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Carlotta Smith in the paper Reference Time without Tense in Recent Advances in the Syntax and Semantics of Tense, Aspect and Modality volume imposes the following condition.

The Bounded Event Constraint. Bounded situations are not located at Speech Time.

Does that mean that a bounded situation with duration cannot be said to be located now, and we cannot talk about events that are occurring ending? Or just that we cannot think that an event now has already ended?

The former seems a bit too much, but I don't know anything else about "bounded events" (because I don't have access to the necessary articles) and I think this captures a problem I have.

What if an event essentially occurs at some or all speech times, does that mean we cannot talk about it ending?

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  • Where does the initial statement come from? Does it mean that we are speaking now (speech time) of some events not occurring now? Is this relevant?
    – Mauro ALLEGRANZA
    Sep 23, 2022 at 9:04
  • Smith explains it in The Pragmatics and Semantics of Temporal Meaning:"Why are bounded events non-Present? The answer is both pragmatic and semantic. In taking the temporal perspective of the Present, speakers are limited by a tacit convention that communication is instantaneous. The perspective of the present time is incompatible with a bounded event, because the bounds would go beyond that perspective". Bounded events are those with fixed endpoints while "the Present must be open and unbounded".
    – Conifold
    Sep 23, 2022 at 9:32

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