SC: Caffeine

[GK]

Balzac drank more than fifty cups of coffee a day and died of caffeine poisoning; furthermore, caffeine did not seem to bother Samuel Johnson, the great writer and lexicographer, who was reported to have drunk twenty-five cups of tea at one sitting.
(A) furthermore, caffeine did not seem to bother
(B) however, caffeine did not seem to bother
(C) however, caffeine did not seem to have bothered
(D) furthermore, caffeine did not seem to have bothered
(E) in addition, caffeine did not seem to bother

Can you please explain why C is incorrect & why B is a better choice? I chose C over B because C uses 'have bothered' which seemed to be parallel with 'have drunk'. However, I am quite unclear regarding the use of 'have + ...'. Can you please explain the correct usage? Thanks.



Source: SC 1000 Practice Questions

[RonPurewal]

I'm with you: I don't think anything is really wrong with C. (I noticed that one of the commenters on the 1000sc thread feels the same way, too.) If you had to choose between the two, though, I'd knock C for wordiness.

There's a slight, very subtle difference in rhetorical meaning here, too: 'didn't seem to bother' reflects the views of a hypothetical observer who was actually there at the time of the mass caffeine ingestion, whereas 'didn't seem to have bothered' reflects the views of a hypothetical observer who took notes after the fact.

Since this isn't an official GMAT question, my advice is simply to ignore it. IF you see the same sort of distinction being drawn on a real GMAT problem, though, take note of it: remember that the GMAT is 'the native speaker' and what it says goes, whether we like it or not.

POST THE QUESTION NUMBERS! (this is #157)

[sandeep.19+mg]

Hi Ron,

Suppose such a question did come in the GMAT. In that case,

1. Could I say that "seem to have bothered" implies that Johnson is not bothered by caffeine even now where as "seem to bother" refers only to the poin of time in the past when he drank the 25 cups?

2. Therefore can I conclude that C differs in meaning from B and choose B because it is similar in meaning to the original text?

Thanks

[whuannou]

My answer would be B.

C does not seem consistent because of:
"Have bothered" on its own (for me) indicates past. If you add "did" on it you are putting another indicator of past atop.

In my opinion, a better formulation for C could be:
(C) however, caffeine does not seem to have bothered

Would you agree?

[Harish Kumar]

How about "did not seem to bother" being a kind of universal statement in present tense about the relationship between Johnson and Caffeine, whereas "did not seem to have bothered" being a statement of fact during Johnson's lifetime (present perfect tense)

[Harish Kumar]

There is also a slight notion of the effect of caffeine on Johnson in "seem to have bothered", so characteristic of the present perfect.

[RonPurewal]

1000SC is now a banned source (and has been for a few years now), so we're going to lock this thread.
Don't concern yourself with problems from that source; it's a poor-quality source.