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555-605 Level|   Idioms/Diction/Redundancy|   Subject Verb Agreement|                                    
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GVelarde
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 01 Feb 2022, 10:53
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nightwing79
Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly because of the difficulty of distinguishing between a language and the sub-languages or dialects within it, but those who have tried to count typically have found about five thousand.


(A) and the sub-languages or dialects within it, but those who have tried to count typically have found

(B) and the sub-languages or dialects within them, with those who have tried counting typically finding

(C) and the sub-languages or dialects within it, but those who have tried counting it typically find

(D) or the sub-languages or dialects within them, but those who tried to count them typically found

(E) or the sub-languages or dialects within them, with those who have tried to count typically finding
Show more

I read this question and immediately noticed the "between a language", which requires an "and" after, not "or". So, choices #4 and 5 are out.

I scanned the remaining three and saw that the first place they diverged was with "it"/"they". The meaning is the sub-languages or dialects within a language, which is singular. Choice #2 is out.

I compared #1 and #3. In #3, the sentence (with replacement of "it" for the noun "a language") is "...and the sub-languages or dialects within a language, but those who have tried counting a language typically find about 5,000." The red text doesn't make sense.

It's clearly #1.
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 20 Feb 2022, 03:30
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As per my understanding , between X and Y is the correct structure even we have to add some "OR" condition, it always affects the later part ( Y in this case). So I am not sure how A is correct.
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 20 Feb 2022, 04:54
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akt715
As per my understanding , between X and Y is the correct structure even we have to add some "OR" condition, it always affects the later part ( Y in this case). So I am not sure how A is correct.
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Hope you got the structure correct.

The structure in A is:

..between

(i) X (a language)
and
(ii) Y (the sub-languages or dialects within it)
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 20 Feb 2022, 06:27
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akt715
As per my understanding , between X and Y is the correct structure even we have to add some "OR" condition, it always affects the later part ( Y in this case). So I am not sure how A is correct.
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Hello akt715,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, we would like to elaborate on the meaning of the "between A and B" structure seen in Option A.

What this structure refers to is the act of distinguishing either between a language and the sub-languages within it or between a language and the dialects within it.

In other words, here, "A" is "a language" and "B" is "the sub-languages or dialects within it"; B consists of two parts, both of which are contrasted against A.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 14 Jun 2022, 21:21
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1. First of "between.." Jumps out to me. "between" requires "and". Also a Parallelism trigger.

Eliminate D and E.

2. pronoun "them" logical refer to "a language". But Noun is singular. So Eliminate B, D and E.

3. In option C, "who have tried counting it.." here "it" has no clear refferent. Also since "it" is a singular pronoun. How can one count "it"?. for counting one need plural noun/pronoun.

usage of Present tense " typically find"..... convey the meaning that it happens regularly... which is clearly not the case....
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly Updated on: 20 Jul 2022, 07:51
Originally posted by jabhatta2 on 19 Jul 2022, 08:04.
Last edited by jabhatta2 on 20 Jul 2022, 07:51, edited 5 times in total.
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Hi DmitryFarber GraceSCKao KarishmaB GMATNinja egmat
avigutman - I see that some experts have used this as a decision point - "try to X" and "try X-ing"

I read Dmitry's Post and GMAT Ninja's post about this issue but I am not able to logically understand the difference between these 2 structures

I have attempted to understand via an analogy

Please let me know your thoughts !

Quote:
I hated to eat carrots
vs
I hated eating carrots
Show more

In the first -->
  • this sentence is in the past tense
  • the sentence implies this was a "Habit" of mine in the past

In the 2nd -->
  • this sentence is also in the past tense
  • the sentence emphasises not the "Habit" of eating per se
  • The sentence emphasises the "Eating" -- this emphasises the verb (perhaps my jaws hurt or my gums bled when I was eating carrots)

I think this difference is too subtle though

Thoughts ?
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 19 Jul 2022, 14:01
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jabhatta2
think this difference is too subtle though
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I agree, jabhatta2.
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 20 Jul 2022, 21:01
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jabhatta2
Hi DmitryFarber GraceSCKao KarishmaB GMATNinja egmat
avigutman - I see that some experts have used this as a decision point - "try to X" and "try X-ing"

I read Dmitry's Post and GMAT Ninja's post about this issue but I am not able to logically understand the difference between these 2 structures

I have attempted to understand via an analogy

Please let me know your thoughts !

