Passive

Question

Dear Masters,The grammar, "the verb transferred to passive terms", preplexes me all the time. I have read an article,"women with money encounter the fragile male ego on date", in New York Times. There is a sentence in this article,"Women are encountering forms of the hostility they weren't prepared to meet, and are trying to figure out how to balance pride in their accomplishments against their perceived need to bolster the ego of the men they date."So the word "prepared"  here seems to be the verb transferred into the adjective. And I presume the passive meaning of the word "prepared" is that the teachers taught the student to prepare well for the test, therefore, the action was from the teacher and the student was rather passive, like the word "well-behaved," right?But the word "perceived" here really got me. From my point of view, The emotion and recognition of a women's percept  should be active. Why didn't the author use the word "perceivable need" or "perceiving need?" Is this usage like I am "interested", "excited", and "surprised"?The same question occuring in the sentence like "PS3 has been successfully produced after repeated experiments and tests."Can I write the sentence like, "PS3 has been successfully produced after repeating experiments and tests," or "PS3 has been successfully produced after being repeated experiments and tests." ?Thank you for your patient to read my question.

Yankee · Accepted Answer

Lin1978Dear Masters,

The grammar, "the verb transferred to passive terms", preplexes me all the time. I have read an article,"women with money encounter the fragile male ego on date", in New York Times. There is a sentence in this article,

"Women are encountering forms of the hostility they weren't prepared to meet, and are trying to figure out how to balance pride in their accomplishments against their perceived need to bolster the ego of the men they date."

So the word "prepared" here seems to be the verb transferred into the adjective. And I presume the passive meaning of the word "prepared" is that the teachers taught the student to prepare well for the test, therefore, the action was from the teacher and the student was rather passive, like the word "well-behaved," right? People can also prepare themselves for things. So, the meaning of a passive interpretation would be "nobody prepared the women" (nobody = neither the women themselves nor anybody else).

But the word "perceived" here really got me. From my point of view, The emotion and recognition of a women's percept should be active. Why didn't the author use the word "perceivable need" or "perceiving need?" Though it does have a passive sense, the word "perceived" is definitely used as an adjective to describe the noun 'need'. It refers to a completed action. In the sentence, "perceived need" means that women have already perceived that there is an outside need to do something.

"Perceivable" would mean "possible to perceive". If the author had used "perceivable" in the sentence, that would have meant that it is possible for someone else to perceive the women's need. So, the meaning would be quite different.

"Perceiving need" doesn't make any sense to me at all in the sentence. That would sound as though the need (rather than a person) was doing the perceiving.

Is this usage like I am "interested", "excited", and "surprised"? No, not really.

The same question occuring in the sentence like "PS3 has been successfully produced after repeated experiments and tests." "Repeated" is an adjective and it tells you that experiments and tests were done again and again before PS3 was successfully produced.
Can I write the sentence like, "PS3 has been successfully produced after repeating experiments and tests,"
You might write it this way: "After repeating the experiments and tests, PS3 has finally been successfully produced." In this case, "after repeating" would mean "after we/they repeated".
or "PS3 has been successfully produced after being repeated experiments and tests." ? No

Thank you for your patient to read my question.

Hi Lin1978

I've tried to answer your questions in the quote above (in blue). I hope it helps.

Lin1978 · Answer

Thank you, Master Yankee. Your answer is quite clear. But I still have one small question. Last time my teacher told me that, "if I have two different subjects in a main clause and in a conditional, and I want to use the participle phrase, I have to keep both two subjects or change it into possessive case to avoid getting confused."

In this sentence, there is no need to add "we" or "they" in the conditional, like "after we repeating the experiments and tests, PS3 has finally been successfully produced," or change it into "after our repeating experiments and tests, PS3 has finally been successfully produced." Because the subject is clear and no one will get confused. Am I right?

