Tony Roberts Favour the present tense

I recommend the rule “if in doubt use the present tense”. Higham (1998), [1], §4.29 The present tense works well for scientific writing. The eternal truths we present in an article should all be in the present tense: instead of “experiments have shown that”, prefer “experiments show that”. The present tense helps make more active writing. Write derivations in the present tense: not the past tense of “where we have assumed R = {k1, . . . , kr}” but instead “where we assume R = {k1, . . . , kr}”; nor the future tense of “As we will scale later the Hamiltonian with the inverse temperature”, but instead “As we scale the Hamiltonian with the inverse temperature, Section 4,”. Generally avoid “will”: prefer “The potential in Example 2 is central” to “The potential in Example 2 will be central”.