# perception verbs + there + verbs



## Takahero

Hello.
Would you judge whether the following sentences are acceptable or not?

1. I saw _there arrive _three girls.
2.Nathan _heard there_ enter three men.
3.We _saw there_ arise over the meadow a blue haze.

Thank you.


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## Copyright

Not ....


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## Takahero

From your answer, "there" can not be used with perception verbs.
But I think that the following sentence containing "it" is correct.

1. I saw it raining.

Do you agree with me?


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## GreenWhiteBlue

That is not what you were told at all. You may use "there" with perception verbs, as long as you use it correctly:
_I saw there were many children playing in the schoolyard.
_You merely used the "there" incorrectly.


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## CapnPrep

GreenWhiteBlue said:


> _I saw there were many children playing in the schoolyard.
> _


Takahero is evidently interested in perception verbs with non-finite complements, so this sentence would become:_I saw there *be/being* many children playing in the schoolyard.
_​which I find unacceptable. (In other words, it's not _there_ that is used incorrectly, but the verb form.)





Takahero said:


> But I think that the following sentence containing "it" is correct.
> 
> 1. I saw it raining.
> 
> Do you agree with me?


Yes, but expletive _it_ and _there_ do not have the same properties.


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## GreenWhiteBlue

The simple answer is that when one uses expletive "there" with a perception verb, the sentence must be able to stand by itself before you add the clause using the perception verb:

_There were two exits from the room.
*I saw* there were two exits from the room_.

_There are no clean dishes on the shelf.
*I noticed *there are no clean dishes on the shelf.

There is no reason to do this.
*We discovered* there is no reason to do this_.


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## Takahero

Thank you for you reply.
I understand that it can be used with perception verbs but there cannot.

How about the following sentences?
Can idioms such as _all hell break loose_ and _the shit hit the fan occur _with perception verbs_?_

1.We heard all hell break loose.
2.Then we saw the shit hit the fan.


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## CapnPrep

Takahero said:


> 1.We heard all hell break loose.
> 2.Then we saw the shit hit the fan.


These sound fine to me.


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## Takahero

I appreciate your help.

In Felser (1999:36), there are many sentences which contain perception verbs and _there_.

1.I've never _seen there _be so many complaints from students before.
2.I wouldn't like to _see there_ be so many mistakes.
3.We will probably _see there _be fewer complaints.
4.We wouldn't like to _see there_ arise any problems from this.

Are they really acceptable?


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## CapnPrep

Takahero said:


> Are they really acceptable?


They are definitely not as acceptable (to me) as _I would like to see John win_ or _I would like to see it rain_. But Felser's point (following previous work by Safir and other authors) is that expletive _there _"becomes more acceptable" with ontological predicates in irrealis contexts. It doesn't become totally natural/acceptable.


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## Takahero

Thank you for your reply.
It really helps.
You are familiar with linguistics.

I hope that you help me again, CapnPrep.


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## ribran

Takahero said:


> I appreciate your help.
> 
> In Felser (1999:36), there are many sentences which contain perception verbs and _there_.
> 
> 1.I've never _seen there _be so many complaints from students before.
> 2.I wouldn't like to _see there_ be so many mistakes.
> 3.We will probably _see there _be fewer complaints.
> 4.We wouldn't like to _see there_ arise any problems from this.
> 
> Are they really acceptable?



This is interesting. The first sentence sounds completely natural to me, but the other three sound odd. Actually, I take that back. The third sentence sounds all right. I think the key here is this sentence: _Sentences like these do not, however, express the direct physical perception of an event, but instead constitute examples of indirect perception._


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## Takahero

CapnPrep said:


> These sound fine to me.


Is it possible to make a passive sentence of 1 and 2?

1. We heard all hell break loose.
1'. All hell _was heard to_ break loose.

2.Then we saw the shit the fan.
2'. The shit _was seen to hit_ the fan.

Are they acceptable in the idiomatic sense?


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## Fabulist

Takahero said:


> Hello.
> Would you judge whether the following sentences are acceptable or not?
> 
> 1. I saw _there arrive _three girls.
> 2.Nathan _heard there_ enter three men.
> 3.We _saw there_ arise over the meadow a blue haze.
> 
> Thank you.



The problem I see with these sentences is the position of "there."

I saw three girls arrive there.
Nathan heard three men arrive there.
We saw a blue haze arise over the meadow there.  (This one needs a comprehensive rearrangement.)


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## lancer99

Takahero said:


> Is it possible to make a passive sentence of 1 and 2?
> 
> 1. We heard all hell break loose.
> 1'. All hell _was heard to_ break loose.
> 
> 2.Then we saw the shit the fan.
> 2'. The shit _was seen to hit_ the fan.
> 
> Are they acceptable in the idiomatic sense?



