Five of the committee members will be unable to attend the

Question

Five of the committee members will be unable to attend the meeting due to the severity of the snow storm,  so I suggest that it be postponed until a later time. 
a) so I suggest that it be postponed until a later time
b) therefore I suggest that the meeting should be cancelled until another time
c) and my suggestion is to be postponing the meeting until a better time
d) for which at another time we can be having it
e) thereby it ought to be postponed until a more safe time

Source: GMAT Club Ultimate Grammar

HumptyDumpty · Accepted Answer

OA is WRONG!

A is correct: Command Subjunctive, "so" is correctly used in the meaning of "therefore", "postpone sh until" is idiomatic!

B is 100% WRONG: you never use "I suggest that sh should" - this is terrible. "To be cancelled until another time" is no less nonsensical: Unlike postponing, cancellation cannot be upheld continuously. Cancellation is not durative action, it is punctual action!

A is the correct answer.

doe007 · Answer

A) What is to be posponed? snow storm or meeting? "it" has modifier problem. Wrong.
B) Meaningful and error free. Correct.
C) So the postponement will be continuously ongoing activity! Changes the meaning. Wrong.
D) No clear reference for "which" and "it". Wrong.
E) No clear reference for "it". Wrong.

Correct answer is B.

HumptyDumpty · Answer

B contains a grammatical howler, is unidiomatic and illogical.
A contains one grammatical ambiguity easy to eliminate by logic.
No chance an answer like B to be correct on the GMAT.
I disagree with a question from this source one more time.

thangvietname · Answer

the question outside official sourse such as og or gmatprep is used for practice logic /meaning analysis . we should not follow the unofficial .

A is best though "it" is ambiguous

mvictor · Answer

this is an example of why questions from unknown sources are bad for preparation.

DmitryFarberMPrep · Answer

Yes, the OA should be A. "It" is only  technically  ambiguous. No one's going to think that we're suggesting that the  storm  be postponed, so A works.

But no, this is not really a GMAT-like question. For instance, the GMAT never uses the first person ("I").

mrittik800 · Answer

'It' is used in option A.....but what is the antecedent of IT? Snow Storm / Meeting? a genuine ambiguity........Option B has no such issue.....other options are trash...

DmitryFarberMPrep · Answer

B doesn't work. As HumptyDumpty stated, we can't use "should" with "suggest." B also has a comma splice: the portion after the comma is an independent clause, so we'd need a semicolon. Additionally, you can't cancel something "until another time." The meeting is either cancelled or it isn't. We can postpone a meeting, but then the phrase "until another time" would be redundant.

As for A, all I can do is reiterate that there is no lack of clarity about the intended antecedent. Many official GMAT SC questions feature pronouns with more than one possible antecedent, but only one logical one. A few examples:

https://gmatclub.com/forum/in-late-1997 ... 85840.html
https://gmatclub.com/forum/congress-is- ... 67594.html
https://gmatclub.com/forum/a-professor- ... 22418.html
https://gmatclub.com/forum/in-some-type ... 20379.html

matthewsmith_89 · Answer

I don't think the answer is B. The reason is that B is a comma splice. A comma splice is the use of a comma to join two independent clauses.

Comma Splice: My family bakes together nearly every night, we then get to enjoy everything we make together.

Correction : My family bakes together nearly every night. We then get to enjoy everything we make together.

Hope this helps.

TejasD · Answer

It is really dangerous when such posts pop up!

Posts must be representative of the GMAT and nothing else!

Sent from my XT1562 using  GMAT Club Forum mobile app

buan15 · Answer

OA must be corrected to A...
Useless question...

destinyawaits · Answer

Any time a pronoun is used to describe a noun in a previous clause, we run into issues of ambiguity.

This is a very simple question when considered through the lens of the GMAT test makers. They are testing whether or not we can identify the fact the ambiguity in the second clause.

We can and we alter the sentence to remove the ambiguity by adding the "meeting" to the second clause.

Nkemjika · Answer

thought it was ambiguous. but i doubt it cos if only fits for the meeting.

Posted from my mobile device

MBAB123 · Answer

DmitryFarber , hello sir. Could you help me with a quick question? 
Regarding the pronouns referring to antecedents, is it safe to say that it is only ambiguous when the pronoun has 2 or more logical antecedent? Like in this case, it would be bizarre to say "it" could refer back to "Storm".

Thanks in advance!

anshsaurabh447 · Answer

You are wrong, my friend. Have you heard of Pronoun Ambiguity ?
The antecedent of 'IT' is 'meeting' because the snow storm cannot be postponed.

Posted from my mobile device

VerbalBot · Answer

Automated notice from GMAT Club VerbalBot: 

A member just gave Kudos to this thread, showing it’s still useful. I’ve bumped it to the top so more people can benefit. Feel free to add your own questions or solutions.

 This post was generated automatically.

Five of the committee members will be unable to attend the

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards

GMAT Sentence Correction (SC - EA only) Questions

Five of the committee members will be unable to attend the

Prep Toolkit

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards