Subject: Why "I have seen him yesterday" is wrong?

Dear Sir/Madam,

What is the mistake in the sentence: "I have seen him yesterday"?

We have always been accepting the simplified answer: Because there is a past
time adverb said in the sentence, we have to use the Simple Past: "I saw him
yesterday".

For a concrete source, Current English Usage, by F.T.Wood, is noted for its
aim at correcting students' errors in English usage. In explaining the
Present Perfect, the book emphasizes a helping rule: "IT [the Present
Perfect tense] MUST NOT BE ACCOMPANIED BY ANY ADVERB OR ADVERBIAL EXPRESSION
WHICH DENOTES PAST TIME. We cannot say 'I have seen him last Wednesday'."
(Here the grammar itself chose to use capital letters to emphasize the
formula.) In fact, this is the most reliable guidance in the usage of
English tense. Scarcely will a grammar book do without it.

Because of this thumb rule, however, all grammar books have to avoid to talk
about the past time adverbs for the Present Perfect tense, such as: in the
past, in the past year, during past year, in the past xxx years, over the
past xxx weeks, during the past few days, for the past two months, etc. And
yet, their examples are frequently found in all kinds of readings and very
probably you may have to use frequently too:
Ex: He has worked in that company IN THE PAST.
Ex: Frequency graph shows how often each number has hit IN THE PAST YEAR.
Ex: There have been great improvements in school teaching IN THE PAST TEN
YEARS.
Ex: As a result, the number of multiple births in the U.S. has more than
quadrupled DURING THE PAST QUARTER-CENTURY.
Ex: At least IN THE PAST FEW YEARS exitways from central Paris have been
greatly improved.
Ex: This function has greatly increased in importance OVER THE PAST HUNDRED
YEARS.

Unknown to ordinary students and teachers, this is the most tricky problem
lurked in present-day explanation of English tenses. If our grammars still
keep avoiding this problem, there will be no righteous rules about tenses at
all.

What is your opinion? How to explain the Present Perfect tense staying with
past time adverbs?

Your help is appreciated.

Shun Tang
www.englishtense.com
======================
P.S. If you could provide any help or opinion, please go and visit the
following forum:
http://www.englishtense.com/forum.asp
and locate the recent thread titled: Why "I have seen him yesterday" is
wrong?

To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at:
     http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"

Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/