Time-relative counterfactuality: Future-less-vivid conditionals and the modal past

Paolo Santorio (University of Maryland, College Park)

Future-Less-Vivid conditionals (FLVs) are X-marked conditionals whose antecedent has future reference time. FLVs are standardly taken to be non-counterfactual, but I show that this is incorrect: their antecedents can be incompatible with propositions about the future that are already settled. This is problematic for existing accounts. I suggest a new theory of X-marking, effectively a hybrid of Past-as-Past and Past-as-Modal theories, that captures all the data.