The emphasis is not being placed on was because it’s past tense, it’s being placed on was because the shitpost is ironically somewhat accurate. You can replace it with is if you’d like for the same meaning. On the other hand, everyone knows we’re talking about Neil as there is no other relevant subject, so bringing attention to the word he doesn’t really make any sense.
Perhaps it would read better if they had said “…he actually was an alien”?
According to the dictionary, ‘is’ and ‘was’ are respectively a present and past tense singular of the word ‘be’. The definition of the word ‘be’ (or at least, the one I find relevant here), is “having the state, quality, identity, nature, role, etc., specified”. This seems like a significantly more important part of the sentence to be emphasizing here.
On the moon he is the alien.
As opposed to who? I still just can’t understand why you would emphasize ‘he’, when there are no other subjects that we could be talking about. Like, obviously we’re talking about Neil, so why would you put emphasis on it? On the other hand, the fact that he actually ‘is/was’ an alien is pretty surprising to think about and thus the important bit. That is to say, it makes more sense to emphasize the fact that he is an alien, and not the fact that Neil is the subject.
I agree that we seem to use language differently, and it’s pretty interesting to see. Both of us have been upvoted by at least one or two other people as well, so it seems some people agree with you and some with me despite our completely different takes, so I don’t think either of us are really wrong.
Why would he be italicized? ‘Was’ would be italicized because the emphasis is being put on the fact that he actually was an alien.
Because HE is the alien there. Not that he is and then is not anymore, he always is the alien there.
The emphasis is not being placed on was because it’s past tense, it’s being placed on was because the shitpost is ironically somewhat accurate. You can replace it with is if you’d like for the same meaning. On the other hand, everyone knows we’re talking about Neil as there is no other relevant subject, so bringing attention to the word he doesn’t really make any sense.
Perhaps it would read better if they had said “…he actually was an alien”?
On the moon he is the alien. Otherwise/usually he is the human and others are the aliens, hence the emphasis that we can be aliens.
According to the dictionary, ‘is’ and ‘was’ are respectively a present and past tense singular of the word ‘be’. The definition of the word ‘be’ (or at least, the one I find relevant here), is “having the state, quality, identity, nature, role, etc., specified”. This seems like a significantly more important part of the sentence to be emphasizing here.
As opposed to who? I still just can’t understand why you would emphasize ‘he’, when there are no other subjects that we could be talking about. Like, obviously we’re talking about Neil, so why would you put emphasis on it? On the other hand, the fact that he actually ‘is/was’ an alien is pretty surprising to think about and thus the important bit. That is to say, it makes more sense to emphasize the fact that he is an alien, and not the fact that Neil is the subject.
I think we just use/understand language differently?
If there is nobody else, then he is no alien to anyone anyway?
I agree that we seem to use language differently, and it’s pretty interesting to see. Both of us have been upvoted by at least one or two other people as well, so it seems some people agree with you and some with me despite our completely different takes, so I don’t think either of us are really wrong.