Great ice sheets existed in what are now temperate areas?

[miaxiang]

His studies of ice-polished rocks in his Alpine homeland, far outside the range of present-day glaciers, led Louis Agassiz in 1837 to propose the concept of an age in which great ice sheets had existed in what are now temperate areas

(A) in which great ice sheets had existed in what are now temperate areas
(B) in which great ice sheets existed in what are now temperate areas
(C) when great ice sheets existed where there were areas now temperate
(D) when great ice sheets had existed in current temperate areas
(E) when great ice sheets existed in areas now that are temperate

The answer is B.

But the usage of 'what', to me, is confusing...should 'What' actually be 'where' or 'the place that' ? i.e. great ice sheets existed in where/the place that are now temperate areas?

Thanks!

[RonPurewal]

His studies of ice-polished rocks in his Alpine homeland, far outside the range of present-day glaciers, led Louis Agassiz in 1837 to propose the concept of an age in which great ice sheets had existed in what are now temperate areas

(A) in which great ice sheets had existed in what are now temperate areas
(B) in which great ice sheets existed in what are now temperate areas
(C) when great ice sheets existed where there were areas now temperate
(D) when great ice sheets had existed in current temperate areas
(E) when great ice sheets existed in areas now that are temperate

The answer is B.

But the usage of 'what', to me, is confusing...should 'What' actually be 'where' or 'the place that' ? i.e. great ice sheets existed in where/the place that are now temperate areas?

Thanks!

basically, this "what" is the same as "the thing that..." or "the things that..." (or you could substitute places, or whatever, for "things")
e.g.
I remember what you told me
I remember the things that you told me

same thing here.

[mtanutama]

Hi Ron,

I thought current temperate areas in answer choice D did not sound awkward until I read the OG that stated current should be currently. Why? Do you have an obvious example to explain this?

Then, the verb form had existed was wrong because the past perfect tense is used to indicate two events that took place, right? I was taught in a GMAT prep class to use past perfect to describe the 1st event and simple past on the 2nd event, but is this the past perfect tense's only application? When I read the question again, I didn't know why when I read it, the verb form had existed misled me/made me jump to think that the phrase "he proposed" and "ice sheets existed" were two orders of events. Should "led Louis to propose..." gave me the hint that the verb form should have been simple past? My friend said that using had existed here just added too much information than it needs to or complication in the sentence. For future reference, I wanted to know how should I make the decision that it was a simple past and not past perfect?

Thank you.

[RonPurewal]

i wrote just about everything that i could write about the verb tenses in this problem here:
ice-polished-rocks-mgmat-sc-text-clarification-t10320.html

check it out. i'm going to lock this thread, so that we don't get two long, redundant discussions about the same problem.

the most important things here are (a) verb tenses are a low priority -- don't stress out about them -- and (b) you don't need this split to solve the current problem.