Can 有 be used to form present perfect tense?

Question

One meaning of 有 is "have" i.e. possess. Can 有 also be used to form the present perfect tense as in "I have looked", possibly "我有看"? If so, then a follow-up question: what is more natural, using 有 or 过?

Answer 1

有 was used to form the present perfect tense in ancient Chinese. In modern Chinese,Mandarin，过 is the way to say instead of 有. E.g.

你看过这本书吗？

我看过。

See，there is no 有 at all.

But in the selection questions, the structure is 有没有.(V).过？ In this case, 有没有 is more like the function of auxiliary verb in English .E.g.

你有没有看过这本书？

我看过/我没看过

By the way, what 有 is used to form the present perfect tense just exits in less area, like Cantonese. E.g.

我有看过这本书。

Answer 2

Just like you observed, some native speakers, especially the ones from the south, say 我有看 instead of 我看了 . They also often say 我有看过 to mean "I have the experience watching (it.)"

However, using 有 before a verb is not considered standard, as it is a dialect influenced structure. If you teacher wish to stick to the standard grammar, both 我有看 and 我有看过 would be considered "bad grammar."

That being said, as a native speaker and a Mandarin teacher from Taiwan, I use these structure every single day with my friends but refrain from using them with my students who want to learn standard grammar.

Here is a sample dialog with standard grammar:

A："你看书了吗？“ (Did you read the book?)

B： “我看了。” (I did.)

Here is a sample dialog of roughly the same meaning using 有 (not standard!!!!)

A：“你有看书吗？” (Did you read the book?)

B： “我有看。” (I did.)

In this particular case, the 有 used by some speakers is a rough equivalence to verb + 了, signifying completion and/or occurrence of an action.

You mentioned 过 in your question. 过 is used when talking about past experiences, not completion. Here is a sample dialog:

A："你看过这本书吗？“ (Have you ever read this book?)

B： “我看过。” (I have.)

Here is a sample dialog of roughly the same meaning using 有 (not standard!!!!)

A："你有看过这本书吗？“ (Have you ever read this book?)

B： “我有看过。” (I have.)

Again, these examples with 有 are not considered "good grammar" if you want to score high on a Chinese test, but is frequently used among some native speakers anyway.