Biologists believe that they have found one of the substances that tel

"That" is a relative pronoun , so it can only refer to a single subject not a phrase or a clause
here that is refeering to substances not the phrase "one of the sbstances"
hope this helps

Consider these examples.

One of the books in the rack has been written by Irving Wallace

This is a simple sentence with ‘one ‘as the subject, of the books as the prepositional intermediary and ‘is ‘as the verb. In this case, the subject and the verb are singular.

Look at the next case. One of the books that have been written by Irving Wallace is in the rack. --- here the main clause is ‘one of the books is in the rack’ and the subordinate clause introduced by the relative pronoun and the conjunction is ‘that have been written by Irving Wallace’. The verb of this subordinate cluse will be plural, since the relative pronoun refers to the noun before and takes on its characteristics such as number and gender. Hence, the subject of the subordinate clause is plural in nature and the verb is plural.

This is what Stacey says according to me. In other words, whenever you see a relative pronoun such as that or who etc, in a complex sentence that contains ‘ one of the construct’ , be guided by the number of the noun it touches for determining the number of the verb.

Nice work on this one, everyone - a few things came into play here:

1) "Both" is an inclusive word, so it should go with "and" - if it were to go with "or", you'd need to use "either". Since both means that you're including two things, you have to link them with "and".

2) The subject of "tell" is "substances" - there are several of them (presumably) that tell genes what to do, and this is one example of that.

3) Because we're listing two things, we need parallel structure, so "both when to x and when to y" is necessary.


Put it all together and it has to be A!

As per the relative pronoun touch – rule, a relative pronoun such as that, which, and who etc must modify the noun touching it and thus, it assumes the traits of the noun’s number and gender. In this given case, therefore 'that' relates to 'substances' and eventually needs a plural verb tell'.

The intent of the text is that there are several substances that tell this and that but the experts believe they have found just one of them.

That said, the correct idiom is ‘both when to’ rather than ‘both at which time’ or ‘both about when’.

A survives.

P.S. The golden rule about the subject-verb agreement is that the subject always determines the verb and not vice versa. So verbs 'tell' or 'tells' cannot decide if the subject is one or substances.

MGMAT says



The above quote explains that the exception is accepted when the most right theoretical choice is not available, but not when a rock solid copy book case is there in front .


I would accept the exception to the touch rule if there existed no choice with the verb 'tell'; There are at least three choices that follow the classic touch rule and therefore it will be prudent to choose among them. Simply a logical case to go after the exception doesn’t exist in the given case IMO

2. @ hellishbrain: Let us compare your example of daagh

daagh is the only one of GMATClubbers who answers the questions. ( your sentence)

daagh is one of GMATClubbers who answers the questions. – ( another sentence) Now which verb is correct?" Answer or answers"? You can’t still stick on to the verb ‘answers” Am I right?

In your sentence the use of the phrase ‘the only one’, that includes a definitive article ‘the’ makes all the difference between the meanings of the two.

Let us not delve into Bob’s versions at the moment, as they relate to a different context.

The issue of the object of the preposition deciding the nature of the verb, mostly arises in the case of the SANAM pronouns( Some, all, none, any, and most) and the pronoun “one´ is not among them. I wonder whether any OG or GPREP question has ever tested the validity of such a ticklish issue given the aversion of GMAT to indulge in controversies.

But the take away according to me should be ” Do not rush to use an exception without a need for it” ; The risk in overusing an exception is that one day the exception will become the rule and the rule an exception.


PS:Will my readers pardon me for such a lengthy essay?

For this sentence, 'one of the substances' is not singular. If we take a closer look we are describing substances. Which substances? The ones that 'tell individual...' Therefore, we can eliminate (C), (D). (We can get rid of (E) because the future tense is not required; the 'it' is wordy).

The idiom is BOTH X and Y. (B) has BOTH X or Y. Thus the answer is (A).

Hope that helps .

@jainvik7



I am afraid one cannot justify such a wide remark. You may refer to Stacey’s observation in the link you have cited.


You may thus see it is not always that 'one of the construct' is singular, as you have mentioned. Secondly, in this present example, you see the prevalence of the subordinate clause introduced by the noun modifier ‘that’ . So the verb is going to be plural in this case, namely ‘tell’ rather than the singular ‘tells’.

Am I right?

Basically the sentence is trying to say:

- There are many substances that tell individual genes both when to become active and when to remain quiescent.
- Biologists have found one of them.


This horses example is one of the numerous examples in OG that illustrate that that can modify a faraway word; but it all depends on the logic. For example in the horses example, clearly the unique system serves as a kind of sling.


The only exception to this one of pattern is when the word only appears as part of this structure. For example:

Mercedes is the only one among the luxury cars that has a global fan following.

p.s. Our book EducationAisle Sentence Correction Nirvana discusses that, its application and examples in significant detail. If someone is interested, PM me your email-id, I can mail the corresponding section.

Guys,

I would suggest all of you to refer to the MGMAT forum to clear this doubt.

https://www.manhattangmat.com/forums/sin ... t1400.html

"One of the" construct is NOT always considered singular. Many of the answers in the 1000 SC collections are not correct.

