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Updated on: 26 Aug 2021, 00:02
Originally posted by cool_jonny009 on 29 Nov 2005, 13:45.
Last edited by Bunuel on 26 Aug 2021, 00:02, edited 2 times in total.
Last edited by Bunuel on 26 Aug 2021, 00:02, edited 2 times in total.
Renamed the topic and edited the question.
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B
Be sure to select an answer first to save it in the Error Log before revealing the correct answer (OA)!
Difficulty:
45%
(medium)
Question Stats:
61% (01:26) correct
39%
(01:34)
wrong
based on 12781
sessions
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According to scholars, the earliest writing was probably not a direct rendering of speech, but was more likely to begin as a separate and distinct symbolic system of communication, and only later merged with spoken language.
(A) was more likely to begin as
(B) more than likely began as
(C) more than likely beginning from
(D) it was more than likely begun from
(E) it was more likely that it began
(A) was more likely to begin as
(B) more than likely began as
(C) more than likely beginning from
(D) it was more than likely begun from
(E) it was more likely that it began
https://www.nytimes.com/1999/04/06/science/when-no-one-read-who-started-to-write.html
The archeologists, historians and other scholars at the meeting smiled at the absurdity of a king's writing a letter that its recipient could not read. They also doubted that the earliest writing was a direct rendering of speech. Writing more than likely began as a separate and distinct symbolic system of communication, like painting, sculpture and oral storytelling, and only later merged with spoken language.
Issues
(1) Parallelism: X, Y, and Z; X, and Y
The sentence contains a parallel construction:
(A) writing was not a rendering, but was to begin a system, and merged
(B) writing was not a rendering, but began as a system, and merged
(C) writing was not a rendering, but beginning from a system, and merged
(D) writing was not a rendering, but it was begun from a system, and merged
(E) writing was not a rendering, but it was likely that it began a system, and merged
The structure of the first three answers requires three parallel verbs: the writing was not X, but [the writing was] Y, and [the writing] merged with Z. The middle verb should be in the simple past tense to match the first and third verbs. Only answer (B) offers this. Eliminate answers (A) and (C).
The last two answer choices change the structure; the new clause (it was) chops out the first item (was not) and reduces the sentence to a two-item list. In such a list, no comma is needed between two items (she hang and danced every day), but this sentence does contain a comma before the final item, and merged. Because of this comma, it's not acceptable to turn the original three-item list into a two-item list. Eliminate answers (D) and (E).
(2) Verb: was
Idiom: as
You might spot a couple of issues in answer (E) when examining this portion of the parallel construction: it was likely that it began a system.
First the likelihood is today, not in the past. The sentence should say it is likely, not was. Second, the writing began as a system. The word as is necessary in this idiom, but the construction is missing the word as. Eliminate answer (E).
The Correct Answer
Correct answer (B) fixes the original parallelism error by matching was, began, and merged.
The archeologists, historians and other scholars at the meeting smiled at the absurdity of a king's writing a letter that its recipient could not read. They also doubted that the earliest writing was a direct rendering of speech. Writing more than likely began as a separate and distinct symbolic system of communication, like painting, sculpture and oral storytelling, and only later merged with spoken language.
Issues
(1) Parallelism: X, Y, and Z; X, and Y
The sentence contains a parallel construction:
(A) writing was not a rendering, but was to begin a system, and merged
(B) writing was not a rendering, but began as a system, and merged
(C) writing was not a rendering, but beginning from a system, and merged
(D) writing was not a rendering, but it was begun from a system, and merged
(E) writing was not a rendering, but it was likely that it began a system, and merged
The structure of the first three answers requires three parallel verbs: the writing was not X, but [the writing was] Y, and [the writing] merged with Z. The middle verb should be in the simple past tense to match the first and third verbs. Only answer (B) offers this. Eliminate answers (A) and (C).
The last two answer choices change the structure; the new clause (it was) chops out the first item (was not) and reduces the sentence to a two-item list. In such a list, no comma is needed between two items (she hang and danced every day), but this sentence does contain a comma before the final item, and merged. Because of this comma, it's not acceptable to turn the original three-item list into a two-item list. Eliminate answers (D) and (E).
(2) Verb: was
Idiom: as
You might spot a couple of issues in answer (E) when examining this portion of the parallel construction: it was likely that it began a system.
First the likelihood is today, not in the past. The sentence should say it is likely, not was. Second, the writing began as a system. The word as is necessary in this idiom, but the construction is missing the word as. Eliminate answer (E).
The Correct Answer
Correct answer (B) fixes the original parallelism error by matching was, began, and merged.
24 Jan 2018, 07:04
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Let's start by putting (A) and (B) side-by-side:
That middle piece is wacky. All three of these things happened in the past, and need to be in the same version of past tense. So the underlined portion is odd: why would we say "was more likely to begin", when we could just say "more likely began as"? "Begin" is in present tense (i.e., a general characteristic), and "was more likely to begin" doesn't make much sense -- it's almost as if the earliest writing had some probabilistic quality or something, and there was a good chance that it would eventually begin "as a separate and distinct symbolic system."
That's so much messier than (B), which just says that according to scholars, it's likely that the earliest writing actually began "as a separate and distinct symbolic system."
So we can get rid of (A), and keep (B).
First, I don't know why we would switch the verb "began" to the participle "beginning", considering that the rest of the sentence features nice, simple, past tense verbs ("the earliest writing was... and later merged..." So in this sense, (B) is clearly better than (C).
