the linking word as

Question

.."it is never the same as seeing it on the big screen" In this sentence, the word "as" is followed by a ing form? Is it possible to say: "..it is never the same as to see it on the big screen"

Answer 1

You find constructions such as those below.

• 'to say or think “is” would be the same as to say or think “is not”

• (…] subject is just the same as to say this— that a subject of ends, namely, a rational being himself

• .. or a (apertly of receiving Body, seems to me the same as to urge that darkness must be shmet/Jing

• For to cite an author is the same as to cite a witness

• To be baptized in the name of the Father, &c. is the same as to be baptized unto the Father ; as to believe on the name of Christ, is the same as to believe in Christ,

I see no reason why it would be incorrect for the verb "to see". In fact this very construction is rather common (ngram).

Answer 2

[1] It is never the same as [seeing it on the big screen].

[2]* It is never the same as [to see it on the big screen].

The simple answer to your question is no.

Leaving aside interrogatives, infinitival clauses don't generally function as complement to a preposition, so [2] is ungrammatical.

The major exception is with the compound preposition "in order", as in "I go to the gym in order to keep fit".

Answer 3

Could you specify what word might have preceded "it is"? The way the sentence is structured seems to imply that the word "it" was preceded by a word similar to "seeing" -- in other words, a gerund, which is a verb made into a noun by adding "-ing".

It looks like the original sentence might have said something like this: "Reading it is never the same as seeing it on the big screen." This is why the sentence feels like it needs a noun where you have the word "seeing", which is, in effect, a noun, since it's a gerund. Using the gerund there gives you a balanced parallel construction.

"To see" is not a noun. It's an infinitive. It wouldn't give you the same parallel construction. It's hard to imagine another infinitive at the beginning of the sentence. So I would not use "to see" instead of "seeing".

There is probably another reason for this, and I don't know what it is offhand. But I do believe you need a noun there, and the infinitive won't do that job for you.

One other point I just thought of: infinitives are often used, like gerunds in English, as nouns in Romance languages. The direct translation of those infinitives into infinitives in English doesn't usually work. Most often, the appropriate translation into English of an infinitive used as a noun in a Latin language is to choose an -ing word in English.