1 to me). Since the intended meaning of 'until recently' is 'not anymore', why not build these sentences using the past simple? Doesn't it make perfect sense? We use simple past when there's a definite moment in the past when the verb action took place (2 days ago, last Monday, etc). To me the preposition 'until' creates a clear cutoff point which feels like a definite moment in the past (although not readily measurable in the case of 'until recently'). Someone here tells me that since the present perfect goes with 'recently' and 'lately', so it should work with 'until recently'. It's like saying that you can use the present perfect with 'until now' only because this tense works well with 'now'. So then, until now I'm going to bed. Good night.