According to recent studies comparing the nutritional value of meat fr

A few of my best students have gotten their asses thoroughly kicked by this one, so please don’t feel badly if you struggled with it. (And most of the early responses look great!) Success on this question is mostly about your ability to be incredibly literal with the meaning, particularly as it relates to the pronouns in the sentence. (For more on pronouns, check out our good old YouTube webinar on the topic.)


“They” has to refer back to a plural noun, but our only options are “studies” (which makes no sense, because studies can’t think) or “wild animals” (which also makes no sense, unless you think wild animals moonlight as nutritionists. (A) is out.


There’s no pronoun here, so that’s cool. And I think the meaning works: “wild animals have less total fat than livestock fed on grain” is fine. The second part seems fine, too: “wild animals have… more of a kind of fat thought to be good for cardiac health.”

I don’t see any huge issues, so let’s keep (B).


As described in our rambling guide to the word “that”, “that” is a singular pronoun in this type of situation. In (C), I guess it has to refer to “total fat,” but that doesn’t really make sense: “wild animals have less total fat than the total fat of livestock fed on grain…”

That’s kind of a mess. Wild animals have less fat than livestock, but it wouldn’t make sense to say that “wild animals have less total fat.. than the total fat…” That comparison is thoroughly wrong. (C) is out.


This comparison is very clearly wrong: “total fat… is less than livestock.” You could, I suppose, also argue that the “they” isn’t 100% clear – but the illogical comparison is the most straightforward issue. (D) is out, too.


There’s a lot of clunkiness here, but the biggest issue is the word “they”: the only possible referents are “wild animals”, “livestock”, or “studies.” And none of those are likely to “think [that fat] is good for cardiac health.” (E) is gone, and (B) is the best answer.
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I am afraid that this is a weird question. No choice seems satisfying.

A and E are out because, we don’t have a proper reference for the pronoun they.

B looks apparently better than others, because, in gist, it maintains the comparison between wild animals and domestic animals, although it is also meaning to say that wild animals have less total fat than they have livestock, which is indeed absurd

C compares the total fat of these two kinds of animals rather than comparing the animals themselves.

D is comparing total fat with livestock.

B is the best of the bad boys.
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The problem with the choice B is its ambiguity. IMO, though weird as it may look, it does imply a possibility that the wild animals have less total fat than they have livestock.

Taking your choices


Japan has more money than China (has).
Japan's economy is better than that of China.
Japan's economy is better than China.

In the first one, which seems to have no problem, the saving grace is the elliptical verb “has.” If you had not indicated it, the meaning may distort that Japan has more money than Japan has China.( absurd though)

Let me give you a couple of examples, where it may not be so absurd

I Jack loves Jill more than Tom.

Basically two interpretations are possible,


1. Jack loves Jill more than he loves Tom,
2. Jack loves Jill more that Tom loves Jill

II Nobody knows the baby better than the mother

1 nobody knows the baby better than the mother knows the baby
2. Nobody knows the baby better than he or she knows the mother

In order to remove this ambiguity only, we have to provide a necessary verb in the second arm of the comparison. In the given text, B would have been better, if it had stated “wild animals have less total fat than have livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat thought to be

Is it of any help?
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Look at the following 3 comparisons

"wild animals have less total fat than that of livestock"
-- this comparison is clearly wrong. does this statement less fat than fat of livestock ? would that be a proper english sentence ?

"wild animals have less total fat than livestock have"
-- This makes much more sense. Sometimes the have at the end is not written (since its obvious). This phenomenon is termed ellipsis, and it is used in this statement.

"wild animals have less total fat than do livestock"
-- I am not sure whether this option is correct. Someone else may have to explain it.

The answer to this question is definitely (B) and not (C). The question itself is fine; somebody just made a minor typo and put (C) instead of (B).

In (C) we have the pronoun 'that': 'wild animals have less total fat than that of....' What exactly does the 'that' refer to? If the 'that' referred to the fat of livestock, then we would be comparing 'wild animals' to 'the fat of livestock' which is indeed a bizarre comparison. (B) maintains a logical comparison between 'wild animals' and 'livestock.'
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Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Concepts tested here: Comparison + Pronouns + Grammatical Construction

• A comparison must always be made between similar things.
• If a list has only two elements, they must be joined by a conjunction.
• Semicolons and the "comma + conjunction" construction are used to join independent clauses.
• A pronoun and its derivatives can only refer to one noun in a sentence.

