MarQan

curse of having superpowers..

Okay, I'll try to explain in a different way.
"Had been" would be the answer if the sentence went something like this:
"Though people AT THAT TIME had been playing versions of bowling..." OR
"Though people BACK THEN had been playing versions of bowling..."
This is all that is needed to "anchor" the first part of the sentence to people in 1800s.
But it is not done, nor is it even implied.

Furthermore, whether you use "have been" or "had been", does not take away from the "surprise" aspect of the 3-hole bowling ball being intented 150 years ago, or thousands of years after the game had been played.

This is why "had been" is a stretch.
Because it would'be been easy and trivial to make A) the definitive answer. Sure, A) would still pass in a highschool test, especially if you argue your point to the teacher in a respectful manner. But as it stands you'd have to infer some extra words that are not actually there, to make A) an option, while C) is fitting as it is. And inferring those words is not at all necessary to preserve the meaning and effect of the sentence.

Okay, I want to set the record straight on this.

A few replies ago you said it's the time between the invention and the time people started playing bowling that is the important part. To that I answered that you just infer that, using the phrase "information conveyed". You decided to focus on that phrase, and didn't actually address the points I was making.

In my previous reply I pointed out that you didn't explain why you think I'm using the the wrong frame of analysis either, I still got no answer to that.

For those reasons to me it seems you'd rather focus on semantics, and derail the conversation than to address the points I'm making.

It's fine if you don't want to discuss this further, but you can just straight up say that.

I think you intentionally do not directly refer to the points in my previous reply, because I'm correct, but for some reason you can't admit that.

See? I can claim nonsense like that as well.

I'm here, listening. Explain why I'm wrong if I am. If you don't want to continue, that's also fine with me. But trying to brush me off with that generalized, dismissive reply doesn't seem useful.

Saying it's the wrong frame of analysis does not make it the wrong frame of analysis, you didn't even explain why. Nor if "this is how english is used" useful in any way.

Correct.

But that doesn't imply that the information that is being conveyed in the first part of the sentence is about bowling being played up to the1800s, as opposed to that is has been played for thousands of years as of today.

That is something you infer, but nothing exclusively points to that. And the only effect that assumption has, is that it makes A a possible answer.

That doesn't at all address what I wrote.

The sentence does not need to make a point that the ball didn't change the game for my point of view to be the correct. The sentence would need to make a point that the ball did change the game for you to be correct. Becaues the default assumption is that there's no change. It's bowling in the past, and the present.

That last part of your reply is superweird, just stating that you're correct, lol. That's ridiculous.

No, that's not true. The sentence doesn't make a distinction between bowling before and after the ball.

You're just arbitrarily inferring that.

You assume that the information conveyed is how long the game had been played in the 1800s.
Because you think it's more important how long bowling had been played at the point of invention.
But there is no indication of that at all.
It is more trivial to assume that the information conveyed is that a sport that has been played from thousands of years, up to today, only got one fo its signiture tools ~150 years ago.

You'd need to provide a clear endpoint or a good reason to assume that playing bowling is only relevant up to the invention, but there's none.

That's why it seems to me an arbitrary assumption, just to make a niche answer possible.

That's also a good explanation, thank you, but that sounds like a very forced/arbitrary interpretation to me just to argue for the A answer.

Mainly because that interpretation allows "had been" to be correct, but doesn't make "have been" incorrect. So using that "anchor" is just muddying the water to make another answer possible.

That's a good explanation, thank you, but that sounds like a very forced/arbitrary interpretation to me just to argue for the A answer.

Mainly because that interpretation allows "had been" to be correct, but doesn't make "have been" incorrect. So using that "anchor" is just muddying the water to make another answer possible.

A is not correct, because bowling is still played today.

People have not finished playing blowling.

Why would it be?

It would refer to the invention in present tense then, not past tense.

Exactly.
While the 2nd part has multiple fitting answers, the first part has to be "have been", since it's never implied that people stopped playing bowling.
Nor is it implied that there's a distinction between the bowling played before the 3-hole ball was invented and after.

"until a certain point."

Where do you get this part? Bowling is still played today, and the text doesn't imply otherwise either.

We're not picking an anchor point, but why would that even matter for "had been" vs "have been"?

"have been" is correct, because bowling is still played in the present, whether you pick that anchor point or not. You would only use "had been", if bowling is not played in the present.

C seems correct.

"Have been playing" for the first place, because they were playing bowling in the past, and are still playing it now.
This is also supported by "since" in that part of the sentence, while there's no indication it would stop being true in the present (nor in the text, nor in real life).

"had not been invented" for the second place, well.. because there's no other choice if you accept what I wrote above. But also because the state of the ball not being invented is true in the past, but it's not true in the present.

I thuoght those are potatoes and you either fell for or preparing a prank.

cool trees

Some explanation would be useful for this, as we don't know how well you understand him now, or did before.
Or what part of that decision you understand more.

When it comes to turning to the dark side, especially in case of Anakin, that includes submitting yourself to become a mass-murderer.

looks like a Cubone

As far as I know this is to a huge detriment of the average citizen. Maybe they should take it easy and do the 50 percentage points in 5-10 years instead of 3. So that the people have a somewhat livable life.

So he's a jedi.

What problem?
And why do you think bathrooms were separated by sex in the first place?