Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, re

Question

Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats,
researchers have determined that there are fewer than 100 Arabian
leopards left in the wild, and that these leopards are thus many times as
rare as

(A) Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, researchers have determined that there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, and that these leopards are thus many times as rare as

(B) Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, researchers have determined, making them many times more rare than

(C) There are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, researchers have determined, which makes the leopards many times more rare compared to

(D) Researchers have determined that, because of being poached and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, thus making them many more times as rare as

(E) Researchers have determined that, because of poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, and that these leopards are thus many times more rare than

SC99250.01
Verbal Review 2020 NEW QUESTION

OA is E. My issue is that "their", as per my understanding, refers to "researchers", not to "leopards".
Could anybody clarify?
Thanks

https://www.economist.com/international/1998/01/08/noahs-ark-in-the-gulf

LUCKY the man who has seen an Arabian leopard in the wild. So hunted and so rare are these elusive beasts that few know that they ever existed, let alone survive today in their dwindling mountain habitats.  Researchers believe that, thanks to persistent poaching and increased cultivation, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, making them many times more rare than China's boring old giant pandas.

anairamitch1804 · Accepted Answer

Original sentence has "many times as rare as" which is the wrong usage. "as rare as" would be used to compare the rarity of 2 species. "many times" will be used to say one specie is more rare than other. "many times" and "as rare as" can't be used together.

A. wrong for above reason. 
B. "Researchers have determined" comes very late in the sentence and the entire structure of the sentence is messed up 
C. "many times more rare compared to " - wrong usage. 
D. "being poached" and "increased cultivation" are not parallel. 
E. correct.

The best way of checking the difference between “due to” and “because of” is by replacing the former with the phrase “cause by” and then rechecking. If the sentence makes sense, the usage is fine. If it doesn’t, then the answer choice is the one which contains “because of”.

For example :-

The dog was barking due to the night -> The dog was barking caused by the night. -> Makes no sense
The dog’s barking was due to the night -> The dog’s barking was caused by the night. -> Makes sense

In this question you can use the same process to get to the answer. However, the sentence contains other errors as well, because of which you will have to be wary of those as well.

A,B, C are straight out because of the use of “due to”

Between, D & E –> D uses “being” and them is “ambiguous”, "Because of" is immediately followed "by poaching" which still holds onto the structure.

daagh · Answer

Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats,
researchers have determined that there are fewer than 100 Arabian
leopards left in the wild, and that these leopards are thus many times as
rare as

A Quick Fix

A. Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, researchers have determined that there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, and that these leopards are thus many times as rare as -- modification problem. Th researchers seem to be suffering from poaching and cultivation in their own habitats

B. Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, researchers have determined, making them many times more rare than -- looks as though the many times being more rare is caused by researchers and their determination.

C. There are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, researchers have determined, which makes the leopards many times more rare compared to --- which has no referent at all in the visibility

D. Researchers have determined that, because of being poached and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, thus making them many more times as rare as-- many times should be accompanied by 'than', not 'as'

E. Researchers have determined that, because of poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, and that these leopards are thus many times more rare than -- The only one left

nverma · Answer

For me Each sentence has some or the other issue and E seems best out of bunch...!!

adalfu · Answer

I agree... there MIGHT be some pronoun ambiguity here as "their" can refer to both researchers and leopards.

The thing is, when you use a pronoun to start a sentence (e.g., some intro modifying clause), usually the antecedent SHOULD be the first approprirate candidate noun.

For example,
Because  she  likes sports,  Kelly  is always seen playing tennis with  Mary .

She refers to Kelly and not Mary (usually)...

Still, it's probably best to just redraft the sentence so there's no ambiguity.

sarathgopinath · Answer

Hi  daagh

Is the usage 'many times rare than' right? Shouldn't it be rarer than and not rare?
I felt that is awkward and hence eliminated E.

daagh · Answer

True. But 'rarer than' is not given in any of the options. E seems to be the best of the bad boys.

dcummins · Answer

Split 1 - replace "due to" with caused by and see if the sentence makes sense
 --> eliminate (A), (B) and (C)

Split 2 - "as rare as" vs "many times more rare than"
 As rare as = the same level of rarity
more rare than = greater rarity e.g. X is 100x more Rare than Y; therefore X = 101Y and 101Y > Y

Tracy95 · Answer

Dear  GMATNinja   EMPOWERgmatVerbal

I have concern over the use of "many times as rare as" and "many times more rare than". I hope you could help enlighten me.

As far as I know, it's okay to say "this road is three times as long as that road". Thus I think it's also okay to say "leopards are many times as rare as pandas".
So either "many times more rare than" or "many times as rare as" is grammartically correct. Is my thinking correct?

Thank you

EMPOWERgmatVerbal · Answer

Hi  Tracy95 !

You are correct that using the phrases "as rare as" or "as long as" are grammatically correct.

However, they are not ALWAYS correct. It depends on what the meaning you're trying to convey.

The phrases "as rare as" or "as long as" are ONLY used to say that the 2 items are the same. If you're trying to say the 2 items are different, you cannot us "as many as" or "as long as."

So for this question, here is what we're dealing with:

"many times as rare as" =  WRONG  (The phrase "as rare as" would mean the 2 items are the same, but we start with "many times," which is a clue that the 2 items are not the same level of rare.)

"many times more rare than" =  CORRECT  (The phrase "more rare than" makes it clear to readers that the 2 items are different - one of them is many times MORE rare than the other.)

As for your other example:

As far as I know, it's okay to say "this road is three times as long as that road".

