Any medical test will sometimes fail to detect a condition when it is

krishnabalu , a pronoun is not ambiguous because more than one noun qualifies as an antecedent.

Almost without exception, a pronoun is ambiguous because more than one antecedent is logical.

True pronoun ambiguity is rare.

Is "test" a logical antecedent?
-- why would a test indicate that it itself is present or "there"?

If doubt persists, look at the last part of the sentence (not underlined): when it is not.

How could a test indicate anything if the test were not present?

The only logical antecedent is condition.

Logic and meaning determine the antecedent. I would discard an option on the basis of pronoun ambiguity only at the end of my analysis. I also would not spend much time studying the subject.

Hope that helps.
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Yes i do agree that by logic "it" refers to condition. So, can I say that if we are able to logically relate a pronoun to a particular noun(instead of subject of object) it is most probably correct? And in case ambiguity occurs we should check if the subject has anything to do with that pronoun.

krishnabalu , I don't understand the "subject-object" reference.
We have a pronoun. It needs an antecedent. That antecedent must be a noun that agrees in number, gender, and usually, kind.

Yes, if we can find a logical relationship between a pronoun and a noun, then the pronoun is not likely to be ambiguous.
In other words, if your eye happens to catch what may be an ambiguous pronoun, flag that answer, but:
(1) look for other, clearer errors first, and
(2) do not eliminate that answer until the end of your analysis.

Check to be sure that only one noun makes logical sense in that context—any kind of noun, not just "subject" or "object."

I wonder whether you use the word "subject" because you are referring to the what is known as "possessive poison" rule.
It's not an ironclad rule. It may not be a rule at all.

In this post, HERE,, I explained why, on the GMAT, as long as meaning is clear, both object and subject pronouns may have a possessive noun as an antecedent. (In other words, GMAC does not seem to follow the possessive poison rule.)

Finally, if two options seem grammatical and one answer contains no possibility of ambiguity, choose that one.
(The "no possibility" option often restates or renames the noun in question.)
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Priyanka1293 , what does "this" mean? Option E?

Option E is wrong because it is ungrammatical. Look at the end.

E) Any medical test will sometimes fail to detect the presence of a condition when it is there and indicate its presence when it is not [presence]
With the noun: . . . and indicate the condition's presence when the condition is not presence.
We can't put just anything after the word not.
At the end, the word presence is implied, this way: not presence
It [The condition] is not presence?
The adjective should be [not] present, (the condition was not present).
We are locked, though, into the implied and incorrect word presence.

-- I was here and then I was not [here].
-- The test will mistakenly indicate that the condition is present when it is not [present].
-- The empty chair seemed to indicate his absence, though he was not [absence]; he had taken a different seat in the large lecture hall.

I hope that helps.
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[quote="WinWinMBA"]Any medical test will sometimes fail to detect a condition when it is present and indicate that there is one when it is not.


(A) a condition when it is present and indicate that there is one

(B) when a condition is present and indicate that there is one

(C) a condition when it is present and indicate that it is present

(D) when a condition is present and indicate its presence

(E) the presence of a condition when it is there and indicate its presence

permit me to post the 3rd time because this is hard problem.
first this is from old og 10th book. so, I think we do not need to study it. we should study a few recent og books.

but we can study this for fun.
if we use "one" , we can not use "it" or "you" to refer to "one". consider
one should learn English if you want to study a good MBA.
this is wrong. there is some questions from og, which prove this is wrong. instead , we should say

one should learn English if ONE want to study a good MBA.
or
you should learn English if you want to study a good MBA.

our problem is similar ( AM I CORRECT?, PLS CONFIRM, no og question prove my this point)

"it" in "when it is not" can not refer to "one" in "there is one".

moreover, "when it is not" can not go with "there is one". they are not parallel. Ellipsis require the same pattern in two part of sentence. we need "one is not" to use "it is not" or "one is not" . (IF MY FIRST POINT IS WRONG, CHOICE A AND B CAN BE ELIMINATED BY THIS ERROR)

we have to say
"there is one when there is not any one.

