According to scientists human expansion and the human appropriation

Hello Mck2023,

We hope this finds you well.

Having gone through the question and your query, we believe that we can resolve your doubt.

As MartyTargetTestPrep has said, if the meaning of a sentence can be interpreted correctly or incorrectly, the correct meaning takes precedence. More importantly, on the GMAT you must look for the best among the given answer choices, not a perfect answer choice. An answer choice with a potential ambiguity in meaning clearly wins out over other answer choices with concrete grammatical errors or more obvious distortions of meaning.

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Experts' Global Team

Your interpretation would only make sense if the preposition "of" had been included in both elements of the parallel construction. If, for instance, you'd seen, "human expansion of and human appropriation of Earth's finite resources," you could assume that whatever came after "appropriation of" would also apply to "human expansion of." Otherwise that first "of" isn't doing anything!

But that's not what we get. Instead, we see "human expansion and human appropriation of Earth's finite resources." Why would we retroactively apply "of" to "human expansion" if it would create an illogical meaning?

In (D), the pronoun "their" has no logical antecedent. The only plural noun "their" could refer to is "scientists." And while scientists may have their shortcomings, I'm pretty sure no one has ever accused them of appropriating the earth's finite resources. So (D) is out.

I hope that helps!

GMATNinja, @experts global, and @MartyTargetTest prep have all rightly addressed your query.

However, we would still like to reiterate the approach to solving GMAT SC questions.
On the GMAT, we have to pick the best option among the five options. Logic and grammar are tools that can help us get to the right answer. Eliminate all answer choices that have grammatical errors (options A, C, and E) or that conveys an illogical meaning ( Option D- as “their” cannot refer to scientists)
If we don’t follow the right approach, our task can get all the more tedious and time-consuming. We would always advise on sticking to the easier and more efficient approach that can make life (read GMAT) easy. All the best

Hi,

I am still not clear with how cause is correct here? Experts, please help.

Thanks

Hello ankitapugalia,

We hope this finds you well.

Having gone through the question and your query, we believe we can resolve your doubt.

In this context, "cause" serves as a noun that refers to "something that produces an effect". Thus, the meaning the sentence conveys is that human expansion and human appropriation of Earth's finite resources are together what may produce the most sweeping wave of species extinctions since the demise of the dinosaurs.

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

When a sentence has more than one subject per verb, those subjects form a compound subject. Compound subjects can be singular, plural, or a mix of both:

TWO SINGULAR: The dog and the cat bother me.
TWO PLURAL: The dogs and the cats bother me.
ONE SINGULAR, ONE PLURAL: The dog and cats bother me.

Compound subjects can also be joined by "and," "or" (sometimes "either...or"), and "nor" (sometimes "neither...nor"):

The dog and the cat...
(Either) The dog or the cat...
(Neither) The dog nor the cat...

Deciding which verb to use can be tricky. Here are the general rules:

1. A compound subject whose parts are joined by and usually takes a plural verb regardless of whether those parts are plural or singular:

TWO SINGULAR: The dog and the cat bother me.
TWO PLURAL: The dogs and cats fight all the time.
ONE SINGULAR, ONE PLURAL: Joe and the kids need me.

2. A compound subject made up of two singular parts that are joined by or or nor takes a singular verb:

(Either) James or John knows who is coming to the party.
(Neither) James nor John knows who is coming to the party.

3. A compound subject made up of one singular part and one plural part that are joined by or or nor must use a verb whose number matches the number of the part of the subject that is closest to the verb:

CORRECT: (Either) The dog or the kids were making a racket downstairs. [kids were...]
CORRECT: (Either) The kids or the dog was making a racket downstairs. [dog was...]
INCORRECT: (Either) The dog or the kids was making a racket downstairs.
INCORRECT: (Either) The kids or the dog were making a racket downstairs.

CORRECT: (Neither) Joe nor the kids want pizza. [kids want...]
CORRECT: (Neither) The kids nor Joe wants pizza. [Joe wants...]
INCORRECT: (Neither) Joe nor the kids wants pizza.
INCORRECT: (Neither) The kids nor Joe want pizza.

There are two exceptions to these rules.

Exception 1. When the parts of a compound subject are joined by "and" but are generally thought to be a single unit, they take a singular verb, not a plural verb:

CORRECT: Peanut butter and jelly is my favorite.
INCORRECT: Peanut butter and jelly are my favorite.
CORRECT: Two and two equals four.
INCORRECT: Two and two equal four.

Exception 2. When the parts of a compound subject are joined by "and" but the subject is modified by the words "each" or "every", the subject takes a singular verb, not a plural verb:

CORRECT: Every boy and girl gets a merit certificate. [every boy gets...every girl gets]
INCORRECT: Every boy and girl get a merit certificate.
CORRECT: Each business and restaurant has to display a business license. [each business has to...each restaurant has to...]
INCORRECT: Each business and restaurant have to display a business license.


Hope the above examples clarify the subject-verb agreement that compound subject can take depending on the nature of compound subject and coordinating conjunction used.

