OFFICIAL EXPLANATIONProject SC Butler: Day 127 Sentence Correction (SC1)
Atoms, the smallest unit of matter, are made up of an equal number of protons and electrons, but if a single electron is lost or gained, it becomes an ion, a charged particle that can combine with other ions to form an electrovalent bond.
A)
Atoms, the smallest unit of matter, are made up of an equal number of protons and electrons, but
if a single electron is lost or gained,
B) An atom, the smallest unit of matter, is made up of an equal number of protons and electrons, but if the atom loses or gains a single electron,
C)
Atoms, the smallest unit of matter, are made up of an equal number of protons and electrons, but if a single electron is lost or gained
from themD) The smallest unit of matter,
atoms are made up of an equal number of protons and electrons, and
when a single electron is lost or gained,E) Made up of an equal number of protons and electrons, an atom, the smallest unit of matter,
until a single electron is lost or gained,****
The sentence means that an atom
-- is the smallest unit of matter and
-- has an equal number of protons and electrons
BUT when the atom either loses or gains a single electron
-- the atom becomes an ion
The sentence ends with a dispensable
appositive that describes an ion:
a charged particle that can combine with other ions to form an electrovalent bond***
• Split #1: Pronoun/antecedent agreement It in the non-underlined portion lets us know that the subject is singular.
IT requires the singular ATOM as its antecedent.
I did not mark the plural verb ARE with red because
are agrees with
atoms and I did not want to suggest that
atoms disagreed with
are.
Options A, C, and D incorrectly use atoms, plural.
Eliminate A, C, and D
• Additional problems with A, C, and DThe electron does not become an ion. The atom becomes an ion.Options A and D create a very subtle meaning issue because IT almost certainly refers to
electron, in which case the electron becomes the ion.
Could "it" refer to "unit"? -- -- Maybe: Now we have pronoun ambiguity. Does "it" refer to electron or to unit?
-- Probably not: to be perfectly parallel, the appositive modifer
unit of matter should say
units of matter. I left this issue alone because the easiest way to eliminate A, C, and D is the disagreement between the non-underlined IT and plural
atoms. I would not use this issue as a first basis upon which to eliminate an answer in these choices that use plural "atoms."
Suppose, though, that option A were written this way:
An atom, the smallest unit of matter, is made up of an equal number of protons and electrons, but if a single electron is lost or gained, it becomes an ion, a charged particle that can combine with other ions to form an electrovalent bond.
Compare to option B.
No contest. B wins. In my hypothetical option A, it seems as though the electron becomes the ion. At the least, we do not know whether the thing that becomes an ion is the electron or the atom.
The electron does not become the ion. The atom becomes the ion.
Option C -
from themThe phrase is awkward, but the phrase does intervene to head off the meaning problem I just discussed.
Even if the sentence were okay otherwise, B does a better job at letting us know which thing becomes an ion.
• Split #2: Clarity vs. The Missing Verb or Unnecessary Pronoun or BabbleWe are down to options B and E.
Sometimes options are laughably bad, as is E in this question.
warrior1991 's comment about option E made me laugh: "This sounds creepy."
Believe me, you will find a sentence or two in which that thought ought to enter your mind.
Quote:
If you read the complete sentence, the construct is awkward. This sounds creepy.A run on as well. Read below.
Made up of an equal number of protons and electrons, an atom, the smallest unit of matter, until a single electron is lost or gained, it becomes an ion, a charged particle that can combine with other ions to form an electrovalent bond.
I quote the entire comment because he's right: describing an error may not be easy, but we can both insert the option into the sentence and compare that construction to (B); even if we cannot quite say what is wrong with (E), we can say, "B is better and E is worse. Bye E. The end."
Option E contains one of these errors
1) if we say that the first part of the sentence ends with "gained," then
atom lacks a verb.
2) we could also say that IT comes between the subject,
atom, and the verb,
becomes, in which case we have an unnecessary pronoun
3) the sentence structure in (E) is not nearly as clear as that in (B)
Answer BCOMMENTSfiras92 , you also made me laugh, grousing (or wondering) about what were indeed typos that I've corrected.
Although this question is unusually easy,
every post contains some piece of advice or an approach or a comment that will apply to similar but harder questions.
These answers are very good to superb. Good work. Kudos to all.
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