so, choice a and b commit 2 mistakes.

choice D dose not offer two opposite meanings, and, so, makes no sense.

choice E is inferior. "it" in " it is there" can refer to "condition" but this reference is not clear because "it" can refer to "presence", and so, is inferior to choice C, in which reference is clear.
the second thing is "it is there" is unclear meaning. where is "there".
"it is not" can be parallel to "it is there" . this is fine.
so, choice E is gone.

some persons consider the following correct

One can not succeed at this unless he tries hard

but i do not see og question prove this point. if you see, pls, share with us.

this question contain unclear points and it is from og 10, which is old. so, I think, we should not study it.

thangvietnam I don't see any reason not to study this question. English grammar, for the GMAT or otherwise, hasn't changed enough in the last 20 years to justify throwing out many OG questions, and in any case, this one was still being republished as recently as 2016. The only significant change I can think of is the abandonment of the rare "possessive poison" rule.

As for the repetition of "one," I believe you're thinking about cases when we use "one" to mean "a person," just as we might use "you" in a casual sense. That's not what's happening here. The sentence just uses "one" to mean "a test," and there's no need to use that word again. A and B are bad for a number of reasons, but the use of "one" in those cases isn't inherently wrong.
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VeritasKarishma GMATNinja ChiranjeevSingh

Please explain Option A & B why they are wrong and why option C is correct

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saby1410

Look at the following sentences:

I thought that there is one, but there isn't.

I thought that there is one, but it isn't.

I thought that it is present, but it isn't.

Which ones make sense?
The first and third ones are ok.

What about the second one? I thought that there is one. The contrast will be that there isn't. How is the contrast "it isn't"? What is "it"? There is none present. Options (A) and (B) makes this mistake.

In the third one, we are talking about a certain "it". I thought it was present but it isn't.
In our original sentence, we are talking about a condition.
The test will fail to detect a condition when it is present and indicate that it is present when it is not.
This is our option (C).
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I have 2 confusions here:

1. Confused with 'that' present in choice C.
As per my understanding of parallelism 'that' should be present in the part before 'and' as well.

2. Elements of 'AND' should make sense with the root phrase independently.
eg.
Complete Sentence: The employees were upset by the company's low pay, poor working conditions, and shortage of outlets for employees’ creativity.

If we break this sentence into root phrase and various elements -
Root phrase: The employees were upset by
Elements:
a. the company's low pay
b. the company's poor working conditions
c. the company's shortage of outlets for employees’ creativity

In our original question with correct answer choice we get the sentence:
Any medical test will sometimes fail to detect a condition when it is present and indicate that it is present when it is not.
Now, when we break it down
Root Phrase: Any medical test will sometimes
Elements
(a) fail to detect a condition when it is present
(b) indicate that it is present when it is not

When we read the Root Phrase and the elements independently, it doesn't make sense to me for the (b) part.
Any medical test will sometimes indicate that it is present when it is not. What is it referring to here?? Without the first element, it doesn't make sense.


Please can someone clear this. I think I am missing something here.

daagh GMATNinja VeritasKarishma AjiteshArun egmat mikemcgarry BillyZ

Hi sudeshpatodiya,

1. Maybe we can read the sentence like this:
Any medical test will sometimes fail to detect a condition when it is present and indicate that it is present when it is not. ← It is the (will) fail that is parallel to (will) indicate.

The that after indicate is not something that we need to be too concerned about. For example:
She took the stage and said that... ← Focus on took and said. The that is just something that is attached to said.

2. A pronoun can absolutely refer to a noun in another part of the list.
Actually, I said that my friend was not driving and that he could not be held responsible. ← We can use a he after the and here.

