inclusion vs. separation (present perfect and simple past)

Dear all,

First, I would like to thank you in advance for reading this rather lengthy post of mine. I do need to lay out my thinking and reasoning as wide as I can so you can best help me to untangle my own confusion knot.

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After a whole day contemplating on freeing myself from this closet of my mind regarding the choice between grammatical correctness and expressional naturalness, I would like to re-explore the marriage between the simple past tense and present perfect - one more time.

As CalifJim clearly explains in one of his writings, simple past represents time specificity; while present perfect serves time non-specificity (i.e., sometime in the past, including the recent time frame). Obviously, ‘specific’ and ‘non-specific’ cannot be the same. However, in terms of time, a ‘non-specific time set’ does include a ‘specific time element’ (e.g., yesterday afternoon is ‘specific’ in the time scale between the moment of big-bang and this very moment).

In addition to that, we all know a ‘non-specific recent past’ does not include a ‘specific far past’ – distinctively, the former is younger than the later.

Therefore, (I think) the distinction between ‘inclusion’ and ‘separation’ must have contributed to the way people express themselves.

Moreover, when ‘the last’ enters a picture – as we often compare ‘the last year’ with ‘last year’ – even though, it symbolizes the last one of any sequence (i.e., non-specific), its nature conveys time-specificity – all are before it and none is after it.

In comparing to ‘the last’ - ‘the best’ or ‘the worst’ is quality-based and time-unbiased – none or more are before it and none or more are after it; and they are all inferior. However, the superlative ‘the’ does indicate a uniqueness, so when it happens, the time involved is specific!

After the above postulation, I can reason that:

“What was the best movie you have ever seen?” means “Among all movies you have seen, which one was the best?” - and that must be logical and natural since “all movies you have seen” covers the time you saw the first one to the time you saw the last one (time non-specific) and ‘the best’ associates with one point in time (time specific). Time inclusion is in play. (Note that: “What is the movie you have seen best?” makes little sense).

Now comes the expression that raised different opinions in the earlier thread (What's the last movie you've seen?):

“What was the last movie you have seen?” – If we think it means “What was the movie that you have seen last?”, then we are trapped in a time conflict because “you have seen last’ combines time non-specific present perfect ‘have seen’ and time specific ‘last’ to support the same object, the movie.

Question #1: Can we interpret “What was the last movie you have seen?” to mean “Among all movies you have seen, which one was the last?” If not, would “What was the last movie you have ever seen?” (“ever” is added) allow us to carry out the similar interpretation?

If we allow the interpretation of “ Among …you have ...., which one was the …”, then we can conclude that simple past and present perfect can comingle provided that we look at the sentence from the ‘time inclusion’ point of view.

Now let’s move on to the next angle of this marriage dealing with the name of great grandmothers (GGMs).

If a GGM passed away far back in the past, should we ask “What is her name?” or “What was her name?. Some say, “Name is name - dead or alive!” thus, “What is her name?” is fine. However, some might disagree - “Name is not mortal; it is buried with the dead!” (side note: in some part of the world, the dead is given a new name since people would not dare to call out the old one disrespectfully); thus, they would go with “What was her name?”

For the first set of people, they would prefer this question: “What is the name of the last GGM you have lived with?” For the second set of people, ‘was’ should replace ‘is’.

Question #2: If ‘was’ is the better choice, do we face the same problem like that of “What was the last movie you have seen?”

Let’s compare “What was the last movie you have seen?” and “What was the name of the last GGM you have lived with?” Structurally, the two sentences are very similar, except that ‘have lived’ comes with preposition ‘with’. (I think) that difference must have allowed us to easily accept the second one. Intuitively, we must have associated ‘have lived’ with the GGM and ‘was’ with the name.

In other words, if what I think is acceptable, then the ‘object separation’ gives the sentence its naturalness and logical weight. Meanwhile, it seems odd to us to associate ‘have seen’ with the movie and not with its title! The ‘object uni-identification’ causes us to question. (Side note: sometimes, we have seen a movie and remembered the actors and its story but its title). The difference between ‘time inclusion’ or ‘time separation’ in fact enters into our mind as a byproduct but not the cause for our confusion. Take a look at this question: "What is the title of the last movie you have played with?" Can you tell any difference between that one and "What is the name of the last GGM you have lived with?"

Finally, for those of us who believe the addition of the word ‘recently’ would provide the ‘time separation’ between ‘recently’ (present perfect) and ‘was’ (simple past) in order to resolve the seemingly faulty logic, (I think) it would not make any difference. In short, if we can convey “What was the movie you have seen recently called?” to mean “Tell me about the movie you have seen recently – What was it called?”, then it should be acceptable – the movie becomes a whole, and the title is a part.

That’s it! Thank you all for trying to understand what has been going on in my mind. I am anxiously looking forward to your comments since I hope that your generosity will help me advance to a new gate on my learning journey.

Best Regards.
Hoa Thai