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Albert Einstein talked about what influenced his life as a scientist. He remembered seeing a pocket compass when he was five years old and (marveling/marveled) that the needle always pointed north.

This is from my exam question which asked to select the correct choice between marveling and marveled. The answer says marveling is the correct answer but it seems like marveled is the right answer for me. Can someone verify the answer and explain why marveling is correct?

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up vote 6 down vote accepted

Marveling was probably given as the correct answer because it matches seeing, seeing and marveling being the things he remembered. However, a different interpretation would allow marveled. That would be the case if you considered that a new finite clause followed and, meaning that he remembered and he marveled were being treated as two separate events.

It depends on just what aspects of English the examination was testing, but in general any question, such as this one, that allows more than one possible answer is poorly designed.

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Thanks. So I guess this question did have two answers. –  l46kok Oct 9 '12 at 7:52
Yes, but in exams you have to think about which answer the examiners want. –  Barrie England Oct 9 '12 at 7:54

He's talking about what he remembered, and the rest of the sentence after that is in continuous tense -- "he remembered seeing ... and marveling ..."

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Ah that makes perfect sense. But wouldn't "marveled" be also grammatically correct? –  l46kok Oct 9 '12 at 7:35
No- you could say 'he marveled' but not 'he remembered marveled' –  Rory Alsop Oct 9 '12 at 7:42
Seeing and marveling are non-finite, so they cannot be said to be in any tense at all. –  Barrie England Oct 9 '12 at 7:43
I agree with Rory Alsop. I think that there's only one correct answer for this question: "...he remembered seeing...and marveling...". –  user21497 Oct 9 '12 at 8:04

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