The hognose snake puts on an impressive bluff, hissing and rearing back, broadens the flesh behind its head the way a cobra does, feigning repeated strikes, but having no dangerous fangs and no venom, eventually, if its pursuer is not cowered by the performance, will fall over and play dead.

- broadens the flesh behind its head the way a cobra does, feigning repeated strikes, but having no dangerous fangs and no venom,
- broadens the flesh behind its head the way a cobra does and feigns repeated strikes, but with no dangerous fangs and no venom,
- broadening the flesh behind its head the way a cobra does and feigning repeated strikes, but it has no dangerous fangs and no venom, and
- broadening the flesh behind its head the way a cobra does and feigns repeated strikes, but with no dangerous fangs and no venom, and
- broadening the flesh behind its head the way a cobra does, feigning repeated strikes, but with no dangerous fangs and no venom, and


The question has been discussed many times, but one point is unclear for me:
MGMAT instructor said that the meaning of the sentence clearly indicates that the forms of broaden and feign should be parallel to "hissing and rearing", since all of those things are actions that occur during the "impressive bluff". But why? How these 2 words define parallelism? For me, these 2 words should be paralleled to each other, without influencing other words, which have their own parallelism story... And it's way better to say broadens... So, for me structure in B is preferrable... Please anybody explain.


Thanks!

Here is how I would break the structure of sentence to understand it more.


as you can see now, second, third and fourth line explain or gives an example of how the snake puts an impressive buff. As you can see, it is the form, "A, B and C" where A, B and C needs to be in parallel, as well as, requires the word "and" before the third one.

now, remove these three lines, and focus on the "snake puts an impressive buff, but ..." here again, you need parallel structure to "snake puts", and it is "it has" (note has is a verb here, and not a helping verb such as "has completed")

I would select "C" for this.

hope this helps.
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E

you are right with the a, b and c part but, there is a d also whichi is the dropping dead part. hence the and should come before eventually

Thanks! The answer is "C".

This is a question from OG:

While some propose to combat widespread illegal copying of computer programs by attempting to change people's attitudes toward pirating, others by suggesting reducing software prices to decrease the incentive for pirating, and still others by calling for the prosecution of those who copy software illegally.

(A) by suggesting reducing software prices to decrease the incentive for pirating, and still others by calling
(B) by suggesting the reduction of software prices to decrease the incentive for pirating, and still others call
(C) suggest the reduction of software prices for decreasing the incentive for pirating, and still others call
(D) suggest the reduction of software prices to decrease the incentive for pirating, and still others by calling
(E) suggest reducing software prices to decrease the incentive for pirating, and still others are calling

The OA is (E) and the question has already been discussed 2 times. The only reasonable explanation given is this:
"propose attempting ....., suggest reducing .... and still others are calling".

But how does this parallelism work? Yes, we see attempting, reducing and calling, but in my view, we should make parallel propose, suggest, and some other word in the third element. So, for me (C) works much better, unless there's a need to subordinate the end of the sentence as it was the case in the "Snake" case. Can anybody clarify? Thanks.

wtf?! OA is E,!
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ok,

both C and E are wrong, but C is wronger according to the GMAT. - "stong logic".

yeah, "for decreasing" is [strike]wrong[/strike] not so correct, I have missed it but, are calling is completly not parallel and this is wrong as well.

I am not complaining but this is a a GMAT b*llsh*t as for me.
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The hognose snake puts on an impressive bluff, hissing and rearing back, broadens the flesh behind its head the way a cobra does, feigning repeated strikes, but having no dangerous fangs and no venom, eventually, if its pursuer is not cowered by the performance, will fall over and play dead.
If you cut out the fluff, the sentence becomes more clear and you can see the error. The sentence means to say that a certain snake puts on an impressive bluff, broadening....thus, C is the correct answer