Besides being incomplete, but more importantly in C and D, what does the pronoun -they - stand for? Is it - the West Indies or the islands or the mammals? - A pronoun should not only stand for its true referent logically but also seem to stand for the due referent unambiguously. So I would rather rule out C and D, notwithstanding other extant errors in these two choices. But E tactfully avoids the pronoun equivocation, uses active voice and employs the right idiom - for determining – and thus is the indisputable choice.
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Going with E:

A: of determining, in addition to how, when mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies - clues of?(need clues-to or clues-for) WRONG

B:in the determination of how and when the islands of the West Indies were colonized by mammals - clues in? (need clues-to or clues-for).WRONG

C:to determine how mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies and when they did - they is ambiguos. WRONG.

D:for determining when the islands of the West Indies were colonized by mammals and how they were - they is ambiguos. WRONG.

E:for determining how and when mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies - CORRECT.

Answer E

In the bold part of the sentence "in addition to" is wordy and inaccurately placed.

The correct phrase is "provide for". This eliminates A, B and C

D - This has so many flaws that please add to the list for I'm sure I'll miss a few. But, to mention a few - usage of passive voice is not preferrable; the way the sentence is worded makes it sounds incomplete/awkward.

E - short and concise; properly connects the "how" and "when"; uses active voice.

Scientists claim that the discovery of the first authenticated mammal bones in amber could provide important clues of determining, in addition to how, when mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies.

A. of determining, in addition to how, when mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies [i]"in addition to how" acts as a modifier and hence it is gievn a low level. Giving equal preference to both HOW and WHEN will correct this option.[/i]
B. in the determination of how and when the islands of the West Indies were colonized by mammals Two mistakes i)"in the determination" is unidiomatic ii)"of" is a preposition and hence it should be followed by a noun or noun phrase
C. to determine how mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies and when they did CLOSE CONTENDER. Reason for elimination- "they" is ambigous
D. for determining when the islands of the West Indies were colonized by mammals and how they were "THEY" is ambigous
E. for determining how and when mammals colonized the islands of the West IndiesCorrect. IMO


Whats the OA and OE.
Whats the source.
IMO E

Hope that helps
-s
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is B wrong only because it is not concise?
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"clues in the determination of how" is unnecessarily using the passive voice and its also has awkward construction. Choice (E) is concise and serves the meaning.
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why is there no rule for awkwardness?
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Hi Sachin,

Choice B is incorrect because it is very wordy. It does not have any grammatical error, but it certianly is lot more wordy. Choice E is concise.

Well, there are no rules for awkwardness because it is a stylistic issue and not a grammatical issue.

Hope this helps.
Thanks.
Shraddha
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Sachin, sometimes you will be able to apply few rules based on grammar or meaning to identify choices with wordy/awkward constructions, however most times you will have to trust your ears to identify such errors. We may "not always" be able to identify/apply the rules for concision.
A quick tip: Always read the SC OG solutions given by GMAC (whether you get the answer right or wrong). Most cases GMAC eliminates answers by just calling them as wordy/awkward (without further explanations), try analyzing those patterns and tune your ears to it. Dont take them as a thumb rule, but during exam once you narrow down to two (grammatically) correct choices, chose the one which is more concise and follows the meaning.

In the concerned problem, "for determining" is more concise (and active in voice) than "in the determination of". Why? check below:

Reasoning & similar example from MGMAT:
Pattern: Prefer verb to action noun
o Wordy: The townspeople’s revolution was against the king.
Revolution is a noun that expresses an action
o Better: The townspeople revolted against the king.

In our case, "determining" verb is preferred over the action noun "(in the) determination of".

Hope this helps.
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Hi Daagh Sir,

WIll you pls suggest why usage of "They" is ambiguous out here ?

As per my understanding They do have clear antecedent as Mammals, especially in C

how mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies and when they did

Garamatically in option C they can refer to Mammals i.e. subject of previous clause. Again these two sentences are parallel and joined by And. SO subject of first sentence is doer of action and same should be doer for "THey did" also.

