Adding necessarily more fertilizers to soil lowers its ability to abso

In A necessarily modifies more .it seems to suggest more variety of fertilizers
B is wrong for wrong usage of necessity
C is a disaster
D lowering modifies soil and we need a full verb
E correct

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It was between B & E for me, i chose E

B - changes the meaning since the sentence conveys now that adding more fertilisers will result in lower yield whereas as per the original sentence, it says 'MAY' which means it may or may not happen.

Adding necessarily more fertilizers to soil lowers its ability to absorb nutrients, a condition that may result in reduction of crop yield.

A. Adding necessarily more fertilizers to soil lowers its ability to absorb nutrients, a condition that may result in reduction of crop yield.

B. Adding more fertilizers to soil than necessity lowers soil’s ability to absorb nutrients, resulting in reduced crop yield condition.

C. What lowers soil’s ability to absorb nutrients is adding more fertilizers to soil than necessary which results in a condition of reduction of crop yield.

D. Adding unnecessary fertilizers to soil lowering its ability to absorb nutrients may result in reduced crop yield condition.

E. Adding more than necessary fertilizers to soil lowers its ability to absorb nutrients, a condition that may result in reduced crop yield.

Clear (E) , for the highlighted errors in other options...

can somebody comment if "its" ambiguous in options (other than B where its is replaced by soil's)?

Usually, GMAT SC questions test more than one concept in a single question. Yes, "its" does sound ambiguous at first glance, but when a person notices option B has corrected that form, he/she straightway goes for that option, thinking they have found what the loophole is. But that is a trap set by GMAT for us.

Notice that this question can be categorized under "STYLE AND USAGE". IF you carefully read all the options you will realize that A and B don't provide a clear meaning. Many people like to call it awkward construction. But I believe they are wrong because they don't make sense. Usage of necessarily and necessity is incorrect in those sentence.

C and D are straightaway incorrect.

But E provides a well-formed, meaningful sentence that is grammatically correct. Here, if another option was provided without "its" and properly mentioning soil, we would have gone with that option.

But just considering these 5 options, we know that first four are incorrect because they are grammatically incorrect.

E is the best option and it is grammatically correct. HEnce we will go with E.

Hope this answers your query.


PLease leave me a kudo if you found it helpful

broall

What is the official explanation of this question?

I think option B has more reason to get rejected.

Adding XYZ to soil....., resulting ABC -- Doesn't seem to be correct construction.

Here is the official explanation from Expert Global
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3nc6Z2 ... e=youtu.be

Q-Adding necessarily more fertilizers to soil lowers its ability to absorb nutrients, a condition that may result in reduction of crop yield.

Between A and E, I have a doubt:

E. Adding more than necessary fertilizers to soil lowers its ability to absorb nutrients, a condition that may result in reduced crop yield.

In E, "Adding more than necessary fertilizers" - Is not changing the meaning?? Necessary here is modifying Fertilizer, it means Adding more than 'Necessary Fertilizer' means there are A, B, C fertilizer and you are adding more than one Necessary fertilizer, here quantity of fertilizer is not coming into picture.

A. Adding necessarily more fertilizers to soil lowers its ability to absorb nutrients, a condition that may result in reduction of crop yield.

In A, i agree that it is not well written however as in GMAT meaning prevails over structure, Option A still clearly says 'necessarily adding more fertilizer is not beneficial'. Please clarify
@e-GMAT @Experts' Global

Hi egmat GMATNinja EMPOWERgmatRichC KarishmaB it would be amazing if you could help me understand why option B is wrong here.

As many people are saying the problem with B is the usage of necessity. My question here is, will NECESSARY be the correct form here ?
And apart from the error in the usage of necessity is there any other error, such as modifier error ?

Thanks in advance.

While the GMAT doesn’t test style, any official SC question written by GMAC has passed several rounds of analysis and has been heavily scrutinized. The issue with E is the lack of the article “the” before the noun phrase “necessary fertilizers.” Even after one fixes that error, the meaning conveyed by version E is still problematic (though E is certainly better than the other 4 options).

I would venture a guess that the Intended correct answer E is:

“Adding more than THE necessary fertilizers to soil lowers its ability to absorb nutrients, a condition that may result in reduced crop yield.”

By omitting the article, the meaning suggested by sentence E is one in which “necessary fertilizers” are some kind of unique types of fertilizers. The meaning that there is a level of fertilizer deemed “necessary” is not clearly conveyed by E.

Instead, the meaning that the answer choice seems to be conveying is that adding more than these types of fertilizers (“necessary fertilizers”) results in the condition stated in the sentence.

It’s as if a person were fertilizing his or her lawn and asks a spouse to please pick up “necessary fertilizers” at Home Depot. The immediate question becomes the following: what exactly are “necessary fertilizers”?

Accordingly, even if the correct article were inserted, the style would still be a bit awkward. Typically, one would say “more fertilizer than is necessary,” as in most circumstances an AMOUNT of fertilizer is added to the ground. From a meaning perspective, labeling this amount “necessary fertilizers” suggests that there are several fertilizers that are understood as “necessary fertilizers,” and adding anything other than these specific fertilizers may lead to the condition in the sentence.

Although problematic in its own right, answer E provides the closest thing to a correct answer if you read the missing article “the” into the version.

Posted from my mobile device

Yes, the sentence is "adding more fertilisers to soil than are necessary..."
How many fertilisers (used in plural) should we add? As many as are necessary (adjective). Not necessity (a noun).

We can skip "are" and use just "adding more fertilisers to soil than necessary"

A better structure is "adding more fertilisers than necessary to soil lowers its ability..." or "adding more than necessary fertilisers to soil..."
It brings 'than' closer to 'more' and brings 'soil' out of the comparison and places it closer to its pronoun "its" - all in all, cleaner & better.

(E) works.

Hi KarishmaB,

In Option E , the part " A condition that may result in reduced crop yield " is an appositive modifier. This modifier should refer back to something. What it is referring back to ?

For Eg : In the below official question

https://gmatclub.com/forum/if-a-single-strain-of-plant-is-used-for-a-given-crop-over-a-wide-area-282454.html

In option E - A practice is referring back to the " The use of a single strain of plant "

Regards

It is not an appositive. It is a noun + modifier construct. GMAT loves it.

Clause, a phenomenon/a situation/an occurrence that ...
It modifies the entire previous clause.

Adding more than necessary fertilizers to soil lowers its ability to absorb nutrients, - Clause
a condition - Noun referring to the entire previous clause
that may result in reduced crop yield - modifier of the noun 'a condition'