No      I don't have a good explanation as to why not, other than that idiomatic expressions tend to be fixed.

-R


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## ribran

Takahero said:


> Is it possible to make a passive sentence of 1 and 2?
> 
> 1. We heard all hell break loose.
> 1'. All hell _was heard to_ break loose.
> 
> 2.Then we saw the shit the fan.
> 2'. The shit _was seen to hit_ the fan.
> 
> Are they acceptable in the idiomatic sense?



Yes, that's how you would do it.

Now whether anyone actually would is another matter entirely. As lancer99 says, they probably wouldn't.


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## Thomas Tompion

Hi Takahero,

Certainly those sentences are there in the book.  They are there as examples of constructions normally considered ungrammatical, in the context of a discussion - a detailed discussion - of what sort of constructions are possible with verbs of perception.

Why can one say _ I saw there was trouble_ and _I saw there to be trouble_, but not _I saw there be trouble_?  It's not an easy question, but it seems to me you are getting  confirmation here, from most posters, that those sentences you mention in Felser are not considered OK, to use her expression.  She would agree and is trying to explain why.


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## ribran

TT,

Are you referring to the sentences in post #9? Felser says that they are probably OK because of their irrealis contexts.


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## Thomas Tompion

ribran said:


> TT,
> 
> Are you referring to the sentences in post #9? Felser says that they are probably OK because of their irrealis contexts.


Well spotted, Ribran.  Where does she say this?  I read a certain amount of stuff about their not usually being perceived as grammatical, but could easily have missed this point.


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## ribran

Thomas Tompion said:


> Well spotted, Ribran.  Where does she say this?  I read a certain amount of stuff about their not usually being perceived as grammatical, but could easily have missed this point.



At the bottom of page 35.


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## Thomas Tompion

ribran said:


> At the bottom of page 35.


Thank you. Brilliant! The version I get from the link goes from page 34 to page 36. I think it's quite a strange claim - can she have lost touch with the way people normally speak? There are no examples of anything like those sentences in either of the corpuses, I think - and I'm not sure I'd reckon all those sentences had irrealis contexts either: 1. in particular, and that is the one which sounded natural to you. That seems to suggest that your feeling goes in the opposite direction to hers.

There's an article by a Swede, Peter Svenonius, Professor of Linguistics, University of Tromsø, who seems to think the form is ok sometimes. It's a pdf file and I'm having trouble getting the link: It's called_ Predication and Functional Heads_, which may be enough for people to get it through a search engine.

On Page 7, he discusses the sentence (18c) _I've never seen there be so many problems_, which sounds odd to me, though presumably fine to people who accept _I've never seen there be so many complaints from students before. _I'd be happy with _I've never known there be so many problems_. In the case of hearing, I'd say _I've never heard of there being so many problems_.


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## boozer

Takahero said:


> 1.I've never _seen there _be so many complaints from students before.
> 2.I wouldn't like to _see there_ be so many mistakes.
> 3.We will probably _see there _be fewer complaints.
> 4.We wouldn't like to _see there_ arise any problems from this.
> 
> Are they really acceptable?


Ribran and TT, if you are discussing this set of sentences and you care to know my opinion, I find them all utterly ungrammatical.  I might think better of them if instead of _be_ and _arrive_ we had _being _and _arriving_, but they would still sound unnecessarily complicated.  (especially the last one  )


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## Thomas Tompion

Hi Boozer,

I'm sorry if it wasn't clear what we were discussing.

Yes, we are considering those sentences and that form, and I am interested in your reaction, as always, and interested also to see that it's very similar to my own.  Ribran is, however, happy with 1. and that surprises and interests me and I wonder if his reaction is unusual, or if we can find others who agree with him, and maybe find some pattern in this.  And I'm interested also that these academics can hold that the form is OK in certain circumstances, and what those circumstances might be, and on what they base their view.


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## Pertinax

Takahero said:


> In Felser (1999:36), there are many sentences which contain perception verbs and _there_.
> 
> 1.I've never _seen there _be so many complaints from students before.
> 2.I wouldn't like to _see there_ be so many mistakes.
> 3.We will probably _see there _be fewer complaints.
> 4.We wouldn't like to _see there_ arise any problems from this.
> 
> Are they really acceptable?



What Claudia Felser wrote in the preceding paragraph on p35 was this:
_Safir (1993) furthermore points out that ontological or inside-verbal "there" complements often become *more acceptable* if the matrix clause sets up an irrealis context (that is, if it contains e.g. negation, a modal, or certain adverbs of modality). This observation is illustrated by the following examples, which have been cited by Gee (1977), Higginbotham (1983), and Safir (1993).
_
That does not make them acceptable, but merely more acceptable than they would have been.

