Originally posted by: Ektoraskan https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/8649253
Hello!
I've prepared this short guide after seeing many questions on "aorist vs. continuous".
Turkish simple present is linguistically called the Aorist tense. (Aorist is past tense in Greek, so I don't know whose idea it was really. It's definitely not the past tense in Turkish). Anyway, sometimes verbs end in -er/-ar or -ır/ir/ur/ür. That's when you know it's in aorist, like: koşar (he runs), alır (he takes), görür (he sees). On the other hand, verbs in the continuous tense appear in -iyor forms, like: koşuyor (he is running), alıyor (he is taking), görüyor (he sees).
See what I did there? I wrote "he sees", and not "he is seeing". That's an English thing. Some English verbs are rarely used in "-ing" forms. You could "be seeing" something right now and still say "I see". But that's a problem of English. Turkish doesn't have such restrictions. So when you type "I'm seeing", "I'm liking", "I'm loving" etc. and your answers are rejected on duolingo, don't report them. Roll your eyes, blame English and carry on!
I. Aorist is not exactly the English simple present tense. Actually, I dare say it's closer to the English future tense. Yep! We've been lying to you all this time! Both the aorist and the English "will" are used in "if-clauses": "Param olursa, ev alırım." (If I ever have money, I'll buy a house) or the past form: "Param olsaydı ev alırdım." (If I had (had) money, I would have bought a house). Here you see "would" which is actually related to "will".
Apart from that, when you make sudden decisions, English uses "will" and Turkish uses "aorist". Your girlfriend or wife comes to you and says: "Do the dishes." You can say: "Bir ara yaparım." (I'll do it some time). You don't know when, but you've decided on the spot that you will do it some time in the future. Because you have a soccer match to watch right now.
II. Aorist is also usable in sentences where you talk about habitual actions, just like the English simple present: "Her cumartesi koşarım" (I jog every Saturday). But this is not obligatory. The continuous tense is completely fine and even more common in Turkish: "Her cumartesi koşuyorum," (but you can't say: I am jogging every Saturday, in English). So that's something to keep in mind.
III. Aorist is also used in requests. "Pencereyi açar mısın?" → "Can you open the window?" (Compare: 'pencereyi açıyor musun?' [are you opening the window?]). You can also use "-ebilir" to get the same meaning: "Pencereyi açabilir misin?" (Can you open the window?) Note that "-ebilir" is also in aorist.
IV. In spoken language, aorist is used kind of like the 2nd use of -dir. For example: "I've heard Ektoraskan is going to buy a villa." and your friend says: "Alır tabii!" - something like: "Of course he would... I don't know if he will really buy a villa, but why doesn't that surprise me...? He's got all the money he needs goddammit!"
V. Aorist is also used in certain fixed phrases that you just have to memorize. For example, using a verb twice, one in positive aorist and one in negative aorist, gives you the meaning of "as soon as". The formula is: V-er V-mez. Ex: "Süt içer içmez yattı." (He went to bed as soon as he drank milk); "Ben evden çıkar çıkmaz yağmur başladı." (It started to rain as soon as I left the house).
Another phrase is aorist +ken. It gives the meaning of "while". "Uyurken konuşuyor" (He speaks while sleeping). Note that "ken" is not harmonized.
Another such phrase is "aorist + cesine/casına", which gives the meaning of "sort of ... -ing". For example: "Koşarcasına yanına gitti." (He went to her, sort of running. He didn't actually run, but it looked as if he were about to.)
Hopefully, it's clear(er) now! :-]