If the first peoples in the Americas arrived more than 15,000 years

Question

If the first peoples in the Americas arrived more than 15,000 years ago, they  would have had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue that such a journey would have been impossible and thus that the first peopling of the Americas happened much later have had to  account for the presence of artifacts indicating that the Americas were inhabited over 15,000 years ago.

A. would have had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue that such a journey would have been impossible and thus that the first peopling of the Americas happened much later have had to

B. would have to traverse thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue against this impossible journey and thus claim that the first people came to America much later have to

C. had to traverse thousands of miles of ice fields, but those who argue that this was an impossible journey and thus that the first peopling of the Americas happened much later have had to

D. had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, but those who argue that this would have been an impossible journey, the first peoples thus coming to America much later, must

E. would have had to have had traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue that such a journey would have been an impossibility and thus the first people had come to America much later, have had to

aragonn · Accepted Answer

Official Explanation 
A question about the first peoples in the Americas.

Split #1: verb tense, beginning of underlining

The sentence begins with a past hypothetical possibility, and then, the verb at the beginning of the underlining has to be a verb that is similarly hypothetical but happened earlier than the action of the “if” clause.

Choice (A): “they would have had to have traversed” = hypothetical & earlier

Choice (B): “they would have to traverse”= hypothetical, but present/future = incorrect

Choice (C): “they had to traverse” = factual and simple past = incorrect

Choice (D): “they had to have traversed” = factual past perfect = incorrect

Choice (E): “they would have had to have had traversed” = iffy: the past perfect infinitive is extremely rare and unneeded after the main verb = incorrect.

Split #2: verb tense, end of underlining

Here, the difference is whether the obligation to account for something is itself in the present or the past. Context does not make clear which, so either is fine. All five choices are correct here.

Split #3: verb tense, part three

Choice (E) has an odd tense pairing: the journey “would have been” (hypothetical past) impossible, and thus first people “had come” (past perfect) much later (??). If that later action is “much later,” why is it in the past perfect, which emphasizes that it was earlier. This is a tense mismatch. Choice (E) is incorrect.

Split #4: pronoun

The beginning of the underlining talking about the people journeying across all the ice, an action given by a verb. We cannot use a pronoun to refer to the action of a verb. We have to refer to this by saying something such as “such a journey,” as in (A) & (E). Choices (C) & (D) use the pronoun “this” to refer to the action of the previous clause: a clear pronoun mistake. Choices (C) & (D) are incorrect.

Split #5: logic

In choice (B), the phrasing “those who argue against this impossible journey” is quite odd. It’s one thing to argue that the journey was impossible—such seems the opinion of some scholars. But the phrasing here seems to assume that we already know that the journey is impossible, and the opinion expressed is that one shouldn’t try this thing known to be impossible—really great advice here: don’t do anything impossible! Furthermore, the sentence here shouldn’t simply assume that the journey is impossible, since the first part of the sentence discusses the possibility of this journey. There are layers of logical problems here. Choice (B) is incorrect.

The only possible choice is (A).

Akash720 · Answer

+1 for E

This is a nightmare question to me as I struggle with verb tense.

My reasoning:
As we are predicting something which happened in the past we need 'would' here. 
Between A and E
In E, the second clause 'people had come' is correct as that happened in the past. Hence, E

Please help me understand how to tackle this one  sudarshan22   workout

Posted from my mobile device

Nikhil · Answer

Akash720

I agree with your reasoning to eliminate options B, C and D. However, I eliminate option E for the usage of two "had" to represent the same event.

"would have  had  to have  had  traversed thousands of miles of ice fields"

I will chose option A.

sandman13 · Answer

Some theory first:
 If then conditional and verb tenses: 
 would  is necessary since we are talking about a hypothetical case in the simple past tense. We're talking about an unlikely event. 
Refer to image from e-GMAT below:
 https://i.imgur.com/jgpwQuW.png

Eliminate C and D.

If the first peoples in the Americas arrived more than 15,000 years ago, they  would have had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue that such a journey would have been impossible and thus that the first peopling of the Americas happened much later have had to  account for the presence of artifacts indicating that the Americas were inhabited over 15,000 years ago.

A.  would  have had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue  that  such a journey would have been impossible and thus  that  the first peopling of the Americas happened much later have had to
^Nice and parallel

B.    would   have to  traverse thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue against this impossible journey and thus claim that the first people came to America much later have to
would have to implies --> in future people will do this. eliminate.