To my BrE ear they are still unacceptable.  Yet I could accept (1) with "known" instead of "seen":
_I've never known there be so many complaints from students before._

.. and perhaps "seen" is as acceptable as "known" in AmE, since Google turns up many examples like this:
_I have seen there be a fee charged to do this_
http://www.deangraziosi.com/real-estate-forums/tax-sales/53981/tax-lien-certificates-can-be-assigned

Staring at this strange "see there be" combination somehow reminds me of Rider Haggard's _She_:
_In earth and skie and sea
Strange thyngs ther be.
_


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## Thomas Tompion

Thank you for the missing bit, Pertinax.  One interesting point to me was that these complements seemed to become more acceptable to Ribran if the matrix clause did not set up an irrealis context: he could accept 1. but not 2-4. (see post #12)

Several AE posters have suggested that they find the form as strange as we do.


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## JulianStuart

My initial reaction: the first three sentences in post 9 , while a little awkward, seem OK to me.  I interpret them as the "infinitive" or "subjunctive" ( you can tell I'm not a grammar technician - and I haven't studied the link) form of "*there are*" .  
Last year I noticed *there were* a lot of complaints from the students.
I expect* there will be* a lot of complaints next year.
I see *there are* a lot of complaints this year.
I have never seen *XX YY* so many complaints before.



In all cases the bold words can be omitted and the sense changes a little.  However, the xx yy form of this verb for the present tense seems OK as *there be*.

The fourth sentence, even to me, seems biblical!  There arose a great multitude of complaints this year


Not disputing anything others have said, just sharing my reaction.


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## PaulQ

Takahero said:


> Hello.
> Would you judge whether the following sentences are acceptable or not?
> 
> 1. I saw _there arrive _three girls.
> 2.Nathan _heard there_ enter three men.
> 3.We _saw there_ arise over the meadow a blue haze.
> 
> Thank you.


I don't think that 1 and 3 are particularly strange; poetic and a little old fashioned perhaps but not strange.

If we substitute the participle for "there + verb" and add a few commas,

1. I saw, *arriving,*three girls.
2.The verb and there have changed places
3.We _saw, *arising*_ over the meadow, a blue haze.

And from OED a long quote:





> 4. Used unemphatically to introduce a sentence or clause in which, for the sake of emphasis or preparing the hearer, the verb comes before its subject, as _there comes a time when, etc., there was heard a rumbling noise._ In interrogative sentences there comes between the verb and subject, as Breathes there the man, etc.?, or follows the first word of a compound verb, as _Does there breathe a man?, Shall there be any notice taken of it? _The same order was formerly observed after an introductory adv. or clause, as _Then came there a voice, Soon shall there arise a prophet._
> 
> Grammatically, there is no difference between _There comes the train!_ and _There comes a time when, etc_.; but, while in the former there is demonstrative and stressed, in the latter it has been reduced to a mere anticipative element occupying the place of the subject which comes later. Preceding or following a main verb, or following any verb, there, thus used, is stressless (proclitic or enclitic: e.g. there-ˈcame, ˈbreathes-there, ˈis-there, ˈwill-there), but preceding be or an auxiliary, there has a slight stress, and the verb is enclitic (e.g. ˈthere-is, ˈthere-was, ˈthere-will).
> 
> 
> 1814    Byron Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (ed. 7) ii. lxxxii. 110   _Lurk there no hearts that throb with secret pain?_
> 1857    H. T. Buckle Hist. Civilisation Eng. I. vii. 399   _From all these things there resulted consequences of vast importance._


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## ribran

Thomas Tompion said:


> Thank you for the missing bit, Pertinax.  One interesting point to me was that these complements seemed to become more acceptable to Ribran if the matrix clause did not set up an irrealis context: he could accept 1. but not 2-4. (see post #12)
> 
> Several AE posters have suggested that they find the form as strange as we do.



At the bottom of page 35, she explains that an "irrealis context" is simply one that contains "negation, a modal, or certain adverbs of modality," so by that definition, the context of 1 is irrealis. 

Of course, the negation is key for me. _I've never seen there be so many complaints _is fine, but _I've seen there be 20 complaints so far today _​is not. (EDIT: bad example)


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## Thomas Tompion

1. I've never _seen there _be so many complaints from students before.
2. I wouldn't like to _see there_ be so many mistakes.
3. We will probably _see there _be fewer complaints.
4. We wouldn't like to _see there_ arise any problems from this.

Thanks for this Riley. I've put down the four sentences again, so we don't have to keep flipping back a page. Of course, 2 & 4 contain negations, and 3. was the other one which you decided on second thoughts sounded natural.

Funnily enough, though I hardly dare say it, _4. We wouldn't like to see there arise __any problems from this _sounds the lease weird of the four to my ear. The weirdness springs from the _there arise_ form, I suspect. I think it's the subjunctive, _be_, which is bugging me in the first three, for some reason. I realize that the _there arise_ in 4 is a subjunctive too. I might be less repelled if we added a _that_, to introduce the idea of a subjunctive, _I've never seen that there be so many complaints from students before_. It still sounds very odd, nevertheless.


