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19 Jan 2019, 05:07
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Hoozan
You’re correct about the usage of “like” here. The GMAT generally frowns upon the use of “like” to introduce examples.
However, I don’t think there’s any rule that states that “whether” needs to be used on a parallel list of two items. I’ve never heard of that before, and I don’t think it’s a real thing. There’s nothing at all wrong with either of the following:
- "I’ll eat anything that looks edible, whether it’s a caterpillar, a goat, or a roasted rodent." → Makes perfect sense, right? (Other than my lack of dietary discretion, of course.)
- "I don't know whether I’ll eat an entire large pizza tonight." → There’s no list of parallel items here at all! And you see this use somewhat frequently on the GMAT.
So I don’t see any issue with the use of “whether” in the original question, either.
The bigger issue? The phrase “the more avidly it is sought by collectors” only makes sense if it is preceded by a phrase that expresses some sort of continuous comparison. So we need to start the sentence with “the rarer something becomes.” In (A), it doesn’t really make sense to say “as rare as something becomes… the more avidly it is sought by collectors.” Not terribly satisfying, but that idiom is the reason why (A) is wrong and (E) is correct.
Also, I think this comes from the 1000 SC series, and there are often errors in those questions. In theory, the 1000 series contains official questions, but be a bit careful with them – every version of that resource seems to be riddled with errors, and I can’t promise that they’ll accurately mimic real questions.
I hope this helps!
19 Jan 2019, 05:11
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Hoozan
I’ll punt on this one, just because it has the same issues as I mentioned above: since it came from the somewhat dodgy 1000 series, I just don’t know that this is a real GMAT question. If you have a specific question about the grammar or usage in it, feel free to let me know, and I’ll do my best to answer it in a way that will help you more broadly on official GMAT questions. Otherwise, don’t worry too much about this one.
19 Jan 2019, 05:30
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kagrawal16
First of all, please don’t look at non-official SC questions and assume that they are accurate representations of what happens on actual, official GMAT questions. It’s essentially impossible for even the very best test-prep companies to produce valid verbal questions, and I don’t think that non-official questions are worth your valuable study time.
And yes, you’re getting far too mechanical, in my opinion. Nobody likes to hear this, but there are very, very few grammar rules that apply 100% of the time on the GMAT – or in English in general. If you try to break the entire language down to rules, you’ll miss a whole lot of logic and meaning… and then you’ll miss a whole lot of GMAT questions.
And you definitely don’t want to get too mechanical with comparisons. The important thing is that the comparisons actually make sense. If you try to overthink the parallelism of the structures, you’ll completely ignore the logic and meaning of the comparisons, and that’s what really matters.
Let’s go back to the original sentence about the weather, with a few things removed to keep the comparison succinct:
- "The weather was colder and wetter than usual in some regions."
If you’re being too mechanical, you could conclude that “colder and wetter” is being compared to “usual.” Or that “the weather” is being compared to “usual.” Either way, if you’re being too mechanical, you might say “whoa, that’s not parallel, so it’s wrong!”
But it really isn’t unclear at all. The sentence is trying to say that “the weather was colder and wetter than the weather usually is in some regions.” If you’re demanding strict, mechanical parallelism, then you need the part in italics. But it’s fine to remove a few words if the comparison is still clear: shortening “than the weather usually is” to just “than usual” absolutely preserves the meaning, and keeps the sentence clean. Totally acceptable, and arguably better.
So whenever you look at comparisons, think of it this way: is the MEANING of the comparison clear? If so, you’re probably OK. If not, you have a problem. If removing a few extra words doesn’t hurt the clarity or meaning, then it’s probably fine.
More on this issue in this post and this post. And if you want more on comparisons, check out this video and this sequel.
I hope this helps!
But all of the 21st-century questions seem to frown on this construction.