A: This answer choice suffers from a pronoun error, as the pronoun "they" has no logical referent.

B: Correct. This answer choice correctly compares "wild animals" with "livestock fed on grain". Further, Option B avoids the pronoun errors seen in Options A, D, and E, as it employs no pronouns. Additionally, Option B avoids the grammatical construction errors seen in Options D and E, as it uses the single independent clause "wild animals have less total fat than livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat thought to be good for cardiac health", correctly using conjunction ("and" in this sentence) to join two elements in a list - "less total fat than livestock fed on grain" and "more of a kind...health"; please remember, if a list has only two elements, they must be joined by a conjunction.

C: This answer choice incorrectly compares "wild animals" to "that (total fat) of livestock fed on grain"; please remember, a comparison must always be made between similar elements.

D: This answer choice incorrectly compares "total fat of wild animals" to "livestock fed on grain"; please remember, a comparison must always be made between similar elements. Further, Option D suffers from pronoun ambiguity, as it is unclear whether "they" refers to "wild animals" or "livestock". Additionally, Option D incorrectly uses conjunction ("and" in this sentence) to join the independent clauses "total fat of wild animals is less than livestock fed on grain" and "they have more fat of a kind thought to be good for cardiac health"; please remember, semicolons and the "comma + conjunction" construction are used to join independent clauses.

E: This answer choice incorrectly compares "in wild animals" to "that (total fat) of livestock fed on grain"; please remember, a comparison must always be made between similar things. Further, Option E suffers from pronoun error, as the pronoun "they" has no clear referent. Moreover, Option E incorrectly uses "their" and "they" to refer to different nouns; please remember, a pronoun and its derivatives can only refer to one noun in a sentence. Additionally, Option E incorrectly uses conjunction ("and" in this sentence) to join the independent clauses "total fat is less in wild animals than that of livestock fed on grain" and "more of their fat is of a kind they think is good for cardiac health"; please remember, semicolons and the "comma + conjunction" construction are used to join independent clauses.

Hence, B is the best answer choice.

All the best!
Experts' Global Team
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I went for C. I strongly believe C is correct.

it was between B vs C.


B. wild animals have less total fat than livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat thought to be -> changes the meaning.

C. wild animals have less total fat than that of livestock fed on grain and have more fat of a kind thought to be -> correct proper comparison

Going by the same logic that you have used, I picked B.

But does the sentence imply that "wild animals have less total fat than they have livestock"?

Let's consider some examples:

Japan has more money than China (has).
Japan's economy is better than that of China.
Japan's economy is better than China.

In the first example, you are comparing two countries. In the second, you are comparing economies. So both the sentences are correct. The third example is wrong because the comparison is wrong.

Please correct me if I'm mistaken but I think that you are attributing the mistake in the third example to the question when in fact it has a structure similar to the first example.

1. If this is an OG or GPRP question, I will agree with the OA.
2. Grammatically A and E are out because both choices use an irrelevant pronoun ‘they’.
3. In D also, ‘they’ is ambiguous and no one knows whether it refers to wild animals or livestock or studies.
4. In C, the comparison is between the total fat in wild animals with that in livestock fed on grains; Considering that the studies compare the nutritional values of two types of meat rather than the two meats themselves or the two types of animals , the comparison seems to be fairly good in C.

5.On the contrary, B straight compares wild animals with livestock, which is prima facie wrong as it alters the intent of the original. In addition, the structure of the sentence gives a slant that the wild animals have less total fat than the wild animals have livestock fed on ……

6.This is not to say that C is rather the most elegant; it also its own flaws. The ‘have’ with less total fat and the ‘have’ with more fat of a kind are both redundant; It would be parallel to cut off the second ‘have’.

In spite of all this reasoning, B is claimed to be the right answer? Any reason?
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Refer official question: Confusion ??

Official Guide 10th SC #19:
In addition to having more protein than wheat does, the protein in rice is higher quality than that in wheat, with more of the amino acids essential to the human diet.