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## boozer

Thomas Tompion said:


> I think it's the subjunctive, _be_, which is bugging me in the first three, for some reason. ...


Yes, maybe that is the reason. I find the use of the subjunctive totally unwarranted by the surrounding context...


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## KHS

These sentences appear to be verbs of perception followed by 'there,' but I wonder if they have a purely perceptual meaning:

I feel (that) there has been an increase in the room temperature.
I see (that) there are many children playing on the lawn.


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## JulianStuart

I have never seen him be so angry.  I have never seen there be such anger in his face.

Is that a subjunctive, too?  I never really got the hang of how grammar specialists identify subjunctives in the wild ...


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## boozer

Well, this is solid evidence that I am not a grammar specialist. 

But..
_He began to shout and scream, demanding that he be served with wine._
The above sentence from the BNC is a perfect example of the subjunctive mood and the bare infinitive of _be _is used like in the sentences being discussed. Now, whether this is enough to make those sentences subjunctive and whether they are grammatical is a different story.  My point is that it looks as though they are in the subjunctive mood and that for no apparent reason...


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## Pertinax

I think that we're dealing with a bare infinitive, not a subjunctive.

From: _Problems arise from this._
We get: _We wouldn't like to see any problems arise from this._ 

From: _There arise problems from this._
We get: _We wouldn't like to see there arise any problems from this._

However, being unable to make much sense of "see there be" in the above contexts I can't be sure that "be" is intended as a bare infinitive instead of a subjunctive.


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## Pertinax

JulianStuart said:


> I have never seen him be so angry.  I have never seen there be such anger in his face.
> 
> Is that a subjunctive, too?  I never really got the hang of how grammar specialists identify subjunctives in the wild ...



No, I think it's a bare infinitive in each case.  Indeed a to-infinitive ("to be") works as well for me if not better.


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## Thomas Tompion

What do you think of my theory that there's a suppressed _that_, Pertinax?  That would make it a subjunctive, wouldn't it?


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## PaulQ

I'm with boozer. I see and unstated *if* in Pertinax's
_We wouldn't like to see there arise any problems from this
as
__We wouldn't like to see [if] there arise any problems from this__.

it is clearer in the positive

__We would like to see __[if] __there arise any problems from this__.

_Whether there will be problems cannot be known_
_


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## Pertinax

Thomas Tompion said:


> What do you think of my theory that there's a suppressed _that_, Pertinax?  That would make it a subjunctive, wouldn't it?



Agreed


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## ribran

A question to both Pertinax and Thomas Tompion:

What about the sentence _I've never seen Boozer cross the street_? Would you say there is a suppressed _that_ there?

_I've never seen that Boozer cross the street. _


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## Pertinax

ribran said:


> What about the sentence _I've never seen Boozer cross the street_? Would you say there is a suppressed _that_ there?



Definitely not.  It ("cross") is a bare infinitive, as in JulianStuart's example.

Edit: To clarify, I don't believe that the OP's examples contain an implied "that", but if they did then then I would read the verb as subjunctive, as suggested by TT.


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## Thomas Tompion

ribran said:


> A question to both Pertinax and Thomas Tompion:
> 
> What about the sentence _I've never seen Boozer cross the street_? Would you say there is a suppressed _that_ there?
> 
> _I've never seen that Boozer cross the street. _


No, I wouldn't. _I see someone do something_.

But I don't say_ I don't see there be anything_. I say _I don't see that there is anything _and that's different from _I don't see if (whether) there is anything_.

Question for you, Riley. Could you say_ I don't see that there be anything_? I'm assuming, I hope correctly, that you're happy with _I don't see there be anything_.


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## ribran

Thomas Tompion said:


> Question for you, Riley. Could you say_ I don't see that there be anything_? I'm assuming, I hope correctly, that you're happy with _I don't see there be anything_.



No, I wouldn't say that. I'm not sure why, though (given that 1 and 3 sound OK)... I'll think about it.


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## dukaine

Fabulist said:


> The problem I see with these sentences is the position of "there."
> 
> I saw three girls arrive there.
> Nathan heard three men arrive there.
> We saw a blue haze arise over the meadow there.  (This one needs a comprehensive rearrangement.)



I feel like I've seen "there" used as it is used in the original given context in literature.  I read classic literature and poetry almost exclusively, and I've seen sentences where "there" is used before the verb.  When I first read the original question, it sounded perfectly normal to me, just literary.  It's not something that would ever be said in conversation.  It's very King James.

_Exodus 1:8  Now *there* *arose* up a new king over Egypt, who knew not Joseph._

_Deuteronomy 34:10  And *there* *arose* not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses..._


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