OFFICIAL EXPLANATIONProject SC Butler: Sentence Correction (SC1)
Quote:
The nation’s highest court struck down a proposed controversial law that could have closed three of the state’s four private health facilities, ruled that such a move would encourage monopolistic practices in healthcare and be contrary to the interests of the larger public.
• Meaning?
The nation's highest court did
one thing: it struck down a controversial law.
The part that begins with
ruled/ruling provides further description or elaboration of this decision.
The court did not separately rule that the law would encourage monopoly and be contrary to the public interest.
The court struck down the law and explained that it was ruling as it was
because the law would encourage monopoly and be contrary to the public interest.
Think of a tennis match. Let's say that
Federer played a great match, serving 32 aces and running his opponent ragged.
We would not say that Federer did three things.
In a literal sense, yes, he played a great match, he served 32 aces, and he ran his opponent ragged.
But "serving 32 aces" and "running his opponent ragged" describe or explain why or how he played a great match.
(BTW, Federer served 50 aces in the final at Wimbledon in 2009, and yes, I am a Federer fanatic.)
• Idiom
Contrary to is correct.
Contrary for is not a thing. Wrong.
THE OPTIONSQuote:
A) that could have closed three of the state’s four private health facilities, ruled that such a move would encourage monopolistic practices in healthcare and be contrary to
•
ruled is the incorrect verb form
→ The use of
ruled is incorrect; its that-clause is not describing a second action on part of the court.
• the word "and" is missing
→ Pretend that we do not have a meaning errors and that the court did do two things.
Well, now we lack parallelism.
For
struck and
ruled to be parallel, there would have to be an
and before
ruled.
ELIMINATE A
Quote:
B) that could have led to the closure of the four private health facilities in the state, instead, ruling that such a move would encourage monopolistic practices in healthcare and be contrary for
• meaning error: the word
instead is incorrect
→
instead is incorrect because what follows is not an alternative decision or action by the court.
What follows is simply further elaboration of the previous part of the sentence.
• unidiomatic
→ The use of
contrary for is unidiomatic.
ELIMINATE B
Quote:
C) that could have closed three of the state’s four private health facilities, ruling that such a move would encourage monopolistic practices in healthcare and be contrary to
• I do not see any errors
• This sentence uses
ruling that . . . to set up a modifying phrase that describes the action of the entire previous clause
KEEP
Quote:
D) that could have closed three of the state’s four private health facilities, instead, ruling that such a move would encourage monopolistic practices in healthcare and be contrary to
• meaning error: the use of instead is incorrect
Just as in option B, the use of
instead is incorrect because what follows is not an alternative decision or action on part of the court.
ELIMINATE D
Quote:
E) that could have closed three of the state’s four private health facilities, and ruled that such a move would encourage monopolistic practices in healthcare and be contrary for
•
contrary for is unidiomatic
• although "and ruled" is grammatical, the phrase is not as logical as its counterpart in option C.
The court did not strike down the law and
then rule that the law's possible effect would be bad.
We are not dealing with two separate actions.
Option C is better because the "ruling that . . ." portion
avoids a nonsensical time sequence. ELIMINATE E
The correct answer is B.COMMENTSHatakekakashi , good to "see" you. It's been a long time.
These answers are interesting!
Analysis goes awry here and there because of an incorrect assumption.
No matter: the analyses display good critical thinking skills and an awareness of subtleties.
Aspirants, emulate what you witness in these answers: seeing patterns, thinking through differences, and eliminating the worst four choices.
Kudos to all, even if a few mistakes exist. Nicely done.
close
28 Feb 2021, 01:03
35%
(medium)
28%
(02:03)
wrong 
