In addition to being used for claims about the future, future morphemes are found in quite a number of languages cross-linguistically in inferences about past and present eventualities. However, these future morphemes often seem to differ in distribution when compared to other epistemic modals used in such inferences (e.g., Winans in Inferences of will, PhD diss., University of California, 2016; Giannakidou and Mari in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 36(1):85–129, 2018; Mihoc et al. in Proceedings of SALT 29, pp. 351–370, 2019; Ippolito and Farkas in Linguistics and Philosophy 45:943–984, 2022). In this paper, I examine the future morphemes in (a.k.a. Commox-Sliammon; Central Salish) and will in English. I develop an account where the future places restrictions on the timing of evidence for the modal claim. More specifically, I argue that the and English future morphemes presuppose that the modal base supporting the strong modal claim is established prior to the earliest moment at which the prejacent proposition holds (according to the modal claim). This analysis captures the restrictions on the distribution of these future morphemes when used for inferences about non-future eventualities, while also allowing a unified denotation for these morphemes to be maintained in both claims about the future and inferences about past and present eventualities.
