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They had a son in July 2010.

When you are talking about a time period (year, month etc) in the past, this sentence might mean;

1-On that date in the past, they had a son. (but they don't have a son now) (eg "I had a car" means "I don't have it now"),

2-On that date in the past, the family welcomed a new baby, so now they have a son.

Is this sentence really ambiguous without a context or it simply means number 2?

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  • It seems clearly their son was born in July, 2010. There is no information what happened after that fact.
    – Sergei
    Commented Nov 19, 2022 at 8:00
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    To have a child can mean (1) 'to give birth to a child'; the mother does that physically, but for a couple we can say they both 'had' the child. (2) 'to be the parent of a child', so they could have had a son at one time but not had one at a later time because he died, or changed sex, was adopted, or in some cultures, ritually disowned. Extra text makes clear which meaning is intended.
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Nov 19, 2022 at 8:18
  • @MichaelHarvey, Thanks for the great explanation. Then I now understand the problems arises from the verb "to have". I thought it meant "to posses", So I thought Having a boy or having a car means the same grammatically. Now I start to think that "to have a boy" and "to have a car" can be interpreted differently if they are in simple past. When you say "She had a car in 2010" it definitely means "She does not have a car now". But when you say "She had a boy in 2010" it means "It is higly likely that she has a boy now."
    – Yunus
    Commented Nov 19, 2022 at 8:38
  • @yunus - when we say 'She had a boy in 2010' it does NOT always mean 'She still has a boy now', as James K explains below.
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Nov 19, 2022 at 8:47
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    A joke: "Mary had a little lamb. The doctors were horrified." This plays on two very different meanings of "have".
    – gotube ♦
    Commented Nov 20, 2022 at 5:22

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It is formally ambiguous, since "had" has a range of meanings. The most likely sense is "The mother gave birth to a boy on that date"

It could mean lots of other things... "had" can mean "eat" so it could mean "they ate a son". But in real life the sense of "They owned, but don't own now" or "They ate" are much more unlikely than the simple interpretation of "gave birth". And there are better (clearer, more tactful) ways to express the other meanings.

Note that meaning "owned in 2010" (which could apply to a car) does not imply much about the present. I had a car in 2010; I still have a car now. You can't deduce from "I had a car" that I do or don't own one now.

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