Hi daagh AndrewN experts

Using this example, is it correct to say that passive voice clause can never be followed by commna + verb-ing modifier, if the does is not specified?

Watch that language, shanks2020. Absolute words—e.g., never, always, must—and the rules you may construct from them rarely stand up in all cases. As much as you can, you want to avoid looking to pigeonhole each grammatical consideration and instead adapt your working knowledge of concepts and general usage to the question at hand and the answer choices contained therein. Look for obvious errors first, and whittle away at what remains from there.

- Andrew
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Hi AndrewN

So is my reasoning correct that one of the reasons that options A/B/C could be wrong is lack of proper subject/doer for the comma verb-ing modifier - resulting? even though it does modify the preceding clause correctly.
Also can you please confirm whether "considering" in options D and E are acting as similar comma verb-ing modifier or they are just nouns after the preposition without, hence does not require any connection with the previous clause.

Hello, shanks2020. Choices (A), (B), and (C) can all be eliminated for the same error in the meaning conveyed by the -ing phrase. GMATNinja has done a fine job detailing that error in this earlier post. I hope that will satisfy your curiosity.

- Andrew
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This is an easy one if we eliminate the wrong choices.
The correct constructions are - as much X as (and not as much X than)
Eliminate A, C and E.

Rewriting B and D in full sentences.
(B) Because 70 percent of the people of India use wood as their sole fuel, ten million acres of forest have been lost there since 1960,resulting in wood now costing eight times as much to collect and distribute as in 1960.
(D) Because 70 percent of the people of India use wood as their sole fuel, ten million acres of forest have been lost there since 1960,and as a result wood now costs eight times as much to collect and distribute as it did in 1960.
In B, it implies that - the result of the fact that ten million acres of forest have been lost is wood (followed by its modifier).This makes no sense.
Hence D is the only choice left to be correct.

I have two queries here :
1. Can we use Comma+verbING modifier if the previous clause does not mention the doer (subject), for instance, if the previous clause is in passive? (as in B here)

I believe the rule is - Comma+verbING should modify the closest action of the preceding clause, and the SUBJECT of the preceding clause should be the agent of the -ING action.

2. As " and" is considered parallel marker, can we use " and" to show the result of one clause as another ?

ten million acres of forest have been lost there since 1960,and as a result wood now costs eight times as much to collect and distribute as it did in 1960.
If we remove "as a result" from the clause second clause,won't the parallel structure become nonsense?

GMATNinja egmat

Not a rule. As a framework for evaluating the logic of a CLAUSE + COMMA + -ING construction, asking whether it makes sense for the subject of the clause to have performed the action works most of the time, but there are definite exceptions. Consider an example:

Tim's children were attacked by hungry squirrels, prompting his wife to insist that Tim stop coating them in peanut butter before releasing them into the wild.

This sentence is fine. The action described in one clause - the squirrel attack - resulted in the action in the next clause - the prohibition on covering kids in peanut butter.

But if you used the above framework, you'd see that the subject of the clause is "Tim's children." Are Tim's children really what prompted his wife to take action? Nope. It was the fact that they were attacked. So there's a risk that you'd conclude, incorrectly, that the construction doesn't work, when it's perfectly acceptable.

The takeaway: when you see CLAUSE + COMMA + -ING, simply ask yourself if the -ing modifier logically describes the previous clause.



"And" is a pretty flexible parallel marker. All it needs to do is connect two parts of a sentence that play the same role. For example:

Tim slathered his children in peanut butter, and as a result, they were attacked by squirrels.

Here, "and" is connecting two independent clauses. Those clauses are structured slightly differently, but that's fine. Grammatically, they play the same role: the part in red can stand on its own as a complete sentence, and so can the part in blue.

I hope that clears things up a bit!
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GMATNinja The way I thought about Option B was that the use of 'costs' in D is better than 'costing' B because 'costs' connotes a general fact which should be applicable here. Is that a right consideration ?

GMATNinja

Clearly the “wood” that was used in the 60’s is not the same as the one being used now. So, why are we using “it?”

Per your comment to question SC67561.01, we should not use “it” or “they” to refer to same type of things that happen in two different time periods. It/they are used to refer to the same things, not carbon copies.

If GMAT is creating questions that are not based on consistent rules, how are we supposed answer questions correctly each time?

