The visiting pharmacologists concluded that the present amalgam of Chi

Question

The visiting pharmacologists concluded that the present amalgam of Chinese and Western medicine is probably  as good, or better than, any system that might be devised for the patients who are  treated at the Nan Kai hospital in Tian-jing.

(A) as good, or better than, any system that might be devised for the patients who are
(B) as good, or better, than any system that might be devised for patients being
(C) as good, or better than, any system that might be devised for patients which are being
(D) good as, or even better than, any other system that may be devised for the patients who are
(E) as good as, or better than, any other system that might be devised for the patients

kunaldutt15 · Answer

I think the correct answer should be E. 
"As good as" is the correct idiomatic usage here. Also both "as good as" and "better than" can be used independently before "any other system...."

-  as good as  any other system that might be devised for the patients
 -  better than  any other system that might be devised for the patients

ahabib · Answer

(A)  as good  , or better than,  any system that might be devised for the patients who are

Correct Idiom is "as good as"

(B) as good, or better, than any system that might be devised for patients  being

Incorrect use of "being"

(C) as good, or better than, any system that might be devised for patients which are  being

Incorrect use of "being"

(D)  good as , or even better than, any other system that may be devised for the patients who are

Nonsensical wording

(E) as good as, or better than, any other system that might be devised for the patients

Looks good.

amarsinha · Answer

one system cannot be compared to itself. so it should be better than any other system and not better than any system. 
This eliminates A, B, C
D - A is good as B seems incorrect. It should be A is as good as B. 
E - it uses as good as. and uses any other system....Comparison of one system with any other system seems ok.

E  should be the answer.

himanshurajawat · Answer

"any other system"/" any system" is it a POE?

MikeScarn   GMATNinja   GMATNinja Two  hazelnut   generis   Bunuel   VeritasKarishma

KarishmaB · Answer

I wouldn't judge the sentence too much on any system vs any other system. This is because it is not very clear whether the current amalgam of Chinese and Western medicine is a part of the group or not.

Current system A is better than all other current systems. (other is required here. Current system A is a part of the group)
Current system is better than any system that may be devised in the future. (other is not necessary though its use will not make it incorrect. Current system is not a part of the group of systems that may be devised in the future)

ChiranjeevSingh · Answer

Here's the   official explanation   provided by the GMAC for this question:
 
This sentence describes pharmacologists concluding that an amalgam of Chinese and Western medicine is probably equal or superior in quality to any other treatment system. In each option this comparison is expressed using two alternatives, one including the word  good  and the other including the word  better , with the latter bracketed by commas. These alternatives must both be adjectival modifiers and parallel in form. The portion of the sentence outside the phrase in bracketing commas must be grammatical. If the amalgam of Chinese and Western medicine is itself one of the systems being considered, the comparison should strictly be between it and any other system, not  any system ; otherwise the amalgam is being compared to itself as well as to other systems.
 
 Option A:  The phrase  as good  must be followed by  as  when used between two noun phrases. When the phrase  or better than  and its bracketing commas are removed from the sentence, the surrounding phrase  as good any system  is ungrammatical. If the amalgam is itself one of the systems being considered, the phrase  any system  oddly suggests that the amalgam is being compared to itself as well as to other systems.

Option B:  The phrase  as good  must be followed by  as , not  than , when used between two noun phrases. When the phrase  or better  and its bracketing commas are removed from the sentence, the surrounding phrase  as good than any system  is ungrammatical. If the amalgam is itself one of the systems being considered, the phrase  any system  oddly suggests that the amalgam is being compared to itself as well as to other systems. The word  being  is unnecessary.

Option C:  When the phrase  or better than  and its bracketing commas are removed from the sentence, the surrounding phrase  as good any system  is ungrammatical. If the amalgam is itself one of the systems being considered, the phrase  any system  oddly suggests that the amalgam is being compared to itself as well as to other systems. The words  which are being  are unnecessary. Furthermore, since patients are people, the more appropriate relative pronoun to use for them would be  who , not  which .