A. the protein in rice is higher quality than that in
B. rice has protein of higher quality than that in (correct)
C. the protein in rice is higher in quality than it is in
D. rice protein is higher in quality than it is in
E. rice has a protein higher in quality than (wrong)

Ron's explanation to above question :
"#19 is interesting. there's still LOGICAL parallelism - you have the protein contained in rice, and you have the protein contained in wheat - but the GRAMMATICAL parallelism isn't lock-step: you have "rice has protein" vs. "that in wheat". in other words, while both halves refer to the protein contained in a particular type of food, they do so in slightly different ways. The lesson here is that we shouldn't complain, but, rather, we should learn: if the logical parallelism is absolutely clear, then the gmat will tolerate slight anomalies from the ideal of exact grammatical parallelism."


According to recent studies comparing the nutritional value of meat from wild animals and meat from domesticated animals, wild animals have less total fat than do livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat they think is good for cardiac health.

A.wild animals have less total fat than do livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat they think is
B.wild animals have less total fat than livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat thought to be
C.wild animals have less total fat than that of livestock fed on grain and have more fat of a kind thought to be
D.total fat of wild animals is less than livestock fed on grain and they have more fat of a kind thought to be
E.total fat is less in wild animals than that of livestock fed on grain and more of their fat is of a kind they think is

Lots of confusion is going on following question in comparison to one old official question.
I am in favor of option C, but few experts are in favor of B, whereas one official answer is supporting my point. Could you please help me to understand why C is wrong

if I say : I have less money than that in box << would it be fine ??
I believe both B and C are correct styles of setting comparison because we are comparing total fats of both kinds of animals.

Dear PiyushK,
I am happy to respond to your p.m., my friend. First of all, on the tricky topic of omitting words in parallel, see:
https://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/dropping-c ... -the-gmat/

In the OG question (OG10, SC #19), choice (B) is clearly the right answer ---- "rice has protein of a higher quality than the protein in wheat". The demonstrative pronoun (that, those) refer to a word or phrase explicitly mentioned earlier in the sentence. Since "protein" was mentioned, literally and explicitly, at an earlier point in the sentence, we can use "that" to substitute for it.

Now, the animal fat question. Hmmm. I don't know the source of this question, but I don't think it's a good question. When the word "than" follows a direct object, the comparison can be with either the subject or the object. In (C), if "that" stands for "total fat", then we are comparing object to object, which is correct. I know the MGMAT folks say that (B) is right and (C) is wrong, and they're very smart, but I say that a strong case can be mounted for either (B) or (C), and because of this, this is not a very well written question. This question is not up to the high standards of the GMAT.

In your sentence:
I have less money than that in box
the big problem is the missing article before "box"
I have less money than that in the box.
We could also phrase that as:
I have less money than is in that box.
This last version might be best, but the second version is logical & grammatical correct, if not completely idiomatically natural.

Does all this make sense?
Mike
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Responding to a pm:

The structure needs to be parallel when you compare.

A has better P than does B.
The verb 'has' demands the verb 'does'.

Error 1:
A has better P than B - incorrect
Makes you think that you are comparing P with B - both of which A has!

Error 2:
A has better P than that of B - incorrect
As said above, verb 'has' demands a verb.

When is 'than that of' correct?
We use “than that of” when we compare an attribute or a possession of two objects.
For example, the correct use of 'than that of' will be "A's P is better than that of B"
or "His job is even more complicated than that of a pilot."

B.wild animals have less total fat than livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat thought to be
Not good - Error 1

C.wild animals have less total fat than that of livestock fed on grain and have more fat of a kind thought to be
Not good - Error 2

But as we see from the official questions (this one and the rice protein one) both structures are acceptable. Honestly, I hope GMAT does not give you such constructions in correct options.
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A. wild animals have less total fat than do livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat they think is --- they has no proper antecedent

B. wild animals have less total fat than livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat thought to be ------ the correct choice with proper comparison and with no pronoun problems

C. wild animals have less total fat than that of livestock fed on grain and have more fat of a kind thought to be --- comparison between wild animals and that of meaning ‘total fat’ is wrong

D. total fat of wild animals is less than livestock fed on grain and they have more fat of a kind thought to be -- comparison between total fat and livestock is wrong.