Yup, I think that's another valid point, one that fits with our previous explanation:


In (D), the "result" is that "wood now costs eight times as much as it used to". In (B), it sounds like the result is just "wood" -- wood that happens to now cost eight times as much as it used to.

In other words, because "costing" is a modifier in (B), it's less clear whether the "costing" part IS the result or just some additional information about the wood. But in (D), it's clear that the result is not just "wood" -- it's the fact that wood now costs eight times as much as it used to.

I hope that helps!
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Unfortunately, GMAT SC isn't meant to be a test of black and white grammar rules -- it's about subtle meaning and logic issues that can't be distilled down to a list of mechanical decision points. That's what makes it so hard!

On the GMAT, your job is to select the BEST answer choice out of the five available options, and that's why comparing sentences from different problems is rarely productive. Looking at a single sentence in a bubble and trying to determine whether it's correct or incorrect based on grammar "rules" is an entirely different job -- one that you'll never have to do on this test!

This question and the avalanche question (SC67561.01) are entirely different animals. But before we dive in, let's look at a couple of examples:

• "Electricity costs more in Chile than it does in the United States." - This makes perfect sense: we are referring to electricity in general and saying that it costs more in one place than in another.
• "Electricity in Chile costs more than it does in the United States." - This one isn't great. Now it seems like the "it" is referring to "electricity in Chile" -- so "electricity in Chile" costs more than "electricity in Chile" costs in the United States?? That doesn't make any sense. Sure, you can guess what this sentence is trying to say. But as written, it suggests an illogical meaning. Is this wrong because it breaks some ironclad rule? No. But the first one is much better because it expresses the logical meaning more clearly.

The correct answer in the avalanche question is much like the second example above, while choice (A) is more like the first example above:


Because we have such avalanches, it's clear that we are NOT talking about the avalanches that already happened. Instead, we are talking about hypothetical avalanches LIKE the ones that already happened, and that makes perfect sense.

Here's (A):

Here the pronoun "they" makes it sound like we are in fact referring to the specific "avalanches at Rogers Pass in Glacier National Park killed more than 200 people between 1885 and 1910," not just hypothetical avalanches. That doesn't make sense -- of course you cannot prevent an avalanche that already happened (unless you have all six Infinity Stones?). So (E) is the better choice.

Back to the current thread. Choice (D) in this question ("Because 70 percent...") is more like the first example above. We are referring to wood (the fuel/resource) in a GENERAL way and then saying that this fuel/resource costs more now than it did before. This is perfectly logical, so (D) is okay.

In general, GMAT SC shouldn't be about memorizing what you saw on other questions and trying to apply that stuff to new questions. Instead, you have to think really hard about meaning in each new question and determine which choice is best. I know: not much fun.

I hope that helps!
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Because 70 percent of the people of India use wood as their sole fuel, ten million acres of forest have been lost there since 1960, resulting in wood now costing eight times as much to collect and distribute than in 1960.

(A) resulting in wood now costing eight times as much to collect and distribute than
(B) resulting in wood now costing eight times as much to collect and distribute as
(C) resulting in wood now costing eight times as much to collect and distribute than it did
(D) and as a result wood now costs eight times as much to collect and distribute as it did
(E) and wood now costs eight times as much as a result to collect and distribute than
A - as much —-than : seems redundant
B- subject- verb missing after ‘as’
C- than - not correct
D - costs - correct, subject- verb - as much ….as subject verb : right approach
E- formation of sentence is illogical

Posted from my mobile device

Hi egmat, I solved this question by eliminating A,B,C as "comma + resulting" is a comma + verbing modifier which should make sense with the doer of preceding clause ( In this case "ten million acres of forest" which does not make sense). Am I right in my approach? Using the logic as mentioned in your article - usage-verb-ing-modifiers-part-1/
Many thanks in advance!

Apologies if I have not read through all the answers, but one of the top answers doesn't seem explainable by focusing on the phrase "resulting in wood".