The other issue is that it doesn't really make sense to say that the earliest writing was beginning "from a separate and distinct symbolic system." The earliest writing didn't evolve from some other separate and distinct system; the earliest writing WAS the separate and distinct symbolic system.
So we can ditch (C).
The more concrete argument is that that parallelism is wrong in (D). Again, we have three different verbs in the sentence, all of which are actions performed by "the earliest writing":
Notice that (D) breaks the parallelism by shoving an "it" into the list of verbs. We can say that "the earliest writing was probably not a direct rendering of speech", and we can also say that "the earliest writing... later merged with spoken language. But we can't say that "the earliest writing... it was more than likely begun..."
If it helps, check out (B) again, which features three nice, parallel verbs.
Plus, "from" doesn't make sense, for the same reasons as answer choice (C). See above for more on that issue.
Anyway, (D) is out.
Plus, there's no preposition after "began", so that tweaks the meaning: "[the earliest writing systems] began a separate and distinct symbolic system..." Huh? The writing system didn't "begin" a new symbolic system; it WAS a separate symbolic system, so we'd need to say that it "began as" a separate system.
And for bonus points, I'm not sure that there's a good reason to include an extra "it" at the beginning of the underlined portion -- it's a non-referential pronoun (classic example: "it is raining" is an acceptable sentence, but the "it" has no referent), and that's not necessarily wrong, but there's no reason to use that extra pronoun at all in this particular sentence.
So (E) is out, and we're left with (B).
Quote:
The verb tense in (A) is really confusing, and it's definitely not our best option. We have three different verbs in the sentence, all of which describe "the earliest writing", which:
- ..."was probably not a direct rendering of speech"
- "...was more likely to begin..."
- and "...later merged with spoken language."
That middle piece is wacky. All three of these things happened in the past, and need to be in the same version of past tense. So the underlined portion is odd: why would we say "was more likely to begin", when we could just say "more likely began as"? "Begin" is in present tense (i.e., a general characteristic), and "was more likely to begin" doesn't make much sense -- it's almost as if the earliest writing had some probabilistic quality or something, and there was a good chance that it would eventually begin "as a separate and distinct symbolic system."
That's so much messier than (B), which just says that according to scholars, it's likely that the earliest writing actually began "as a separate and distinct symbolic system."
So we can get rid of (A), and keep (B).
Quote:
There are two little problems with (C), particularly when we compare it with (B).
First, I don't know why we would switch the verb "began" to the participle "beginning", considering that the rest of the sentence features nice, simple, past tense verbs ("the earliest writing was... and later merged..." So in this sense, (B) is clearly better than (C).
The other issue is that it doesn't really make sense to say that the earliest writing was beginning "from a separate and distinct symbolic system." The earliest writing didn't evolve from some other separate and distinct system; the earliest writing WAS the separate and distinct symbolic system.
So we can ditch (C).
Quote:
We could make a lazy argument that (D) is wordy and awkward, and that's not necessarily wrong. (D) definitely sounds like crap, and I don't think that you could ever use the phrase "was begun" in a correct sentence. At least I can't think of one.
The more concrete argument is that that parallelism is wrong in (D). Again, we have three different verbs in the sentence, all of which are actions performed by "the earliest writing":
- ..."was probably not a direct rendering of speech"
- "...it was more than likely begun from..."
- and "...later merged with spoken language."
Notice that (D) breaks the parallelism by shoving an "it" into the list of verbs. We can say that "the earliest writing was probably not a direct rendering of speech", and we can also say that "the earliest writing... later merged with spoken language. But we can't say that "the earliest writing... it was more than likely begun..."
If it helps, check out (B) again, which features three nice, parallel verbs.
Plus, "from" doesn't make sense, for the same reasons as answer choice (C). See above for more on that issue.
Anyway, (D) is out.
Quote:
(E) features the same parallelism issue as (D), and that's enough by itself to eliminate (E).
Plus, there's no preposition after "began", so that tweaks the meaning: "[the earliest writing systems] began a separate and distinct symbolic system..." Huh? The writing system didn't "begin" a new symbolic system; it WAS a separate symbolic system, so we'd need to say that it "began as" a separate system.
And for bonus points, I'm not sure that there's a good reason to include an extra "it" at the beginning of the underlined portion -- it's a non-referential pronoun (classic example: "it is raining" is an acceptable sentence, but the "it" has no referent), and that's not necessarily wrong, but there's no reason to use that extra pronoun at all in this particular sentence.
So (E) is out, and we're left with (B).
14 Jan 2013, 18:06
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According to scholars, the earliest writing was probably not a direct rendering of speech, but was more likely to begin as a separate and distinct symbolic system of communication, and only later merged with spoken language.
a)was more likely to begin as -- more must be accompanied by than
b)more than likely began as -- correct
c) more than likely beginning from -- beginning from is not parallel with merged.
d) it was more than likely begun from -- begun is not the correct form, began must be used to make it parallel to merged.
e) it was more likely that it began. -- more must be accompanied by than.
a)was more likely to begin as -- more must be accompanied by than
b)more than likely began as -- correct
c) more than likely beginning from -- beginning from is not parallel with merged.
d) it was more than likely begun from -- begun is not the correct form, began must be used to make it parallel to merged.
e) it was more likely that it began. -- more must be accompanied by than.