Hello Marty
MartyTargetTestPrep

May I ask a doubt please ?
I chose A, thinking that it is an inverted sentence and that a singular verb is needed.
How I read this sentence was - > According to scientists, the cause of what may be the most sweeping wave of species extinctions since the demise of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago is "human expansion and the human appropriation of Earth's finite resources ".
My thought flow at that time - cause not causes, so you definitely need a singular verb. Only uneasiness was 'and the human...'. this 'the' was not making sense but i chose to override that.

understand now, everyone has written it should be plural. however, I need your expert view in above context.
Sorry for the trouble, Marty.

Rgds..

Hello 750Barrier,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, in Option A "human expansion and the human appropriation of Earth's finite resources" is one, plural verb phrase due to the use of the conjunction "and"; remember, two singular nouns joined by "and" form a plural noun phrase. What the sentence is saying is that these two things, together, are the singular cause of what may be the most sweeping wave of species extinctions since the demise of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.

To understand the concept of "And" vs Other Conjunctions on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~1 minute):



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

"along with" is an preposition, not a conjunction, so, the noun preceding "along with" do not take plural

prepositional phrase can be noun modifier, noun complement , adjective complement, subject complement, object complements and many other. but we can think that prepositional phrase can work as adjective or adverb for simplicity.

I think "comma+along with..." work as an adverb modifying the verb in choice E because it is meaningless if this phrase work as adjective modify the preceding now even if there is no comma before this phrase.

I , along with you, learn gmat. How do I learn English ?. I learn with you.

so, singular verb is required in choice E.

Read all the comments but still can't wrap my head around the correctness of "are the cause". Any detailed explanation is appreciated.

Hello Namangupta1997,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, "human expansion and the human appropriation" is a plural noun phrase, necessitating the use of "are", because two singular nouns joined by "and" form a plural noun phrase.

Further, the intended meaning here is that the human expansion of Earth's finite resources and the human appropriation of the same, collectively form a singular cause of the "wave of species extinctions".

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

Hello GMATNinja, egmat,

According to scientists, human expansion and the human appropriation of Earth's finite resources is the cause of what may be the most sweeping wave of species extinctions since the demise of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.

A) expansion and the human appropriation of Earth's finite resources is

B) expansion and human appropriation of Earth's finite resources are

C) expansion and its appropriation of Earth's finite resources is

D) expansion, along with their appropriation of Earth's finite resources, is

E) expansion, along with its appropriation of Earth's finite resources, are 

I request some clarification with my doubts. Kindly help

In option D and E -->
1. Does the usage of 'along with' in the sentence construction imply that
'human expansion' is the main reason, while 'human appropriation' is a secondary(less important)
reason for the cause of extinction?
2. Also even though 'human' in the 'human expansion' is singular though but is not a noun, rather an adjective
and hence its can't be used to refer to it, since it is not a noun in the first place.
3. With the usage of 'along with', should the verb be 'are' or 'is' ?


Looking forward to hear from you

Regards,

I wouldn't say that "along with" automatically implies that the second thing is less important -- maybe the expansion wouldn't be an issue if the appropriation part went away? The "along with" could just imply that the second issue wouldn't exist if not for the first. So is the "along with" part secondary, in a way? Sure. Does that mean that it's less important? Maybe not.

Luckily, we don't have to worry too much about that subtle point because, to address your third question, "along with" does NOT create a compound subject. In (D) and (E), the subject is only "human expansion," so we need a singular verb ("is"). If that seems counterintuitive, consider these two examples:

• "Tim was elected to Congress, along with hundreds of other bozos."
• "Tim, along with hundreds of other bozos, was elected to Congress."

The placement of the "along with" part doesn't change the fact that the subject, "Tim," is singular. So (E) is out, regardless of what we think about the pronoun.

But, yes, "human" isn't acting as a noun in (E) -- we'd expect the singular pronoun ("its") to go with the singular noun ("[human] expansion"), and of course that doesn't make any sense. If we wanted to use "its," we'd probably have to go with something like, "the expansion of the human species, along with its appropriation..." And that's not great, because we now have two singular options ("expansion" and "[human] species"), but it could work.

But again, (E) has to go because of the subject-verb error. (D) has to go because of the pronoun error ("their" seems to illogically refer to "scientists").

(A) and (C) feature compound subjects that require plural verbs ("human expansion and [the human/its] appropriation"). So the "is" is definitely wrong in both of those, and we're left with (B).

I hope that helps!

I got the question right but need 1 help. Does "along with" in E or in general makes the subject singular?

Hello TBT,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, yes; "and" is the only conjunction that joins singular nouns to form a plural noun phrase, so "human expansion, along with its appropriation" does not form a plural noun phrase; the subject of the sentence is the singular noun "human expansion".

To understand the concept of "And" versus other conjunctions on GMAT, you may want to watch the following video (~1 minute):



All the best!
Experts' Global Team

Got it! thanks for your prompt response ExpertsGlobal5

X and Y are the cause of Z?

or

X and Y are the causes of Z?

Expert opinion will be appreciated.