E. total fat is less in wild animals than that of livestock fed on grain and more of their fat is of a kind they think is --They has no referent.
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how could B be the answer , fat of wild animals is compared with livestock
it should be "WILD ANIMALS HAVE LESS TOTAL FAT THAN LIVE STOCK FED ON GRAIN HAVE "

Hello Ridhimajain96,

I will be glad to help you out with this one.

Following is the excerpt from the passage that presents the comparison in Choice B:

...wild animals have less total fat than livestock...

In the above structure, wild animals have been correctly compared to livestock.

The thing is the verb have or the helping verb do in place of have is understood after than because such omission does not lead to any ambiguity in comparison.

In total, there are three nouns in the above-mentioned structure - wild animals, livestock, and total fat. Needless to say that only the first two noun entities can be logically compared in the context of this sentence. Wild animals cannot be logically compared to total fat.

Such omissions are NOT allowed when doing so leads to ambiguous comparison.

You may go through our elaborate article named HOW FAR ELLIPSIS IS PERMISSIBLE IN COMPARISON to understand in which sentences we must use the helping verb in the second part of the comparison and in which sentence we not in the following link:

https://gmatclub.com/forum/how-far-ellipsis-is-permissible-in-comparison-148973.html


Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha
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Dear GMATNinja, thank you for your detailed explanation - as usual.

I think this question really troubled me. I need to revisit again and then digest what makes C wrong.

I couldn't learn what makes "that of" in the C doesn't make sense.

Finally, I tried to simplify my understanding. I changed option B and C with extremely simple language.

- I have less money than you. Ohyeah perfect!
- I have less money than money of you. As you said, kind of a mess!

Thanks for your generosity!
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EGMAT

According to recent studies comparing the nutritional value of meat from wild animals and meat from domesticated animals, wild animals have less total fat than do livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat they think is good for cardiac health.

A. wild animals have less total fat than do livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat they think is
B. wild animals have less total fat than livestock fed on grain and more of a kind of fat thought to be

THIS STRUCTURE SUGGESTS THAT WILD ANIMALS HAVE TOTAL FAT AND LIVESTOCK ,BUT WILD ANIMALS HAVE TOTAL FAT LESS THAN LIVESTOCK
C. wild animals have less total fat than that of livestock fed on grain and have more fat of a kind thought to be
D. total fat of wild animals is less than livestock fed on grain and they have more fat of a kind thought to be
E. total fat is less in wild animals than that of livestock fed on grain and more of their fat is of a kind they think is


1.WILD ANIMALS HAVE LESS TOTAL FAT THAN LIVESTOCK
2.LIVESTOCK HAVE TOTAL FAT LESS THAN LIVE STOCK
3.LIVESTOCK HAVE LESS TOTAL FAT LESS THAN LIVESTOCK HAVE.
MA'AM ,CAN YOU PLEASE EXPLAIN ALL THREE COMPARISONS. THEY ARE VERY CONFUSING

Hello JAIN09,

I apologize for getting back to this post so late.

A. wild animals have less total fat than do livestock
B. wild animals have less total fat than livestock


Both these structures correctly present the intended comparison. The only two logical entities that can be compared in these structures are wild animals and livestock.

These structures say that wild animals and livestock both have total fat. But wild animals have less of it.

The verb do that has been used in place of have is for livestock.


C. wild animals have less total fat than that of livestock:- In this structure, the two compared entities are wild animals and that. This pronoun that has nothing to refer to logically. So essentially, we do not know what wild animals have been compared to here.


D. total fat of wild animals is less than livestock:- In this choice, total fat has been compared to livestock. This comparison does not make sense.


E. total fat is less in wild animals than that of livestock:- Here again we do not what total fat has been compared to because this choice does not use the expression X of wild animal. Hence, there is no logical antecedent for that.


Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha
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Hi Shraddha
would you please elaborate further about the sentence B.
I think i must miss something, because i thought sentence B is ambiguous.
there are two ways to understand it
#1wild animals have less total fat than livestock [/i] have
#2 wild animals have less total fat than livestock [/i]

Please,
Waiting for your reply

Thanks in advance

Have a lovely day
>_~