For years, the Ptolemaic view of a geocentric universe

Question

For years, the Ptolemaic view of a geocentric universe  had held sway before the Copernican view became dominant .

A) had held sway before the Copernican view became dominant

B) held sway before the Copernican view became dominant

C) was held by a lot of people before the Copernican view became dominant

D) held its own before the Copernican view became dominant

E) held sway before the Copernican view was adopted by the society

santivilla · Accepted Answer

question!
i am aware that Ptolemaic was the earlier view than the Copernican, and that it is proper to use a past prefect to describe the earlier Ptolemaic and a simple past to denote the later Copernican. But, by putting the word "before" in the sentence, isnt it evident that Ptolemaic was earlier than copernican? Thus, can we make the sentence cleaner by eliminating the past perfect since it is already know that Plto. came before Coper.?? This is why i chose B instead of A.
The MGMAT guide says clearly that if one can avoid using the past perfect, then do it, but always keeping in mind that the sentence can not loose its meaning.
Please correct me if am wrong.

daagh · Answer

The straight question is about what tense to use. It is obvious that Ptolemaic was the earlier view than the Copernican. Therefore, it is proper to use a past prefect to describe the earlier Ptolemaic and a simple past to denote the later Copernican. Chocie A does that neatly. All others use simple past for both events implying that both views existed contemporarily

daagh · Answer

@santivilla: Let us look at this

Before its independence in 1947, Britain ruled India as a colony and they would relinquish power  only after a long struggle by the native people.

A. Before its independence in 1947, Britain ruled India as a colony and they would relinquish power

B. Before independence in 1947, Britain had ruled India as a colony and relinquished power

C. Before its independence in 1947, India was ruled by Britain as a colony and they relinquished power

D. Before independence in 1947, India had been ruled as a colony by Britain, which relinquished power

E. Before independence in 1947, India had been a colony of the British, who relinquished power

Here the timeline is clear with the use of the time marker ‘before’. Still the official answer is E, which uses the past perfect. As per your claim. the answer should be either A or C, both of which do not use the past perfect, but simple past.

To quote MGMAT’s spokesperson trying to justify the use of past perfect:

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Stacey Koprince
Instructor
Director of Online Community
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So, What would you take now?

santivilla · Answer

@daagh:
thanks for the explanation. Its all clear now.
cheers

rohitkumar77 · Answer

The answer is A due to the following rule :-

With phrases like Since , in the last minutes , For centuries , In the last decade where all these are used as a time line we use 
Present Prefect tense .

SO had ...

Source : Manhattan SC

thangvietname · Answer

both a and b are correct. 
if there is time word which show the sequence we can use either did or had done.

gmat never test us to choose between a and b

shyind · Answer

easily A .. only this choice has the past perfect.

dina98 · Answer

I was under the assumption that if 'before' is used, 'had' is not necessary?

guialain · Answer

Past and Past perfect tense.
Only answer A complies.

adityapareshshah · Answer

Though Daagh has given an explanation for the use of past perfect over Simple past, I am still not clear about the rule to be followed. I choose B, because use of 'before' did not necessitate the use of past perfect. I had seen a similar question in the past where it was clearly mentioned that if the use of simple past over past perfect does not change the meaning, and if words like before , since etc (which indicate precedence) are used, then one should avoid past perfect.

Can someone help and provide a clarity?

Thanks

RMD007 · Answer

Expert, I am not sure if this is an official question.

A use past perfect tense and B use simple past tense. But the word "before" correctly points the time sequence.
Option A and B, both are same from the tense prospective. With the real GMAT test this conflict?

Also..

Is this correct???

sayantanc2k · Answer

In my opinion, option B is better because of the use of "before".

The first part is correct - "since" requires present perfect. However I do not see any connection of this concept to this question: there is no "since" and the tense is not present perfect.

soondoobu · Answer

GMATNinja

why is B wrong? why is there the need to use the past perfect tense? the word "before" signals that plotemaic happened before copernican. do we still need to use the past perfect redundantly?

sharmisthamona2 · Answer

After reading the answers, my question exactly..

Posted from my mobile device

maheeef · Answer

I think that the answer is E for other reasons, and not the past perfect verb tenses. 
In A, the beginning modifier "Before its independence in 1947" wrongfully modifies Britain. It should be modifying India-> so that is incorrect.
In B, theres the same mistake as A. 
In C, the pronoun "they" is incorrect. It does not not agree with the antecedent in number . India and Britain are both singular, thus the correct pronoun should be "it". And even if the answer choice used "it", the meaning would be distorted/ambiguous. So C is incorrect.
In D, "which" is the wrong relative pronoun to used. The preferred pronoun would be "who".
Option E corrects all these errors. So option is correct because it does not have the errors stated in the other option choices, NOT because it uses past perfect tense. As long as there are sequence markers and they are clear, past perfect tense is not required.

souvik19 · Answer

I am sorry, but I will beg to differ here. In your example A and C are incorrect choices because of the pronoun ambiguity ("its" can refer to both India and well as Britain), however, w.r.t the question under consideration, both option A and option B are logically as well as grammatically correct. 
Hence the only possible take for me would be to believe GMAT will never test a question like this. In GMAT, as far as I know, all choices except one has to be incorrect on solid reasons. If that is not the case, then may be its good to know GMAT prefers past perfect over simple past even if both options are grammatically correct.

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For years, the Ptolemaic view of a geocentric universe

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