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As a result of a supernova explosion, every human being on Earth was 04 Aug 2022, 04:58
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hadimadi
MartyTargetTestPrep

Hi,

I was struggling between (A) and (E) and went for (E). My reasoning was that the first 'that' is not essential. Why do we need to know that they are made in some kind of explosion?

Whereas in (E), the main point of the sentence is in a modifier, it is still conveyed.

Could you please explain?

Thanks
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Hello hadimadi,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, Option E alters the meaning of the sentence through the clause "fortunately, these elementary particles...are neutrinos"; the construction of this clause incorrectly implies that it is fortunate that the particles in question are neutrinos; the intended meaning is that it is fortunate that neutrinos are harmless. Further, Option E does place a piece of information that is important to the core meaning of the sentence between commas; this information is the fact that neutrinos are harmless.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
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As a result of a supernova explosion, every human being on Earth was 04 Aug 2022, 05:01
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hadimadi
MartyTargetTestPrep

Hi,

I was struggling between (A) and (E) and went for (E). My reasoning was that the first 'that' is not essential. Why do we need to know that they are made in some kind of explosion?

Whereas in (E), the main point of the sentence is in a modifier, it is still conveyed.

Could you please explain?

Thanks
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Yes, the use of the restrictive clause in (A) is a little odd.

At the same time, in (E), the point of the sentence is conveyed by a nonessential modifier. In other words, (E) is written as if the key point, the fact that neutrinos are harmless, does not matter and could be left out, and focuses on the fact that the particles are neutrinos, which is not the fortunate fact that matters.
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As a result of a supernova explosion, every human being on Earth was 04 Aug 2022, 05:50
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Thanks MartyTargetTestPrep, ExpertsGlobal5

It makes more sense now. I thought that there maybe several kinds of neutrinos, and in that way, (E) would specify that the ones that came out were harmless... but I see that the main point if put into a modifier, hence (A) might be better.

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As a result of a supernova explosion, every human being on Earth was 14 Feb 2023, 11:31
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That and that parallelism.
Fairly easy question.

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As a result of a supernova explosion, every human being on Earth was 20 Aug 2023, 23:06
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EducationAisle
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Option C: As a result of a supernova explosion, every human being on Earth was bombarded on February 23, 1987, by about 100 billion neutrinos; fortunately, neutrinos are harmless elementary particles produced in nuclear reactions and which interact very weakly with matter.


In the above, isn’t “produced in nuclear reactions” a modifier modifying “elementary particles” and hence, I initially thought “neutrons are” (i.e. a Subject (Noun) and Verb) parallel to “which (Subject/Pronoun) interact (Verb)”.

I guess I am wrong because "and" is NOT preceded by a comma here, therefore, it has to be parallel to the modifier (produced) and not with the Subject-pair (Neutrons are). Is my understanding correct?
Hello TargetMBA007, it's not so much about presence or absence of comma. Generally speaking, if the RHS of a parallelism trigger (and in this case) is a relative clause (which interact... in this case), then from a parallelism perspective, there should generally be another relative clause on the LHS of the parallelism trigger.

In C, we have which... on the RHS, but no corresponding relative clause on the LHS; hence C is not ideal from a parallelism perspective.

Quote:
Also if the sentence was without which, would the below variations be correct:
Added the comma before "and" without which.
Quote:
fortunately, neutrinos are harmless elementary particles produced in nuclear reactions, and interact very weakly with matter.
Not correct. Any of the following would be preferable:

i) fortunately, neutrinos are harmless elementary particles produced in nuclear reactions and interacting very weakly with matter.
- Here, parallelism is between two participial phrases: produced and interacting, both modifying particles.

ii) fortunately, neutrinos are harmless elementary particles produced in nuclear reactions, and they interact very weakly with matter.
- Here, parallelism is between two Independent clauses (ICs): First IC: neutrinos are harmless elementary particles produced in nuclear reactions Second IC: they interact very weakly with matter.
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Hi egmat KarishmaB GMATNinja , can you explain when do we need to repeat that in a parallel construction?
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As a result of a supernova explosion, every human being on Earth was 21 Aug 2023, 05:24
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Hi egmat KarishmaB GMATNinja , can you explain when do we need to repeat that in a parallel construction?
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We may need to repeat a word to signal the start of a parallel element when without the repetition, the structure of the sentence may not be clear. This happens sometimes when a parallel element may itself have a list.

... fortunately, neutrinos are harmless elementary particles that are produced in nuclear reactions and that interact very weakly with matter.

We can break this into:
- neutrinos are harmless elementary particles that are produced in nuclear reactions
- neutrinos are harmless elementary particles that interact very weakly with matter

Without 'that,' the structure may not be clear.

fortunately, neutrinos are harmless elementary particles that are produced in nuclear reactions and interact very weakly with matter.

What do we want to say?
We are fortunate neutrinos are harmless particles with two characteristics (produced in ... and interact weakly ...)
or
We are fortunate neutrinos are harmless particles that are produced in ... and we are fortunate neutrinos interact very weakly with matter

Hence the extra 'that' was put in to clarify the message.

This post gives you an example of a sentence when a parallel element itself has a list and hence we repeat some words: https://anaprep.com/sentence-correction ... rallelism/
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