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I saw one phrase:

He will have eaten it until it made him sick.

Why don't we say ...until it makes him sick?

I saw this rule under Time words with no future forms: by the time, until, as soon as, when (except for questions), etc) in Round Up 5.

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    It's understood as: until it will have made him sick.
    – Lucian Sava
    Apr 17, 2017 at 13:03
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    @LucianSava To clarify further, the second "will have" can be elided precisely because it is repeated, and therefore implied by context.
    – Monty Harder
    Apr 17, 2017 at 18:00

1 Answer 1

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The future perfect simple is a funny tense, and since it is a future tense, I can see why you might expect to use the word will.

However, it's not quite that simple. We use the perfective will have when we are looking back from a point in time when something will have already happened. Therefore, what follows is in the past tense.

By the time he gets home, he will have played for six hours hours in the park.

I would love to go out for dessert with you after the feast, but I will have had too much to eat by then. I'm afraid I wouldn't have room in my tummy for any more food!

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    Hmm... I don't know why this answer's got 5 upvotes because it doesn't address the real question of the question, which is the choice of tense after until, not the one after will have. -- To make it more obvious using your example, why didn't you use By the time he got home, he will have played for six hours hours in the park in your example like the example in the question does?
    – Damkerng T.
    Apr 18, 2017 at 1:00
  • The tense in OPs question is modified by will have. As far as I can tell, tense is not ever changed by the word until. I am a native speaker, so someone who knows grammar more formally might pipe in to contradict me here, but I can't think of any examples where until modifies the tense of the remainder of a sentence. As far as your incorrect sample sentence, I don't understand how you came by it. There is no past tense prior to will have in OPs question.
    – Ben I.
    Apr 18, 2017 at 1:35
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    Don't get me wrong. I didn't question your proficiency. I just think that you missed the point of OP's question. It basically comes down to this: why would someone use He will have eaten it until it made him sick instead of He will have eaten it until it makes him sick? So, focusing on eaten (or played or had like in your answer) is missing OP's point. If you don't think until modifies anything, that's fine, but why is it made rather than makes? (FWIW, the sentence doesn't sound very good to me, but as a non-native speaker, I'm reluctant to judge it.)
    – Damkerng T.
    Apr 18, 2017 at 1:45
  • Oh, I see what I did there, and I can see why it is confusing. I changed the placement of the verb. Sometimes being a native speaker has its own disadvantages - it takes a long time to formulate my answers, because I don't know the grammatical structures formally, only intuitively. I will try to formulate a response to your question tomorrow, and possibly modify my answer as well. Now, though, I have to go to bed :)
    – Ben I.
    Apr 18, 2017 at 1:55
  • Have a good sleep :-)
    – Damkerng T.
    Apr 18, 2017 at 1:58

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