Yankee · Answer

Lin1978Thank you, Master Yankee. Your answer is quite clear. But I still have one small question. Last time my teacher told me that, "if I have two different subjects in a main clause and in a conditional, and I want to use the participle phrase, I have to keep both two subjects or change it into possessive case to avoid getting confused." That sounds about right, except that you cannnot simply insert the subject into a participle phrase. You must also change the participle to the appropriate verb tense.

In this sentence, there is no need to add "we" or "they" in the conditional (1), like "after we repeating the experiments and tests, PS3 has finally been successfully produced,"(2) or change it into "after our repeating experiments and tests, PS3 has finally been successfully produced." (3) Because the subject is clear and no one will get confused. Am I right?

Hi Lin1978

(1) The sentence you are referring to is not a conditional sentence.

(2) "after we repeating the experiments and tests,..." ==> This is never grammatical!

"After repeating the experiments and tests" is grammatical" and it means:
- "After the experiments and tests were repeated, ..." (simple past tense, passive voice)
OR
- "After I/you/he/she/we/they/ repeated the experiments and tests, ..." (simple past tense, active voice)

The passive voice is frequently used when it is not important or not known who performed the action. In the active sentence above, I don't know who repeated the experiments and tests. However, I assume it was the same person or people who produced PS3.

(3) In a passive sentence, the subject is usually unknown or not important. As I mentioned above, in your sentence it can be assumed that the same person or people who produced PS3 also performed the experiments and test. But there is no way for me to know exactly who that person or those people were.

Inserting a possessive adjective before a gerund does not always result in a natural construction.
"After our repeating the experiments and tests" is extremely awkard. Your sentence is not a good candidate for the insertion of the possessive adjective.

Lin1978 · Answer

Thank you so much, Master Yankee. You're very helpful. But, can I make a last request? Because I keep making the awkard examples. Could you please make a good example for the insertion of the posessive adjective so I can tell the difference about what a good example is?

Yankee · Answer

Hi Lin1978

Here are some examples:

I appreciate your taking the time to help me.

My son's reading improved drastically after he got glasses.

It was Mary's incessant lying that led to her being fired..

My husband didn't approve of my spending our life savings on a gold-plated Ford pick-up truck.

Goodman · Answer

Lin1978Dear Masters,

The grammar, "the verb transferred to passive terms", preplexes me all the time. I have read an article,"women with money encounter the fragile male ego on date", in New York Times. There is a sentence in this article,

"Women are encountering forms of the hostility they weren't prepared to meet, and are trying to figure out how to balance pride in their accomplishments against their perceived need to bolster the ego of the men they date."

So the word "prepared" here seems to be the verb transferred into the adjective. And I presume the passive meaning of the word "prepared" is that the teachers taught the student to prepare well for the test, therefore, the action was from the teacher and the student was rather passive, like the word "well-behaved," right?

But the word "perceived" here really got me. From my point of view, The emotion and recognition of a women's percept should be active. Why didn't the author use the word "perceivable need" or "perceiving need?"
Is this usage like I am "interested", "excited", and "surprised"?

The same question occuring in the sentence like "PS3 has been successfully produced after repeated experiments and tests."
Can I write the sentence like, "PS3 has been successfully produced after repeating experiments and tests," or "PS3 has been successfully produced after being repeated experiments and tests." ?

Thank you for your patient to read my question.

Lin1978

Amy has already given you a detailed explanation. I don’t know if this will help you clear some of the confusion on passive usage.

Active – John told me that you were the one that kept taking my stationary from my office.

PASSIVE USAGE- To avoid mentioning John, I could say “I was told that the you were the one that kept taking my stationary from my office.

We can use present as well as past participle as adjective:

Present participle adjective- Seeing Chris Angel’s mind-boggling magic acts is truly a fascinating experience

Past participle adjective phrase - Fascinated by watching his magic on TV, we actually bought tickets paying $80 a piece to see his show live while we were on vacation in .

Others common past participle adjectives: a well planned party, A poorly organized meeting, a germ infested bathroom, (trying to convince Larry to quit smoking was) a wasted effort. A well prepared presentation, a well educated work force.

Does that help?

Passive

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