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NandishSS

Quote:
(ii) it is hard-working people having most chance to succeed on GMAT.
in this option having is correctly modifying people -- Correct me if I 'm wrong than what is the error?
You are right. In this case, having is a present participle, modifying people.

However, everything else remaining the same, whenever there is a choice between such usage of present participle (present participle towards the end of a clause modifying the immediate preceding noun) and a relative clause (who have most chance..), GMAT seems to exhibit a distinct preference for the relative clause.
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sayantanc2k , chetan2u

Can you explain this one in detail. i cannot understand this .

In 1776 Adam Smith wrote that it is young people who have “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” <Dont we need a verb here. it seems incomplete to read> needed to found new businesses.


Hello goforgmat,

I will be glad to help you out with this one. :-)

In 1776 Adam Smith wrote that it is young people who have “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” needed to found new businesses.

Let's first understand the meaning of this sentence. The sentence intends to say that Adam Smith wrote something in 1776. What did he write?

He wrote that young people possess two qualities (if I may): “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success”. What is the significance of these two qualities.

These two qualities are required to found = establish new businesses.

Now let's come to the grammar part of it.

In the above-mentioned sentence, the subjects are highlighted in blue while the verbs are in green. All the subjects have appropriate verbs.

Please note that the word needed is a verb-ed modifier that further explains “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success”.

We do not need anymore verbs in the sentence as there are no subjects with missing verbs.

We may expand this sentence as In 1776 Adam Smith wrote that it is young people who have “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” that are needed to found new businesses.

The added that clause is just the expanded version of the original sentence. We actually derive verb-ed modifiers in this way by removing the subject and the helping verb.

You can read our very famous article named ED FORMS - Verbs or Modifiers to learn how to distinguish between a verb-ed modifier and a simple past tense verb in the following link:
https://gmatclub.com/forum/ed-forms-verbs-or-modifiers-134691.html


Hope this helps. :-)
Thanks.
Shraddha


Thanks a Lot Shraddha for the detailed explanation why A is correct. Would you please elaborate the reasons why B & C are incorrect ?

Thanks
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ran787



Thanks a Lot Shraddha for the detailed explanation why A is correct. Would you please elaborate the reasons why B & C are incorrect ?

Thanks


Hello ran787,


Thank you for the query. I am not sure if you still have this doubt. Here is the explanation nonetheless. :-)


IMHO, meaning wise, there is hardly any difference in the information given by Choice A, B, and C.

However, generally. the structure it is the xyz is followed by a relative pronoun modifier to lay emphasis on a special characteristic of the entity xyz.


So structurally, Choice A wins as it presents the intended meaning in the best manner.


Hope this helps. :-)
Thanks.
Shraddha
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GMATNinja, could you please provide some more examples of this kind of sentence structure:

It is young people who have X needed to found new business.

I am unable to comprehend this structure as it looks abruptly ended after X. I have gone through the explanations provided by egmat as well but still this structure does not seem familiar and I do not intend to memorize rather grasp the concept behind this kind of structure.
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ravikumarmishra
GMATNinja, could you please provide some more examples of this kind of sentence structure:

It is young people who have X needed to found new business.

I am unable to comprehend this structure as it looks abruptly ended after X. I have gone through the explanations provided by egmat as well but still this structure does not seem familiar and I do not intend to memorize rather grasp the concept behind this kind of structure.
Good! If you try to memorize every possible construction you might encounter, your face will melt. "Needed to found new business" is simply modifying "the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success," and it's the article "the" that indicates that we might specify what kind of "contempt of risk" and "presumptuous hope" we're talking about. Pretty common construction.

Take a silly example. "It was Tim who ate the burrito." That's fine as a sentence. We don't need really need more. But if we want to specify which burrito we're talking about, we could write, "It was Tim who ate the burrito found in the dumpster." "Found in the dumpster" is playing the same role as "needed to found new business," modifying the preceding noun. Also, Tim is kind of gross. Don't shake his hand or kiss him goodnight.

I hope that helps!
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I have eliminated A because it says "who HAVE"

Can someone explain me why does "it is young people" is plural to use HAVE instead of HAS?

tks
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Hi! who modifies young people (plural) and hence, have is the correct verb.
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Hi @egmat/ GMATNinja

I respect your time :please . So I have read all above posts before putting this post. Doubt is still not resolved :-D

In 1776 Adam Smith wrote that it is young people having “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” needed to found new businesses.

In this option- Having is verbing modifier (without comma) modifying YP.
Subject- Adam Smith, Verb- Wrote
Subject- IT, Verb- IS
Needed is verb-ed modifier modifying preceeding phrase...

So everything seems to be fine. Why A over C then?
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Hi @egmat/ GMATNinja

I respect your time :please . So I have read all above posts before putting this post. Doubt is still not resolved :-D

In 1776 Adam Smith wrote that it is young people having “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” needed to found new businesses.

In this option- Having is verbing modifier (without comma) modifying YP.
Subject- Adam Smith, Verb- Wrote
Subject- IT, Verb- IS
Needed is verb-ed modifier modifying preceeding phrase...

So everything seems to be fine. Why A over C then?
Without the modifiers, choice (C) boils down to, "Adam Smith wrote that it is young people." Sure, we have a bunch of subject-verb pairs, but what is it about those young people? It makes more sense to say, "... that it is young people WHO {verb}." For example:

  • "It is young people who destroy their eardrums by listening to nerdcore rap with headphones."
  • "It is old people who do not understand why a smartphone is needed to hail a taxi."

