Turkish: A Comprehensive Grammar

Assumptions expressed with the aorist always have future time reference, and denote
events that are not envisaged as planned or predetermined:
(78) Mehmet geç gel-ir.
late come-AOR
‘Mehmet will (probably) be late.’
(79) Umarım Semra vazonun yokluğunu farket-mez.
notice-NEG.AOR
‘I hope Semra won’t notice the absence of the vase.’
(ii) Nominal and verbal sentences with -DIr:
A striking feature of assumptions expressed with -DIr is that in this type of utterance -
DIr is attached not only to 3rd person but also to 1st and 2nd person predicates (see
8.3.3).
(80) İnşallah hasta değil-im-dir.
hopefully ill not-1SG-GM
‘I hope I’m not ill.’
(81) Herhalde bir yerlerde karşılaş-mış-ız-dır.
-PF-1PL-GM
‘We have probably met somewhere or other.’
(82) Mutlaka bugün telefon ed-ecek-ler-dir.
-FUT-3PL-GM
‘They will definitely ring today.’
-(y)AcAKtIr expresses the assumption that the predicted action is planned or otherwise
predetermined. (82) therefore expresses greater confidence in the realization of the
prediction than if the aorist had been used.
(iii) Probability statements with olsa gerek:
This construction (the conditional form of the copular/auxiliary verb ol-followed by
gerek ‘necessary’) is used mostly in the 3rd person:
(83) En iyisi bu olsa gerek.
‘This one is probably the best.’
olsa gerek occurs also in compound verb forms (21.5).
(iv) Non-future predictions with olacak:
The future form of ol- can be used with present tense reference to make a confident
statement about an entity that is not within sight at the moment of speech, but is near
enough for the prediction to be immediately verified:
(84)
Tense, aspect and modality 299
A. -Zarflar nerede?
‘Where are the envelopes?’
B. -İkinci çekmecede olacaklar.
‘They’ll be in the second drawer.’
For the occurrence of this usage of olacak in compound verb forms, see 21.5.1.