Quote:
I hated to eat carrots
vs
I hated eating carrots

In the first -->
  • this sentence is in the past tense
  • the sentence implies this was a "Habit" of mine in the past

In the 2nd -->
  • this sentence is also in the past tense
  • the sentence emphasises not the "Habit" of eating per se
  • The sentence emphasises the "Eating" -- this emphasises the verb (perhaps my jaws hurt or my gums bled when I was eating carrots)

I think this difference is too subtle though

Thoughts ?
Show more


Both look ok to me -
... those who have tried to count have found ...
or
... those who have tried counting have found ...

Though GMAT often prefers the use of to-infinitive (which means that you will find it more often in correct answers) but I wouldn't eliminate based on this distinction.
Here, options using 'counting' have errors in them as discussed in my post on page 1.
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 26 Jul 2022, 13:29
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jabhatta2
Hi DmitryFarber GraceSCKao KarishmaB GMATNinja egmat
avigutman - I see that some experts have used this as a decision point - "try to X" and "try X-ing"

I read Dmitry's Post and GMAT Ninja's post about this issue but I am not able to logically understand the difference between these 2 structures

I have attempted to understand via an analogy

Please let me know your thoughts !

Quote:
I hated to eat carrots
vs
I hated eating carrots

In the first -->
  • this sentence is in the past tense
  • the sentence implies this was a "Habit" of mine in the past

In the 2nd -->
  • this sentence is also in the past tense
  • the sentence emphasises not the "Habit" of eating per se
  • The sentence emphasises the "Eating" -- this emphasises the verb (perhaps my jaws hurt or my gums bled when I was eating carrots)

I think this difference is too subtle though

Thoughts ?
Show more
I'll echo Karishma and Avi here, and add that your example is a little different than the official one.

While "I hated eating carrots," isn't technically wrong, it's less than ideal, because there's more than one way to interpret "eating." Is it modifying "carrots," in the sense that the subject hates the type of carrots that people eat, but is okay with, say, decorative carrots? Or is it modifying "hated" and is simply conveying that the subject hates to eat this particular food?

In a vacuum, I wouldn't get rid of it for this reason alone, but I'd keep the potential confusion in mind when I'm evaluating alternatives.

In the official example, there's no ambiguity with the phrase "those who have tried counting," because without a noun next to "counting," there's only one possible interpretation of what "counting" could be doing here: it's conveying the action that people have tried to do.

The takeaway: there's no rule here, so don't generalize about whether the GMAT prefers "to verb" or "verb-ing." Take each case on its own. If one is clearer or more logical than the other, then you can use it as a decision point. If you're not sure -- and there will be times when you won't be sure, or when either construction could work -- then just move on to other issues.

I hope that helps!
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 02 Oct 2022, 10:42
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DmitryFarber
Actually, "try to X" and "try X-ing" are both valid constructions with different meanings. If I try to surf, I am attempting to surf. I may or may not succeed. If I try surfing, I am trying out the experience of surfing to see if I like it. It's common to see advice along the lines of "Try studying in the morning and see if you get better results." You're not ATTEMPTING and possibly failing to study in the morning; rather, you're studying in the morning to see if it works well for you.

In the context of this SC question, however, "tried counting" doesn't make sense. We want to say that people attempted to count but were not able to get a precise answer, not that they tried out the experience of counting to see if they liked it!
Show more

DmitryFarber

Thank you for your helpful explanation.

To clarify, I was initially focused on the -ing parallelism between "distinguishing" and "counting." Would Choice C be correct if the second "it" was removed? --> "and the sub-languages or dialects within it, but those who have tried counting typically find"?
I realize that choice A has correct parallelism with the repetition of "have." Thank you for your time.
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Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly 15 Jun 2023, 02:16
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Correct idiom is distinguish between A and B
d) and e) are out
c)the second refers to a language. Doesnt makes any sense if there is a single language what is the problem in counting it
d) them refers to sub languages/dialects and makes no sense at all
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