Pls suggest !
Thanks in advance !

True. I agree. E is preferred more for concision and the use of a more suitable idiom.
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Hi GMATNinja ,
I have some queries here.
I think there is no problem with "they" as according to parallelism , "they" must refer to mammals.
Is there ellipsis here like :
for determining how (mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies) and when mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies .
Is it right to have ellipsis before ?

Thanks

Hi,
I have written the queries here for this question.
https://gmatclub.com/forum/scientists-c ... l#p2168633

Hi,

I think 'they' can also refer to Scientists as well as per parallelism and 'did' can refer to the action 'Claim'. So , ambiguous and distorts the meaning.

GMATNinja , sir would be great if you can check whether my explanation is correct here.

I think that's reasonable, but generally, you want to be careful about relying solely on pronoun ambiguity as a reason to eliminate answer choices. (More on pronoun ambiguity in this video.)

Another problem with (c) is that the construction "AND + Clause" typically introduces a new idea. For example, "Marissa plotted her revenge for several months, and when she finally pounced, her victim was suitably surprised and horrified." Notice that the clause in red introduces a fresh action and consequence.

Similarly, the expectation for a second action makes (C) difficult to understand. It sounds as though we're going to read more information regarding what happened after the mammals colonized the island, and, at best, it's disorienting when we don't get this. Contrast that with (E) in which the parallelism makes it crystal clear what the author is trying to convey - "how" and "when" the mammals colonized the island. Clear and concise beats murky and confusing every time.

I hope that helps!
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Sir, beside this pronoun ambiguity, isnt there a idiomatic split ? CLUE TO OR CLUE FOR

Option A – the use of preposition ‘of’ is not idiomatic with the word ‘clue’. Eliminate.

Option B – the use of preposition ‘in’ is not idiomatic with the word ‘clue’. Eliminate.

Option C – the use of pronoun ‘they’ is unclear. Here ‘they’ could refer to West Indies or mammals. Eliminate.

Option D – Same as E. Use of ambiguous pronoun ‘they’. Eliminate.

Option E – clear and concise option.

Option E is the best choice.

Hope this helps!
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guptakashish02, good questions.

1) I believe you are correct that "they" is acceptable here, based on the parallel structure. However, when we compare C and E, we notice that E is more concise and clearly communicates the intended meaning with the simple parallel structure "how and when".

2) Yes, this involves ellipsis, but we would normally use "did SO". The OG explanation notes this issue with C.

One more thing that I didn't see discussed above -- this is something I didn't notice when I did the question, but the OG notes a subtle difference between "to determine" vs "for determining":
"To determine (instead of for determining, toward determining, or to help determine) suggests that the clues would be used as a sufficient basis for determining the information needed. That makes it rhetorically somewhat at odds with the standard meaning of clues; clues are normally thought of as incomplete bits of evidence. At the end of the sentence, 'did so' would be more standard and rhetorically effective as an indication that the verb did refers back to colonized the islands of the West Indies."
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[quote="jerrywu"]Scientists claim that the discovery of the first authenticated mammal bones in amber could provide important clues of determining, in addition to how, when mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies.


(A) of determining, in addition to how, when mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies

(B) in the determination of how and when the islands of the West Indies were colonized by mammals

(C) to determine how mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies and when they did

(D) for determining when the islands of the West Indies were colonized by mammals and how they were

(E) for determining how and when mammals colonized the islands of the West Indies

if the agent who take an action is not important , we use passive voice. here, agen is important , and we should use active voice. so, choice B and D are gone.

if we want to know two point of an event presented by a clause, we should use one clause and two interogative pronouns such as "when" and "how". this use is concise and and makes us understand the intended meaning easily. use of two clauses and ellipsis in choice B, C and D is wordy and make the intended meaning hard to understand.

in choice A, ellipsis "in addition to how" is wrong. we can not have ellipsis of this kind. we have to use 2 clauses and one of them is ellipted. the second error is that "in addition to" is different from "and". "in addition to' means that one of two exists before the other. this is not the intended meaning. so, choice A contain 2 errors.