NO, this is not grammatically correct. If you say that there is a 3x difference between the two roads, you CANNOT use "as long as." Remember - "as X as Y" only works if the 2 items are the same - and these two roads are different lengths. You must say "This road is three times longer than that road."

I hope that helps clear things up!

CrackverbalGMAT · Answer

Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats,
researchers have determined that there are fewer than 100 Arabian
leopards left in the wild, and that these leopards are thus many times as
rare as

(A) Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, researchers have determined that there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, and that these leopards are thus many times as rare as  "Due to" can only modify a noun - here it is modifying a clause ("researchers have determined..."). Eliminate.

(B) Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, researchers have determined, making them many times more rare than  Same error as in (A) - "due to" modifies the clause "there are fewer than...". Eliminate.

(C) There are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, researchers have determined, which makes the leopards many times more rare compared to  Same error as in (A) and (B). Eliminate.

(D) Researchers have determined that, because of being poached and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, thus making them many more times as rare as  "being poached" is not parallel to "increased cultivation". "Thus" + "making" is redundant since verb + "ing" already denotes effect. Eliminate.

(E) Researchers have determined that, because of poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild, and that these leopards are thus many times more rare than  Correct answer.

Hope this helps.

Laksh47 · Answer

Hi  GMATNinja ,

Could you please explain if the pronoun "their" is ambiguous OA ie Option E?

DmitryFarber · Answer

Laksh47 There's an easy answer to that. The pronouns in a correct answer on an official question are never ambiguous!

We only have to worry about ambiguity in two cases: 1) it's truly unclear what the pronoun is supposed to refer to, or 2) the structure of the sentence leads us to expect the pronoun to refer to something other than its intended meaning. We don't have either case here. It's clear that we'd be talking about the native habitat of the leopards, not the researchers. We'd only have to worry about case #2 if we had already seen "they" used to refer to researchers, or if the sentence said something like "Because the researchers spent a great deal of time in the field, they . . . ," in which case we'd expect "they" to be the researchers, and it would be odd to start talking about leopards.

adityaganjoo · Answer

GMATNinja  in (E), how did we conclude that "their" refers to Arabian leopards, and not to researchers?

GMATNinja · Answer

Here's how I'd think about it: the moment I see "their," I'm asking myself two questions: 1) is there a plural noun the pronoun can refer to? and 2) does this plural noun make sense? It's true that if my eyes drift backwards from "their" I might first come across "researchers" as a candidate. But while "researchers" is plural, it makes absolutely no sense. We're talking about something getting poached -- common sense tells me that we're probably referring to some kind of animal here, not researchers. (Though I definitely worked with some researchers in my PhD program who reminded me of wild animals.

) Also, the phrase "native habitats" is another clue that we're talking about an animal, not people. So I'll keep looking for my antecedent elsewhere. As soon as my eyes begin to move in the other direction, they come across "leopards." Well, this is plural. And it's perfectly logical to write about leopards getting poached in their natural habitats. So I'm pretty confident that "their" refers to "leopards." There's no rule about where to look for the pronoun's antecedent. I just knew I was looking for something plural and logical. "Leopards" is the only thing that works. Do I love this? Nope. But I don't have to. There's no rule that if a sentence contains a plural pronoun, it must contain just one plural noun elsewhere in the sentence. It just needs to have something that could work logically. Every other answer choice here contains a concrete error, so I'm left with option (E). I hope that helps!

Lazybum · Answer

MartyTargetTestPrep

for "B" when we have 2 clauses like that, does the second modify the first? How does that work, is there a TTP chapter on it.

B. Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild,  researchers have determined, making them many times more rare than  -- looks as though the many times being more rare is caused by researchers and their determination.

MartyTargetTestPrep · Answer

If I have it correct, you mean these two clauses.

there are fewer than 100 Arabian leopards left in the wild,  researchers have determined

When you have a clause such as "researchers have determined" or "politicians claim" right after an independent clause, or sometimes embedded within a clause, it simply mentions who has said, has determined, claims, found, etc. what the other clause states.

In this case, the structure of (B) is opening adverbial modifier, "due to poaching ...," clause "there are fewer ...," clause "researchers have determined," closing participial phrase, "making them many times more rare ...."

The closing participial phrase more logically modifies the main independent clause than the "researchers have determined" clause, which is parenthetical and, thus, not integral to the main idea of the sentence.

I hope I've answered your question.

Vubar · Answer

Hi  GMATNinja , sorry for digging up an old one, but can I just clarify the last part of your explanation: "It just needs to have  something  that could work logically."

What if there are multiple  somethings  that could work logically?

My inclination is that if I'm given two grammatically correct options and one makes it clearer what the correct antecedent is, then I will choose it; BUT, if not, ambiguity is not going to be an error to eliminate on. So I would eliminate things like verb agreement, parallelism, etc. first, and then only eliminate based on ambiguity before other style errors like wordiness.

Does that sound about right?

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Hello  Vubar ,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, the approach you have outlined here is quite appropriate; distortion of meaning and concrete grammar errors are the most serious errors on GMAT, the dealbreakers; ambiguity is a lower demerit, and stylistic issues should only be considered in order to differentiate between otherwise error-free answer choices.

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

jabhatta2 · Answer

Hi  avigutman  - many people have eliminated (A) because of the opening modifier error - do you agree ?

I dont see whats wrong with the opening modifier

Due to poaching and increase cultivation --  Researchers  have determined that blah blah

Analogy -

Due to rain and hail, JD cancelled his trip =  this to me makes complete sense

Due to poaching and increased cultivation in their native habitats, re

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