C.  had to traverse thousands of miles of ice fields, but those who argue that this was an impossible journey and thus that the first peopling of the Americas happened much later have had to

D.  had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, but those who argue that this would have been an impossible journey, the first peoples thus coming to America much later, must

E.  would   have had to have had  traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue  that  such a journey would have been an impossibility and  thus  the first people had come to America much later, have had to
argue that ... thus the first is not parallel (unlike choice A)
would have had to have had is just too awkward and wordy
eliminate.

Left with A.

daagh · Answer

If the first peoples in the Americas arrived more than 15,000 years ago, they  would have had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue that such a journey would have been impossible and thus that the first peopling of the Americas happened much later have had to  account for the presence of artifacts indicating that the Americas were inhabited over 15,000 years ago.

A. would have had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue that such a journey would have been impossible and thus that the first peopling of the Americas happened much later have had to

B. would have to traverse thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue against this impossible journey and thus claim that the first people came to America much later have to

C. had to traverse thousands of miles of ice fields, but those who argue that this was an impossible journey and thus that the first peopling of the Americas happened much later have had to

D. had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, but those who argue that this would have been an impossible journey, the first peoples thus coming to America much later, must

E. would have had to have had traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet those who argue that such a journey would have been an impossibility and thus the first people had come to America much later, have had to

I n the event of getting such an unnerving maze of verb tensing and if you think it is too much to bear on the D - day within those seconds that are available to you, the most important thing is not to panic but try this quick fix.

The non-underlined part mentions as 'the first peoples' and this should be followed steadfastly in the choices. Eliminate B and E for using 'the first people" We are now sufficiently aware that the demonstrative 'this' cannot stand alone in formal writing. Dump C and D. A only remains and is the correct one.

The other alternative is to undergo the rigmarole of verifying the correctness of the verb tense forms in the 'conditionals,' or why B is still wrong in the given context in spite of using the subjunctive "would" and so on.

Disclaimer; This quick fix is only the proverbial last straw and an intuitive process rather than rational decision making.

sananoor · Answer

How i approach this question in 1 min 34 secs
If (conditional) arrived (past tense) then it means "then" clause must include conditional "would" + have had
So i ruled out B, C and D
E is wrong because it uses "would have had to have had" and "an impossibility" 
Moreover "such a journey" is necessary because it refer back to "thousand of miles of ice fields"
A is the right option

gvij2017 · Answer

Hello there!

I need a little help here. 
1. What was in my mind till now that 
if+past perfect tense, clause (would have Verb's 3rd form). 
If +simple past tense, clause (would Verb's 1st form)

2. Can I split choice on the basis of yet and but here? If yes, how?
3. In choice A, can we rewrite "would have had to have traversed" as "would have had to traverse". I think former phrase is wordy. 
I appreciate you for sparing time for this problem.

s170618 · Answer

I have the same problem as gvij2017.
So someone can explain why if + simple past tense in this case, we should use ‘would have verb'.
Thank you.

fracheva · Answer

I have a doubt as well: the third sentence starts with "those who argue", shouldn't it continue with "have to" and not "have had to"? "A" doesn't sound correct to me, for this reason

dcummins · Answer

Hypothetical in the past --> "would have" is required.

Eliminate (C) and (D)
"this" incorrectly refers to an action in (C) and (D) also... "traverse thousands of miles..., this.."

E - additional "had" isn't required for " had come  much  later " as the past perfect is used to emphasise the event in the past, but we're saying that it came "later"

B changes the meaning from "those who argue that  such a journey  would have been impossible  " to "this impossible journey". This meaning change states that the journey is in fact impossible instead of the fact that people were arguing about its impossibility

mykrasovski · Answer

If the first peoples in the Americas arrived more than 15,000 years ago, they would have had to have traversed thousands of miles of ice fields, yet   those  who argue   that  such a journey would have been impossible and thus  that  the first peopling of the Americas happened much later  have had to account for  the presence of artifacts indicating that the Americas were inhabited over 15,000 years ago.

I am not convinced that the bold parts are in the tense agreement. It seems that it would be more appropriate to stick to present tense (argue .... have to account for ... OR argue ... had to account for ...). I don't quite understand why Present Perfect "have had to account for" is necessary here.

generis  - do you mind analyzing the sentence for the community?

RishSri1996 · Answer

Is this accurately the level of GMAT? I mean isn't this a tough question

Bunuel · Answer

The difficulty level of a question on the site is determined automatically based on various parameters collected from users' attempts, such as the percentage of correct answers and the time taken to answer the question. You can find the difficulty level of a question and its related statistics in the first post. For this particular question, the difficulty level falls in the 700+ Level range. So, yes it's a tough question.

If the first peoples in the Americas arrived more than 15,000 years

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If the first peoples in the Americas arrived more than 15,000 years

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