Correcting my statement (Adding a NOT which i missed earlier and changed the whole meaning. ... sorry for the confusion.

Thanks!!

Hi,

If you scroll one post above you will find my post that details the sentence structure of this SC questions.

If you focus on the sentence structure and especially the meaning analysis you will see that the "Biologists" found one of the substances What kind of substances? "The ones that tell individual genes..."

The relative pronoun modifier beginning with "that" is simply modifying the noun "substances" and that is correct! We are essentially saying that
(1) the Biologists found one of the many substances.
(2) These substances are those that tell genes when to become active and when to remain quiescent

Hi hope this helps

John is THE ONLY ONE of the members WHO IS PLANNING TO ATTEND.

Here, John is THE ONLY ONE planning to attend.
No other members are planning to attend.
In other words:
Of the members, John is THE ONLY ONE WHO IS PLANNING TO ATTEND.
Since John is THE ONLY ONE, IS PLANNING is correct.

John is only one of THE MEMBERS WHO ARE PLANNING TO ATTEND.

Here, many members ARE PLANNING to attend.
John is ONLY ONE of these members.
In other words:
Of the MEMBERS WHO ARE PLANNING TO ATTEND, John is only one.
Since John is not THE only one -- other members ARE PLANNING to attend -- a plural verb is needed here.



Biologists...have found one of the substances that tell individual genes...when to become active.
Here, many substances TELL genes when to become active.
Scientist have found ONE of these substances.
In other words:
Of all the SUBSTANCES THAT TELL GENES WHEN TO BECOME ACTIVE, one has been found by biologists.
Since many substances TELL genes when to become active, a plural verb -- tell -- is required.

Hello, NandishSS. I agree with what has been written already in response to your query. In fact, reading over the reply by GMATGuruNY reminded me of a similar dialogue that you and I had engaged in on a different question. Rather than piggyback off of an already fine and detailed analysis to this that question, I would urge you to revisit that other dialogue, here.

Happy reading, and thank you for thinking to ask me about this one.

- Andrew

NandishSS, This is a common source of confusion, thanks for asking me. I see that there are already excellent explanations to your question by other experts above. I will only add:

The singular "tells" is a tempting trap, because we are often crossing off the "of X" modifier to find the subject. The difference here is the word "that", which modifies "substances" to create the intended meaning -- "found one of (multiple) SUBSTANCES that TELL"

For example:

ONE of the dogs IS gold.

ONE of the DOGS that LIVE here IS gold.

Here is another similar question for you to try: https://gmatclub.com/forum/with-a-new-p ... 89983.html

There are also more details and examples from Ron Purewal's notes here: https://gmatclub.com/forum/subject-verb ... l#p1129636

hey i studied Stacey's explanation on the forum. But still not very clear as to when consider one of the as singular and when to consider it plural.

@daagh: can you please give a detail explanation?
It would be really very helpful
Thanx

I guess D is correct as it uses 'tells' according to the rule, ' One of the' + noun (plural) + singular verb. Please correct me if I am wrong.[/quote]

you are partly wrong, "that" is the demonstrative pronoun, its antecedent is substances

biologists found one of the substances

these substances tell smth

since that refers to substances, the plural verb tell is needed.

it would be correct if "that" was not present here.

one of the substances tells - ok
but this is not the case[/quote]


This question is troubling and if someone can explain to me clearer, I will much appreciate it.

The idea of "that" baffles me because
1) I understand that GMAT uses "that" to modify the preceding noun "substances". However, the meaning does not make sense to me because it is not all the substances that "tell(s)" the gene when to become active or not, but that "one" substance. That is the meaning of the sentence to me. If we are applying GMAT's rule strictly though, I guess we have no problems.
2) But, as in this link https://gmatclub.com/forum/horses-have-a-unique-system-of-interlocking-ligaments-and-bones-192969.html, i can say sufficiently that the "that" can modify the "XX of YY and ZZ" if it sufficiently makes sense for the meaning of the statement.
3) This means that there should not be any hard rule or there are exceptions to this rule, especially if it makes sense. So if, say the exceptions, liken that of "XX of YY, which" when "which" modifies XX, doesn't it also mean that our question here, with "that", should modify "one" and give our answer "tells"?

Please if someone can advise on this, that'll be great.

Hi,
1) "that" in "One of the substances that" correctly refers back to substances..
The meaning is also correct..
It does not mean that all substances tell the gene..., It is rather putting retriction on the substances..
We are now talking of ONLY those substances that tell the gene..... AND scientists have found ONE of them...
2) Yes which and that can refer to some slightly faraway noun at times. In these conditions generally there is no verb in between and there is no ambiguity.

If you remember the idiom "Both X and Y" you can eliminate all answers expect A
If you didn't, you can eliminate C and D because "substances...tells" have an SV agreement error.
E: "will tell... should" doesn't make sense
B: They could refer to "individual genes" or "substances" (pronoun ambiguity isn't always wrong). Plus A is more concise