Although blue herons can still be found along the Maine

Will it really modify "the 1970s"? I raised this issue because "the 1970s" is a part of "prepositional phrase".

Hii Mike.
Thanks for intervening.
Really appreciate it.

Can you please elaborate the above blue shaded part.

Also consider these:
1) In an unusual spiritual ceremony for celebrating changes in season such as the emergence of the spring season, as much as 10% of the organization's cash, which is the most liquid of all the organization's assets bla bla bla

and this one:

2) In an unusual spiritual ceremony for celebrating changes in season such as the emergence of the spring season, as much as 10% of the organization's cash, the most liquid of all the organization's assets

In the above mentioned blue shades, IMO the first one will modify "the 10% of the organisation's cash" whereas in second one will modify "organisation's cash".

Also,
I have been through a sentence " The box of nails, which was black in color, was upon the table". Here don't you think that "box" is black in color rather than "nails".

Thanks in advance.

Dear Marcab,
I'm happy to help.

You indicated "the above blue shaded part", but I didn't see this, or couldn't tell to what you were referring.

In all three of these --- the two "spiritual ceremony" examples and the "box of nails" ---- we run into one of the subtleties of grammar: the distinction of a vital vs. non-vital modifier. See these two posts:
https://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/that-vs-which-on-the-gmat/
https://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-gramm ... modifiers/
Vital noun modifiers can violate the Modifier Touch Rule --- that is to say, they can come between a noun and the modifier that modifies this noun, meaning that the modifier doesn't touch the noun is modifies.

This leads to the possible ambiguity in the structure:
[noun][vital noun modifier][modifier #2]
All three of your examples are of this form. The ambiguity is ---what does "modifier #2" modify? Does it modify the original noun? That would be a correct grammatical structure, consistent with the role of a vital noun modifier. Or does it modify something inside the "vital noun modifier", something which it touches? That would also be a correct grammatical structure. Often, context will make clear what modifies what. In some cases, a sentence could be genuinely ambiguous, and grammar alone will not resolve the ambiguity. I guarantee you, the real GMAT will not give you sentences like this, and better GMAT prep sources will not either.

I will say, in both "spiritual ceremony" examples, it seems to me that the two modifies both modify the word "cash" --- I guess I am inferring that from context. In the "box of nails" example, clearly the box, not the nails, are black. Again, all these deductions are happening from judgments about context --- nothing in the grammar allows us to distinguish between the two possible targets of the modifier.

Does all this make sense?
Mike

Hii Mike.
Thanks for your help.
Thanks for your links.
But still some doubt remains.
First of all, my direct query is "can prepositional phrases become the subject of the clause"?

In [noun][vital noun modifier][modifier #2], you said that "modifier 2" can modify either:
i)[noun]
ii) [vital noun modifer]

If somehow, in both the cases the meaning sounds fine then what?

Actually the sentence in question is "In an unusual spiritual ceremony for celebrating changes in season such as the emergence of the spring season, as much as 10% of the organization's cash, the most liquid of all the organization's assets, disappears and vanishes".

Now since "the most liquid of all of the organization's assets" is a non-vital modifier, so we can cross that off.
The sentence now becomes "In an unusual spiritual ceremony for celebrating changes in season such as the emergence of the spring season, as much as 10% of the organization's cash, the most liquid of all the organization's assets, disappears and vanishes.

Here now it becomes clearer that its the "10% of the organizational's case" that "disappears and vanishes".

But doubt persists: what is the most liquid of the organisational's assets? Is it the 10% of the cash OR the entire cash. Though meanings resulting from these sentences are different, but they are logically clear.
As you said, it depends on the context in order to select the desired meaning and there can be other errors as well but there has to be a subtle difference.
Please help me decide over this.

Thanks in advance.

NO. A prepositional phrase can act like an adjective or an adverb, but unlike an infinitive or gerund or substantive clause, it can never act like a noun. Therefore, at no time can a prepositional phrase ever take on any of the noun-roles in a sentence or in a clause. A prepositional phrase can never be the subject of any clause. Is this clear?


A sentence in which both meaning were equally valid and in which context does not provide sufficient clues would be, by definition, an ambiguous sentence. Whether a sentence's meaning is ambiguous may depend on grammar, but sentences that are completely grammatically correct can still be ambiguous in meaning. You will NEVER see an ambiguous sentence on the GMAT SC. NEVER. Period. Just as poor grammar is the sign of an inferior writer, so too is ambiguity in meaning. If you ever receive an ambiguous memo in a work environment, you have every right to ask for clarification. if you receive such a memo from someone who is under your charge, you should admonish them to write univocal messages. That's what you do if you receive a poorly written ambiguous sentence.


