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Verb Tense - OG # 2

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by punitkaur » Tue Oct 13, 2009 2:59 am
Of all the vast tides of migration that have swept through history, may be none is more concentrated as the wave that brought 12 million immigrants onto American shores in little more than 3 decades.

I understand this is an idiom + verb question and it should be more X than Y.

I have a question about the verb tense usage here.

the answer uses "was" so,

perhaps none was more concentrated than.

Why should we use was, when we are using present perfect "have swept". why can't it be ,

none "is" more concentrated than the wave...

this answer choice was not there in the choices, but I would like to know why "was" is correct.

Can you not use simple present after using present perfect?
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by Onell » Fri Dec 31, 2010 10:55 pm
punitkaur wrote:Of all the vast tides of migration that have swept through history, may be none is more concentrated as the wave that brought 12 million immigrants onto American shores in little more than 3 decades.

I understand this is an idiom + verb question and it should be more X than Y.

I have a question about the verb tense usage here.

the answer uses "was" so,

perhaps none was more concentrated than.

Why should we use was, when we are using present perfect "have swept". why can't it be ,

none "is" more concentrated than the wave...

this answer choice was not there in the choices, but I would like to know why "was" is correct.

Can you not use simple present after using present perfect?
Can smn please comment? thanks
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by Onell » Fri Dec 31, 2010 10:58 pm
punitkaur wrote:Of all the vast tides of migration that have swept through history, may be none is more concentrated as the wave that brought 12 million immigrants onto American shores in little more than 3 decades.

I understand this is an idiom + verb question and it should be more X than Y.

I have a question about the verb tense usage here.

the answer uses "was" so,

perhaps none was more concentrated than.

Why should we use was, when we are using present perfect "have swept". why can't it be ,

none "is" more concentrated than the wave...

this answer choice was not there in the choices, but I would like to know why "was" is correct.

Can you not use simple present after using present perfect?
Can smn please comment? thanks
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by prachich1987 » Fri Dec 31, 2010 11:53 pm
I got your point punitkaur.
Even I had thought the same way when I attempted this question from OG
I would be grateful if experts can reply
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by EducationAisle » Sat Jan 01, 2011 10:45 am
There is no rule that Present tense cannot be used with Present perfect. For example, following would be a valid sentence:

Of all the movies I have seen, GodFather is the best.

However, what needs to noticed in this sentence is the following clause:

...none is/was more concentrated than the wave that bought 12 million immigrants...

So, since bought is Simple Past (and is in the non-underlined portion, which we cannot change), we need to use was (again Past) in the underlined portion.

Meaning-wise, the sentence can be split into two parts:

1. Many vast tides of migration have perhaps swept throughout history - This is a good use of Present Perfect, since these tides have occured at several unspecified times in the history.

2. Characteristics of one specific tide in the past are being described (it was concentrated, since it brought 12 million immigrants)

p.s. Not sure if you read OG's OE. Explains pretty well.
Ashish
MBA - ISB, GMAT - 99th Percentile
GMAT Faculty @ EducationAisle
www.EducationAisle.com

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