These two examples are clearly standalone sentences. But if I just say, "It is young people.", then I haven't really told you anything. There's a subject and a verb, but we don't have a complete thought.

Also, if we want to modify "young people", why would we use "having" (an -ing modifier that can be used to modify the entire preceding clause) instead of "who have" (a noun modifier that MUST modify "young people")? That latter is much clearer.

Comparing (A) and (C) side by side, (C) has no advantages over (A), so (A) is the winner!
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Hi Shraddha, hope everything is doing fine.
I'm pretty confussed with the pronoun IT in the clause "...that IT is young people...". IT stands for “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success”?.

Thank you in advance!

Regards,
R.
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rszarate
Hi Shraddha, hope everything is doing fine.
I'm pretty confussed with the pronoun IT in the clause "...that IT is young people...". IT stands for “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success”?.

Thank you in advance!

Regards,
R.
Hi rszarate,

This is a particular type of dummy it, used to move what would otherwise have been the subject of the clause out of that position. Let's quickly take a look at why someone may use it:

1. The corruption scandal torpedoed his career. ← This is fine.
2. It was the corruption scandal that torpedoed his career. ← This is the same sentence, but the way it is constructed draws extra attention to the corruption scandal. This could be used (for example) to emphasize that it was the corruption scandal (and nothing else) that "torpedoed his career".

Don't worry too much about the difference between (1) and (2). The GMAT is extremely unlikely to test us on this. What is important is that we remember that there is no corresponding "plural" for this type of it, so we go with [it + singular verb] even when the noun on the other side is plural.

3. It was his parents who encouraged him to take the GMAT. ← This is fine.
4. They were his parents who encouraged him to take the GMAT. ← Trying to make the it in (3) plural leads to an incorrect sentence.

5. ... it is young people who have X. ← We ignore the fact that young people is plural.

Remember not to apply this to other verbs:

6. It was his parents who were... ← The was is singular, but the were is plural (to go with parents).
7. It was his parents who was... ← This is incorrect.
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pikolo wrote

Quote:
Hello Sir,

I am confused between Option A and Option B, Can you explain the reasoning here?

A. In 1776 Adam Smith wrote that

it is young people who have “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” needed(required) to found (establish) new businesses. This is a relative clause with the modifier phrase starting with 'who' modifying young people.

B. In 1776, Adam Smith wrote that

it is young people with “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” needed to found new businesses. --- This prepositional modifier 'with' modifying young people lacks a verb to complete the meaning.

Therefore, A is correct.

Why option B can't be written like A ?

it is young people with “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” needed(required) to found (establish) new businesses.
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Why option B can't be written like A ?

it is young people with “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” needed(required) to found (establish) new businesses.
Hi Harsh, which one would you choose:

(i) Gandhiji said that it was the young people with energy to change the nation.

(ii) Gandhiji said that it was the young people who had the energy to change the nation.

Doesn't (i) sound incomplete to you?
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AbdurRakib
The Official Guide for GMAT Verbal Review 2018
Practice Question
Sentence Correction
Question no. 207
In 1776 Adam Smith wrote that it is young people who have “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” needed to found new businesses.

Although the thread says this is a medium level question, I believe this question, form now on, is one of my favourite, and solving this question, I learnt a lot. I will try to elucidate whatever I could surmise from the question. Without any further adieu, lets jump in to the thread !

"In 1776 Adam Smith wrote that it is young people " (This is the core structure of the sentence, and rest everything is a modifier emphasizing the characteristics of young people)who have “the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” (this is a modifier which starts with a relative pronoun and modifies "Young People") needed to found new businesses (Participial modifier that modifies the two two characteristics).

Quote:
(A) who have
This is idiomatic or one can say rhetorical to usually say "It is Michael (or aka X) who did speak an elaborate speech (or Y) in ...."

Quote:
(B) with
(C) having
These modify the sentence structure and we expect to see the main verb after "with.../having...)

Quote:
(D) who are those with
(E) who are the ones to have
No need to even think of these two options. Both of them are obviously wrong, and I believe everyone knows why is that so.

Experts,
Kindly let me know whether I understood this question correctly.

Regards
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Hello experts! :)

Within answer choice C, does it mean young people continually possess "the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success"? I'm also unsure how "having" modifies the whole clause before it - "Adam S. wrote that is young people HAVING [X] needed to found new businesses." Adam S. wrote that some younger people continually possess two types of mentality needed to found new businesses.

Please help clarify this doubt. Thank you in advance!
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samgyupsal
Hello experts! :)

Within answer choice C, does it mean young people continually possess "the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success"? I'm also unsure how "having" modifies the whole clause before it - "Adam S. wrote that is young people HAVING [X] needed to found new businesses." Adam S. wrote that some younger people continually possess two types of mentality needed to found new businesses.

Please help clarify this doubt. Thank you in advance!
In this case, "having" is not separated from the rest of the sentence by commas. So, 'having "the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success”' does not modify the clause.

It's not really clear what that phrase does. That version does not make sense.

If anything 'having "the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success”' restrictively modifies "young people."

Thus, if read literally, that version conveys that Adam Smith wrote that "it" whatever "it" is, "is" a particular type of young people, 'young people having "the contempt of risk and the presumptuous hope of success” need to found new businesses.'
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Hi, can you please tell me what is the verb for people in option A?
Thanks,
MK
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