"I had eaten three pieces of cake when I learned that the cake was poisoned."
So this is the sentence from MGMAT Verbal Basic. I feel weird about the meaning of this sentence. My interpretation is that, "I learned that cake was poisoned so I ate the cake", which is definitely stupid. So can someone clarify this sentence.
past perfect tense doubt
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- hemant_rajput
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- EducationAisle
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when is used in the sense of before in this sentence.
Ashish
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by the time u learned that the cake was poisoned u already had eaten three pieces of cake
so the sequence is : u ate ----->then u learned that cake was poisoned (on a lighter note ..kind of dangerous situation else why wud u eat if u knew its poisoned unless of course ur on a suicidal streak )
so the sequence is : u ate ----->then u learned that cake was poisoned (on a lighter note ..kind of dangerous situation else why wud u eat if u knew its poisoned unless of course ur on a suicidal streak )
- Gowri@CrackVerbal
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In the example you cited, 'when' is used as a time marker to indicate the particular juncture in time when you realized that the cake was poisoned.hemant_rajput wrote:"I had eaten three pieces of cake when I learned that the cake was poisoned."
So this is the sentence from MGMAT Verbal Basic. I feel weird about the meaning of this sentence. My interpretation is that, "I learned that cake was poisoned so I ate the cake", which is definitely stupid. So can someone clarify this sentence.
For the meaning you suspect to come out, the sentence should be worded differently:
When I learned that the cake was poisoned, I ate three pieces of it.
Gowri N Kishore
Verbal Specialist & Mentor
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