Jaya6 wrote:
Hi,
can you help me understand the position of 'is descended' in this sentence as a part of speech? also, the question says have found which is past perfect so is it correct to use 'is', a present tense here?
The combination of some form of "to be" plus the past participle of a verb creates a passive verb construction.
Here's an example: "My leftovers
are stolen out of the fridge every night by my hungry spouse." The verb in this sentence is "are stolen."
Similarly, in the clause "the elephant
is descended from an aquatic animal," the verb is "is descended."
In addition, "have found" is the
present perfect, not the past perfect. The past perfect will always have the word "had" (for example, "had eaten," "had kicked"). The present perfect, on the other hand, will contain the word "have" or "has" (for example, "has eaten," or "have kicked").
The present perfect tells us that an action started in the past and continued up to the present moment. So, in saying that Australian embryologists "have found evidence..." we know that this discovery began in the past and is now complete.
This can be correctly used with a variety of other tenses. For example, I could say that "I
have discovered that my own spouse
ate the last croissant." Here, I have discovered something that happened in the past.
Or, I could say that "I
have discovered that the local zoo
allows visitors to feed the giraffes." Here, I have discovered something that is happening in the present.
In the official example, the embryologists "have found" two things: that the elephant "
is descended.." and that "its trunk originally
evolved..." One of these things is in the present (the elephant is
currently descended), and one is in the past (the trunk evolved
in the past). That's totally fine! Those tenses make sense with the intended meaning of the sentence.
For much more on verb tenses, check out
this video.
I hope that helps!
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