(a) scientists has discovered a new group of ferociously giant apes strengthening a surprisingly simple vegetarian fare and exhibiting - Incorrect - Subject Verb error

(b) scientists have discovered a new group of ferociously giant apes strengthened by a surprising simple vegetarian fare and exhibiting - Incorrect - Meaning error. 'surprisingly' is required here.

(c) scientists have discovered a new group of ferocious giant apes that eat a surprisingly simple vegetarian fare and exhibit - Incorrect - Changes the meaning.

(d) a scientist have discovered a new group of ferocious giant apes strengthened by a surprising simple vegetarian fare and exhibiting - Incorrect - Subject Verb error

(e) scientists have discovered a new group of ferocious giant apes strengthened by a surprisingly simple vegetarian fare and exhibiting - Correct - 'strengthened' and 'exhibiting' are parallel and modify the apes.

Answer: E

rishab wrote





You are obviously looking at strengthened and feeling it is some kind of a finite verb, while, exhibiting is a substantially different form of verb+ing, probable either a present participle or a kind of gerund.

Please note that it is 'strengthened by' and not simply 'strengthened'. It is a past participle and a modifier modifying apes. Similarly, the present participle ' exhibiting' is also a modifier modifying apes.

The foundation of participle modification is that on both sides of the conjunction one should use participles, to arrive at the intended meaning. There are umpteen examples of such usage in the GMAT official questions

You may google the following links to verify the veracity of such participle modification.

1. Scientists have recently discovered what could be the largest and oldest living organism on Earth

2. First discovered more than 30 years ago, Lina's sunbird, a four-and-a-half-inch animal

3. The growth of the railroads led to the abolition of local times, which was


HTH!

P.S: This is a poor copycat of offical questions
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Vyshak How is C changing the meaning?

Hi,

The original statement states that the apes were strengthened by a vegetarian diet. Option C just states that apes eat a vegetarian diet and eliminates the 'strength' aspect.

Also the strength contributed by the vegetarian diet is surprising. Its not surprising that apes eat vegetarian diet.

How does E maintain parallelism here? Strengthened and exhibiting don't look parallel. daagh

Can anyone please explain in detail why "e" is correct and if in "b" it was surprisinly... would it be a correct answer?

I can see why people are confused between C and E. The answer lies in what modified what. The vegetarian diet of ferocious apes is surprising! and the fact that they are strengthened by it, is part of the sentence construct.

although i selected C by mistake, i now realize my answer...

between C and E, E is correct.

C : We have a SV error. The subject is "group" ..... and the prepositional phrase after of in : "of ferocious giant apes that" is not the main subject. So the verb following this should be singular
eats ... so C is out... (those who agree please reply back and confirm)

E is the better answer.

Yes i Agree. "Group" must follow the SV form and so C is out. Nice catch!