Option D:  In formal writing, the phrase  good as  should be preceded by  as  when used in a comparative sense between two noun phrases.

Option E:  Correct. The phrases  as good as  and  better than  are parallel in form, and each works grammatically between two noun phrases. The amalgam is appropriately compared only to other systems, not to itself. The phrasing is concise, with no unnecessary words following  patients .
 
The correct answer is E.

Please note that I'm not the author of this explanation. I'm just posting it here since I believe it can help the community.

AbhishekDhanraJ72 · Answer

If (A) were :- as good as, or better than, any system that might be devised for the patients who are 
Would option A will be preferred over option E.
I earlier crossed option E because it has past tense sentence: patience treated. And selected option A because it has present tense : patience who are treated. I felt it is kinda a universal sentence so present tense should be used. Experts please correct my reasoning

Posted from my mobile device

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Hello  AbhishekDhanraJ72 ,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, the use of the simple present tense verb "is" in the main clause of the sentence conveys that "treated" refers to the habitual or regular action of treating patients; here, "treated" is not a simple past tense verb, rather it is a past participle, which can be used to form simple present tense verb phrases, as seen in Option A.

So, if the errors of Option A were corrected, it would still not necessarily be superior to Option E.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
Experts' Global Team

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Concepts tested here: Pronouns + Idioms + Awkwardness/Redundancy

• “as A as B” is correct, idiomatic usage.
• The pronoun “which” cannot be used to refer to a human being.
• “being” is only to be used when it is part of a noun phrase or represents the passive continuous verb tense; the use of passive continuous must be justified in the context.

A:  This answer choice incorrectly uses the unidiomatic construction “as A…than B”; remember, “as A as B” is correct, idiomatic usage. Further, the sentence formed by Option A uses the needlessly wordy phrase “who are treated”, leading to awkwardness and redundancy.

B:  This answer choice incorrectly uses the unidiomatic construction “as A…than B”; remember, “as A as B” is correct, idiomatic usage. Further, Option B incorrectly uses the word “being”, leading to awkwardness and redundancy; remember, “being” is only to be used when it is part of a noun phrase or represents the passive continuous verb tense; the use of passive continuous must be justified in the context.

C:  This answer choice incorrectly uses the unidiomatic construction “as A…than B”; remember, “as A as B” is correct, idiomatic usage. Further, Option C incorrectly uses “which” to refer to the noun “patients”; please remember, the pronoun “which” cannot be used to refer to a human being. Additionally, the sentence formed by Option C incorrectly uses the word “being”, leading to awkwardness and redundancy; remember, “being” is only to be used when it is part of a noun phrase or represents the passive continuous verb tense; the use of passive continuous must be justified in the context.

D:  The sentence formed by this answer choice uses the needlessly wordy phrase “who are treated”, leading to awkwardness and redundancy.

E:   Correct.  This answer choice correctly uses the idiomatic construction “as A…as B”. Further, Option E avoids the pronoun error seen in Option C, as it uses no pronouns. Additionally, the sentence formed by Option E is free of any awkwardness or redundancy.

Hence, E is the best answer choice.

To understand the concept of "Being" on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~2 minutes):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlX2LKQlLTI

All the best!
Experts' Global Team

wadhwakaran · Answer

(A) as good, or better than, any system that might be devised for the patients who are  Incorrect use of as good, rather it should be as good as

(B) as good, or better, than any system that might be devised for patients being  Incorrect use of as good, rather it should be as good as

(C) as good, or better than, any system that might be devised for patients which are being  Incorrect use of as good, rather it should be as good as

(D) good as, or even better than, any other system that may be devised for the patients who are  Incorrect use of good as, rather it should be as good as

(E) as good as, or better than, any other system that might be devised for the patients  Correct

The visiting pharmacologists concluded that the present amalgam of Chi

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GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

The visiting pharmacologists concluded that the present amalgam of Chi

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