I would say, cash is cash. Cash, almost by definition, is the most liquid form in which you can have your money. Cash usually consists of physical bills you have somewhere at hand, perhaps locked up on the premises, but still quickly accessible to the folks in charge. The only way you could call money in the bank "cash" would be if you could access it more or less instantly on demand. All cash, by definition, is liquid, easily accessible, ready to move. Cash is the most spendable form of money. The most liquid of any organization's assets would be, almost by definition, that organization's cash. Why would only 10% of the cash be liquid? That's almost a contradiction in terms. If the other 90% is not liquid, then in what sense would it be "cash" instead of "money" of some other form?

Does all this make sense?
Mike

Can we write "populations" ? I believe "population" does not have a plural from. If such is the case, then (C) is wrong
Please clarify

Dear Marcab,
First of all, the pronoun "it" refers to "music" --- audiophiles (myself included!) can accumulate music, transfer music, copy music, and digitally alter the music. This is a very common structure, in which the pronoun direct object of one verb has, as its antecedent, the direct object of a previous verb.

More importantly, your phrasing may betray a fundamental misunderstanding. There is absolutely no such thing as a "subject of a prepositional phrase" --- preposition phrases have "objects", but not "subjects." This is precisely why we have to use the objective form of a pronoun with a preposition (e.g. "for her", "to me", "with him", "because of them"), not the subjective forms (e.g. "for she", "to I", "with he", "because of they") which we would use as the subject of a sentence or clause.

Here, the only preposition in the first part of the sentence is "on", the the objects of this preposition are "compact discs, digital audiotapes, or digital videodiscs." Furthermore, as I have said above, it is 100% correct for the object of a prepositional phrase to be the antecedent of a pronoun. It would be perfectly correct to say " ... is now recorded on compact discs, digital audiotapes, or digital videodiscs, and they provide better sound quality than ...." The antecedent of the pronoun "they" is the long object of the preposition "on."

BTW. the best analog recordings are superior to the sound quality that digital produces. I'm a snob about sound quality, because I'm a classical music fan, but that's relevant to the content of the sentence, not its grammar.

Mike

Sorry Mike.
I somehow posted the wrong question, its nowhere close to my doubt.
I have attached the question here.
In this , the question talks about collections of music.

Dear Marcab,
I would say here, the clincher is not with the pronouns, which indeed could lead to a few interpretations, but with the parallelism in the participles: transferring ...copying ... altering. No answer but (B) does that correctly. I'm honestly not sure that we could decide this one on the basis of the pronouns alone --- I don't think the sentence gives us enough information with which we could make a conclusive decision based on the pronouns alone --- other than knowing they have to be consistent.
Does all this make sense?
Mike

mikemcgarry :- Can you please explain why E is wrong?
I found one issue Dynamically is omitted in E , other than this is there any issue by which we can Discard C.

Thanks in advance

Dear Shree9975,

I'm happy to respond. Here's the question again:
Although blue herons can still be found along the Maine coast, their population has declined dramatically when compared to the 1970’s, a period in which there were fewer bald eagles competing with them for food and nesting sites.
A) their population has declined dramatically when compared to the 1970's
B) their population has declined dramatically compared with the 1970's
C) their populations have declined dramatically since the 1970's
D) their populations have declined in comparison to those of the 1970's
E) their population has declined in comparison with that of the 1970's

Yes, one problem with (D) & (E) is the subtle change in meaning caused by dropping the word "dramatically." More importantly, both of those choices are monsters of awkward length. Suppose we re-insert the word "dramatically" and compare (E) to the OA of (C):
C) their populations have declined dramatically since the 1970's
E) their population has declined dramatically in comparison with that of the 1970's
Think about what happens after "declined dramatically:" (C) has just three words, brief and elegant, to express the comparison, whereas (E) has a bloated seven words to say the same thing. Choice (E) is 100% grammatically correct and it completely awkward in its excessive wordiness. It uses more than twice the number of words necessary to say the same thing.

Remember: the GMAT SC is not just about grammar. Many incorrect answers on the SC are entirely grammatically correct. A correct answer also must be forceful, unambiguous, and direct. Choice (E) is flaccid, bloated, and livy-livered---the stuff that the GMAT hates! That's why it is wrong.
See
https://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-sc-wordy-vs-concise/

Does all this make sense?
Mike

My one question is: is there a word as populations? I do not think any dictionary defines populations. They define only Population. Population itself is said to act as a plural in some cases. I would welcome some academic references for the word 'populations'.


So I feel all the choices depicting populations may prove grammatically wrong, leaving us only with choice E as the best contender, notwithstanding the dropping of the word 'dramatically'.

Any takers?

