"Ĉu via koramiko laboros morgaŭ?"
Translation:Will your boyfriend work tomorrow?
23 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
854
English, and the Germanic languages in general, don't have a true future tense. What we think of as the future tense behaves more like a deontic mood than a tense. Thus the present tense is more of a present/future tense.
So it's not that English speakers are being lazy, it's just a normal part of English grammar. It is, however, something to be aware of when learning other languages.
When I was translating this sentence, my first thought was to write "Does your boyfriend work tomorrow." So the schedule rule makes sense. Thinking about it, I would say that the future of "will do" is used for more active verbs, such as arrive, sleep, or eat. If there is one clear, definitive rule (as if there ever is in english :), I don't know it.
While your sentence and the sentece for this lesson will lead to the same answer, it's important to remember that this lesson is for learning the future tense and the past tense specifically; therefore, one should try to only translate these sentences using either the simple future or the future tense in english (going to / will) to express these ideas.