The elimination I focus on is the comparison:
8 times as much to collect and distribute....
A) than in 1960
B) as in 1960
E) than 1960
A/B/E are comparing the cost to a year = wrong

Between C and D, it is clear that the idiom should be "as much... as" not "as much... than"

Hi avigutman - there are many strategies to eliminate but i was intrigued on the above strategy above in purple on eliminating especially given i hope to practice my comparisons as much as possible

Per the above , one can eliminate A, B and E because of an incorrect comparison (specifically A, B and E dont have the subject-verb on the right hand side of the comparison marker)

Why is it when comparisons between now and a past time are made - we HAVE TO repeat the verb ?

Here was my attempt in simpler sentences.

(i) Wood costs NOW more than 1960
(ii) Wood costs NOW more than in 1960

I thought sentence (i) as okay because we are comparing two time periods

sentence (ii) i thought was okay'ish because we are comparing two time period (Even though, in 1960 is in prepositional phrase but i thought it was acceptable)

I thought the above two sentences were both good because we are comparing time periods in bold [Now vs 1960's || Now vs in 1960's]

Do we really have to repeat "It did"

jabhatta2 you're not comparing now vs 1960's. You're comparing the cost of wood now vs the cost of wood in the 1960's.
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Hi avigutman – thanks you for responding.

I think I figured out why “I DID” has to be repeated. Curious on your thoughts.

The reason is because the ellipsis DOES NOT work in my simple sentences given the usage of present tense “Costs”
(i) Wood costs NOW more than (woods costs) 1960
(ii) Wood costs NOW more than (wood costs) in 1960

My ellipsis is in the brackets.

In both cases, the ellipsis forces the usage of the present tense whereas one needs the past tense obviously.

(ii) Wood costs NOW more than (wood costs cost) in 1960

Hence you need to repeat "Wood Cost" or [It did] when you have Now and Before because the present tense is going to be used with "Now" whereas you need past tense with In 1960.

Going back to the original sentence – here is my analysis on the comparisons (I have cancelled out useless modifiers)


Resulting in wood is obviously wrong

Is the comparison in the parenthesis wrong though ? I think it sounds okay but i think the comparison is wrong because this way, we are comparing wood to wood (costing is a present participle adjective)

The intention is to compare cost to cost

Cost has to be a verb. Cost cannot be a present participle adjective



Resulting in wood is obviously wrong

Is the comparison wrong ? The comparison is wrong beacuse on the Right hand side, there is a clause (it did) whereas on the Left hand side, there is a noun only (wood costing)
ii) also there is no verb for "did" to refer back too. 'Costing' is an adjective. "Did" should refer back to an actual verb



- The comparison is wrong beacuse of the ellipsis. The ellipsis forces the usage of present tense "Wood Costs" in the brackets as shown above in option E.
- We need the usage of past tense instead in the brackets (the brackets should be wood cost and NOT wood costs)

That's a great analysis, jabhatta2, well done!

I would just add these two important issues with answer choice E:

[*]"and" hides the causality (the third clause is the result of the second clause, which in turn is the result of the first clause).

[*]"eight times as much than"
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Hello, everyone. I just finished responding to a PM on this question. I will provide my thoughts below in an effort to assist the community. (Pardon the PM-like brevity.)

My first round of eliminations:


I always like to look for easy targets first, and as much... than creates an improper comparison. We should be looking for as much... as. Meanwhile, the comparison in (E) is nonsensical—wood cannot cost eight times as much as a result. The price of wood needs to be compared to the price of wood. In one fell swoop, we can comfortably get rid of 60 percent of the answer choices.

Round two of eliminations:


The modifier in (B) is hard to grasp at first—because "ten million acres of forest have been lost... since 1960," this fact is "resulting in wood"? We would expect to see some clear break from the past to usher in a commentary on the consequences. Furthermore, the comparison relies on a lot of ellipsis: wood now costing eight times as much... as [wood cost to collect and distribute] in 1960. Note that costing is an adjective, while the implied "cost" is a verb. These elements within the comparison are not parallel. There should be a better way to express the comparison.

Notice how choice (D) addresses the above concerns. "As a result" indicates that a commentary on the earlier sequence of events is about to follow; it did uses a pronoun and substitute verb to create a clearcut comparison between the cost of wood now and the cost of wood in 1960: "wood now costs" or "[wood costs in the present]" and "[wood cost] in 1960." We have a verb-to-verb comparison, and we have sidestepped the other doubts present in (B).

Perhaps that clarifies a matter or two. Good luck with your studies.

- Andrew
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