Dear daagh,
I'm happy to respond. My friend, the word "populations" is absolutely a word with a valid meaning, as long as we are talking about a non-homogeneous group. If we are talking about human beings, all human beings, and emphasizing our commonality, then of course there is just one human population. BUT, if we are talking about several individual mass movements, and we want to emphasize the uniqueness of each one, we would be more inclined to use "populations." Example:
The example of Easter Island raises the question whether human populations can bring about their own demise purely through unchecked consumption.
You see, the folks on Easter Island were one isolated group, one population, and we could easily imagine other indigenous isolated groups, other populations. The dynamics within any one of them are self-contained, so it makes sense to emphasize their differences.

Now, in this question, I am not an expert on blue herons, and perhaps you are not either. When non-experts hear "blue herons," we may think that there is only one kind of animal, one species, only one way to be a "blue heron." Suppose an expert came along, a trained biologist, and told us that there were, say, 15 different species of blue herons, and that each species had its own diet, its own environmental requirements, etc. etc. In particular, perhaps different blue heron species participated in different levels of conflict & competition with bald eagles for food & nesting sites. If that were the case, then the biological expert would have every reason to emphasize their differences, and speak of the "populations" of blue herons, that is, the collections of the groups of distinct species.

Of course, we don't know any of this expert knowledge, but it is certainly plausible that there are different species of blue herons, and that therefore it would be perfectly correct to speak of their "populations." We don't know this a priori, but the grammar of the SC problem forces us to accept (C), which de facto leads us to the "different species" conclusion.

My friend, does this make sense?
Mike

Thanks Mike: as a native speaker, you ought to know better than I do. After all, non-natives may go more by book knowledge, than by the more relevant contexts and subtle shades of differences in meaning. I take you point.

Now that VerbalBot has raked this up yet again, let’s revisit it. The OA is supposed to be C as per the elaborate discussions done hitherto

C) their populations have declined dramatically since the 1970s, a period in which there were fewer bald eagles competing with them for food and nesting sites.

The preposition since indicates (erroneously IMO) that the declines have been happening since 1970 until now or for that matter may even continue further. However the following part after the timeline in choice C, an appositive modifier that relates to the period between the 70’s and now, uses a past tense verb were. To put in the other way, should we not say…
C. their populations declined dramatically in the 1970s, a period in which there were fewer bald eagles competing with them for food and nesting sites.

One may note that 'since' is incongruous here, as the period 1970’s is long, long over.

I am not sure why this one is vexing so many people. Perhaps many aspirants are overcomplicating matters. Keep it simple. If a shorter, just as clear option is compared side by side with one that is okay, then go for the terser answer. The GMAT™ prefers clear and concise meaning. Let us look below.




The comparison is off here. We are comparing a population to the 1970s, rather than to another population. Keep looking.


Again, read this one for literal meaning, and it is comparing a population with the 1970s. There is no difference between compared to or compared with in this context, but that is beside the point.


What is wrong with this one? The comparison is ongoing here, saying that since the 1970s, the blue heron population has been in decline. If you are caught up on populations versus the singular population, think of the former as numbers and the latter as number. One is counting individuals, while the other is counting the whole body of animals. Either one could work. Finally, if the issue is a period, since one might argue that since the 1970s does not represent a distinct period, first, a period in time can be ongoing. I could say this is a post-WWII period, but I could just as easily refer to it as the period since the mid-1940s. Keep in mind, for comparison, a geological period can cover tens of millions of years. What is wrong with being in one, rather than commenting on one that has passed? Then, a period... is nothing more than an appositive phrase, one that can refer to the 1970s specifically, and in this case, the past tense were in were fewer bald eagles indicates that this latter interpretation is the correct one. If the meaning is clear and the writing is concise, then the answer is hard to argue against.


I am doing something I do not typically do, grouping two answer choices together for discussion. But recall from above what I said about the population/populations split, or the compare to/compare with split. Here, those in choice (D) logically refers back to populations, while that in choice (E) logically refers back to population. It is six of one and a half dozen of the other. There is no way to separate the vital meaning of these two answer choices. One says that populations have declined compared to populations of the 1970s, while the other says that the population has declined compared with the population of the 1970s. If you can get behind (E), then why not (D) as well? I like to say that if you cannot tease two answers apart, then they are both wrong. It is not that anything is grammatically incorrect about either option. It is just that they take their time to convey the vital meaning of the sentence, something that the outlier in (C) does not do.

I hope that helps. If you have a different approach, feel free to share.

- Andrew

Hello,
Does C not change the meaning here. The author is comparing population now and populationin the 70's. But in C, using since suggests that the population has been continuously decreasing. Doesnt this cause a problem?

Is there another error in D except for the missing 'drastically'??