Hi All,
Adding the explanation as provided by
egmat.
Like the great navigators who first sailed around the Earth gathering information about its size
and the curvature of its surface, astronomers have made new observations that show with
startling directness the large-scale geometry of the universe. (Choice D)
After reading this one, almost all of you will say that “gathering” is a verb-ing modifier that is
placed after “Earth” and is not preceded by a comma. Hence, it must modify “Earth”. This
modification makes no sense because Earth dis not gather information. The great navigators did.
This sentence is incorrect. BUT IN REALITY, this sentence is absolutely correct. Here is why.
Structurally, “who first sailed around the Earth” is a clause. Here “who” stands for “the great
navigators”. Now together “the great navigators who first sailed around the Earth” is a big noun
phrase (refer to the mini article on noun phrases and Noun modifiers).
Many of you may argue that this entity contains a “who clause”. How can we classify as a noun
phrase. We can classify this as a noun phrase since it has a noun at its head. It is of the
construction – Noun + Clause.
The head of this big noun phrase is “the great investigators”. Now the “who” clause that
modifies “the great investigators” cannot be placed anywhere else in the sentence. This gives
“gathering”, a noun modifier, the liberty to jump over the preceding modifier and modify the
head – “the great investigators”. Hence, “gathering” in this sentence is correctly modifying “the
great investigators”.
Furthermore, logically “earth” cannot gather information.