Unless there's a ton of redundancy in a sentence, we shouldn't expect to be able to remove an element and expect the sentence to survive.
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Check out this post for another explanation of (B) vs (C). This explanation also applies to choice (A), since (A) and (B) both have the same problematic clause at the end: “indicate that there is one, when it is not.”
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There is one was bit too akward and usually not an answer i opted out A and B
C felt nice hence i hung onto it
In D the medical test should check the condition before it's presence itself
E it feels redundant and there was a higher possiblity it was a trap answer
hence IMO C

Can in (A) "one" means "condition" and use ellipsis "present", which would make the sentence "one when it it is not[present]?"?

It is really a confusing SC. I approached it by replacing the word condition with virus . Now it is much simpler to evaluate.

Any medical test will sometimes fail to detect a condition ( Virus ) when it is present and indicate that there is one when it(Virus) is not.


(A) a condition ( Virus ) when it ( Virus) is present and indicate that there is one : Not what ? cross A

(B) when a condition ( Virus) is present and indicate that there is one : Not what ?Cross B

(C) a condition ( Virus ) when it is present and indicate that it is present : Best option

(D) when a condition ( Virus ) is present and indicate its presence :

(E) the presence of a condition ( Virus ) when it is there and indicate its presence

A is ambiguous in the meaning it is trying to connect "indicate that there is one", does this mean "a condition", or "any medical test"

B and D break parallelism by placing "when" just after the action "detect". "to detect when a condition, and indicate... when..."

E breaks parallelism too.

C is mostly right and improves upon the parallelism issue we saw in A.

Dear Friends,

Here is a detailed explanation to this question-

Meaning is crucial to solving this problem:
Understanding the intended meaning is key to solving this question; the intended core meaning of this sentence is that a medical test will sometimes fail to detect a condition when it is present and indicate that it is present when it is not.

Concepts tested here: Meaning + Pronouns + Awkwardness/Redundancy

A: This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase “that there is one”; the construction of this phrase leads to an incoherent meaning: the intended meaning is that a medical test will sometimes fail to detect a condition when it is present and indicate that it is present when it is not; this incoherence is a result of pronoun ambiguity, as the pronoun “one” has no clear antecedent.

B: This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase “that there is one”; the construction of this phrase leads to an incoherent meaning: the intended meaning is that a medical test will sometimes fail to detect a condition when it is present and indicate that it is present when it is not; this incoherence is a result of pronoun ambiguity, as the pronoun “one” has no clear antecedent. Moreover, Option B further alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase “when a condition is present”; the construction of this phrase incorrectly implies that a medical test will sometimes fail to detect at what point in time a condition is present; the intended meaning is that a medical test will sometimes fail to detect the presence of a given condition.

C: Correct. This answer choice uses the phrase “when it is present and indicate that it is present”, conveying the intended meaning – that a medical test will sometimes fail to detect a condition when it is present and indicate that it is present when it is not. Further, Option C correctly and clearly refers to the noun “condition” with the pronoun “it”. Besides, Option E is free of any awkwardness or redundancy.

D: This answer choice alters the meaning of the sentence through the phrase “when a condition is present”; the construction of this phrase incorrectly implies that a medical test will sometimes fail to detect at what point in time a condition is present; the intended meaning is that a medical test will sometimes fail to detect the presence of a given condition.

E: Trap. This answer choice suffers from pronoun ambiguity, as it is unclear whether the pronoun “it” refers to the noun “condition” or the noun “presence”. Further, Option E uses the needlessly wordy phrase “the presence of a condition when it is there”, rendering it awkward and needlessly wordy.

Hence, C is the best answer choice.

All the best!
Experts' Global Team
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Hi Experts! I had a doubt. egmat

Can we eliminate A,B and E by considering that the ellipsis implied here is ambiguous?
Considering the presence of there to have an ambiguous effect on the sentence.

.... when it (condition) is not present
.... when it (condition) is not there

Hello rabjeet,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, no; in this case "there" and "present" convey the same meaning, so there is no ambiguity at play.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
Experts' Global Team
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Hey ExpertsGlobal5

There are some glaring errors in this solution you've provided (highlighted in red above). Could you please check?

Regards,

Abhishek
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