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Until Antoine Lavoisier proved otherwise...

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sam.railkar
 Post subject: Re: Until Antoine Lavoisier proved otherwise...
 Post Posted: Wed Nov 25, 2009 4:12 pm 
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I am not clear about the use of past-perfect here. Isn't "Until" telling you the time sequence clearly? Why do we need past-perfect?
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RonPurewal
 Post subject: Re: Until Antoine Lavoisier proved otherwise...
 Post Posted: Tue Jan 19, 2010 8:18 am 
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sam.railkar wrote:
I am not clear about the use of past-perfect here. Isn't "Until" telling you the time sequence clearly? Why do we need past-perfect?


you're still obligated to use the tense that is dictated by the context of the problem, even if the time cues ore otherwise "obvious".

this problem still features a condition that persisted up until a definite point in the past (i.e., the point at which lavoisier proved X).
that's the context in which we use the past perfect.
therefore, the past perfect is the CORRECT tense. other tenses are INCORRECT.
what other tense would you use?
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gs.abhinav
 Post subject: Re: Until Antoine Lavoisier proved otherwise...
 Post Posted: Mon Jul 26, 2010 6:56 am 
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Ron,

Beg your pardon but don't you think the usage of the relative pronoun 'whose' is incorrect in this sentence. I have usually seen that 'whose' modifies people and sometimes places but I have never seen it modify an object like in this question.

Would you be so kind to clarify the acceptable style in the GMAT.

Many thanks.
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tim
 Post subject: Re: Until Antoine Lavoisier proved otherwise...
 Post Posted: Mon Aug 23, 2010 7:55 pm 
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Hi GS,
i guess the best thing would be to ask you what word you would use in place of "whose". Considering there are no other ways to express this concept without using way more words, "whose" is definitely the most economical choice. Because of this, the GMAT has apparently concluded that in such cases "whose" can be used to refer even to things without personhood..

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Tim Sanders
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gmat.acer
 Post subject: Re: Until Antoine Lavoisier proved otherwise...
 Post Posted: Mon Aug 22, 2011 2:29 am 
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Posts: 20
RonPurewal wrote:
sam.railkar wrote:
I am not clear about the use of past-perfect here. Isn't "Until" telling you the time sequence clearly? Why do we need past-perfect?


you're still obligated to use the tense that is dictated by the context of the problem, even if the time cues ore otherwise "obvious".

this problem still features a condition that persisted up until a definite point in the past (i.e., the point at which lavoisier proved X).
that's the context in which we use the past perfect.
therefore, the past perfect is the CORRECT tense. other tenses are INCORRECT.
what other tense would you use?


As per 'Dinosaur' example in the study guide and 'war' example (http://www.beatthegmat.com/timmy-war-t72033.html) that Tommy W. covered in one of the study halls, I learnt that if the timing of the actions in the sentence is clear from the context we should not change tense and should stick with simple tenses.

So would following choice that uses simple past instead of past perfect be correct?

Until Antoine Lavoisier proved otherwise in the eighteenth century, many scientists believed that combustion released phlogiston, an imaginary substance whose properties were not fully understood.

If its incorrect, could you please explain why? Why/how the word 'Until' fails to show that scientist's belief persisted only until AL proved it wrong?
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jnelson0612
 Post subject: Re: Until Antoine Lavoisier proved otherwise...
 Post Posted: Sun Oct 09, 2011 10:25 pm 
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Posts: 1857
Your sentence looks correct to me. Nice work!

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Jamie Nelson
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