Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels

Can someone explain why A is wrong.
I went think A:
subject verb and parallelism - the fossil fuels have raised is correct in otion A and also parallelism is correct - the effects are contributing to -- and thereby leading to ---, and bringing down the temperature.

In A, the burning (of fossil fuels) have raised flouts S-V agreement. It should be has raised or raises in line with the singularity of the burning

As pointed out rightly by almost all, the OA is D.

I am confused between D and E.

(D) Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels raises the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and causes an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects contribute to an abundance of plant mass, thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, and bringing down the temperature - is D better?

(E) Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels raise the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and cause an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects are contributing to an abundance of plant mass and thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, bringing down the temperature

Also, what is the role of thereby/ and thereby? Why is E incorrect?

Bunuel,

Can you pls add OA to this question.

Thanks,

I think the answer is E. There is a parallelism error in D.
(D) Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels raises the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and causes an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects "contribute" to an abundance of plant mass, thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, and bringing down the temperature - is D better

All the other verbs are in ing form. Hence I think that the use of "contribute" is wrong.

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Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels have raised the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and have caused an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects are contributing to an abundance of plant mass and thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, and bringing down the temperature

(A) Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels have raised the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and have caused an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects are contributing to an abundance of plant mass and thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, and bringing down the temperature - Incorrect

,
(B) While admitting that the burning of fossil fuels raise the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and cause an increase in the level of global temperature, some climatologists argue that both these effects are contributing to an abundance of plant mass and thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, bringing down the temperature
- Incorrect
© While admitting that the burning of fossil fuels has raised the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and has caused an increase in the level of global temperature, some climatologists have argued that both these effects have contributed to an abundance of plant mass and thereby have lead to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, having brought down the temperature - Incorrect

(D) Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels raises the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and causes an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects contribute to an abundance of plant mass, thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, and bringing down the temperature - Correct

(E) Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels raise the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and cause an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects are contributing to an abundance of plant mass and thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, bringing down the temperature
- Incorrect

If we take a close look at the options, we soon begin to see some clear errors emerge. Option E has an obvious subject verb disagreement, the ’ verb ‘have’ (plural) is being used with the noun ‘the burning of’ (singular). The confusion here seems to be that the sentence refers to ‘the burning of fossil fuels’. ‘fossil fuels’ is plural but it is not what the verb refers to. B makes a similar error by again pairing ‘the burning’ with a plural verb, ‘raise’. A also makes this mistake with the verb ‘have caused’. C suffers from a meaning error, ‘having bought down the temperature’ implies that the temperature is done dropping, when the sentence is supposed to mean that the heightened consumption of CO2 levels is currently bringing down the global temperatures.



So, D is the correct answer.

GMATNinja

Could you please explain why E is wrong?

Thanks in advance

Because 'raise' and 'cause' are not referring to plural subject fossil fuels but they are referring to singular subject 'burning of fossil fuels'. Therefore, 'raises' and 'causes' or 'has raised' and 'has caused' is is expected.

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Kudos if helpful!

GMATNinja
My bad regarding that...But I have a question regarding option D.
Is this part : "...thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, and bringing down the temperature..", doesnt the use of and leads to the thinking that the heightened CO2 consumption and temperatures brought down are 2 independent things? I thought the sentence actually means that "bringing down the temperature" is an effect of "heightened CO2 consumption"...Therefore I had selected E as the correct answer

Please help! Thanks again

Good question! I see your point. If I have a choice between, "Tim fell down the stairs, breaking his ankle," and "Tim fell down the stairs and broke his ankle," I'd have a preference for the first construction, since this sentence clarifies that he broke his ankle as a consequence of having falling down the stairs. The second sentence, on the other hand, makes it sound as though the actions might have been distinct, and maybe Tim broke his ankle later when something completely unrelated. However, I wouldn't say that the second sentence is definitively WRONG - it also seems reasonable enough to have poor Tim do both actions as parallel verbs.

I'd want to look for another decision point when comparing (D) and (E). Take another look at (E): "The burning of fossil fuels raise the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and cause..." The subject of the sentence, "the burning", is singular, but the associated verbs, "raise" and "cause", are both plural. So (E) has a definitive error, and it's out.

I hope that helps!

GMATNinja

Thanks again for your nice and concise explanation!
Helped a lot.Cheers

here in D see the words: abundance of plant mass, thereby leading . here thereby leading .... and bringing down modifies the plant mass.
whereas in E O2 bringing down the temperature modifies the CO2 levels , which is wrong

Hello daagh
This is an old thread; sorry to open it again. I am facing some jitters while solving this one.

I will list down my doubts.

1) Can you please explain me the parallelism for both in the question? How are the entities parallel?
both these effects are contributing to an abundance of plant mass and thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels

2) "Some climatologists argue that ..., bringing down the temperature" - bringing down the temperature is modifying the whole clause... (creating a CAUSE and EFFECT). Some Climatologists bring down the temp? Doesn't make sense to me.

3) Burning of fossil fuels raises/have raised .... which one do you prefer and why? Isn't this a fact, so we should directly look for a present tense?

4) In option (D) why is there a comma before and? Doesn't then it has to be an independent clause? (COMMA + AND --> joins to IC)

Please help.

(A) Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels have raised the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and have caused an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects are contributing to an abundance of plant mass and thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, and bringing down the temperature
This was runner up however i eleminated for the pure reason for using and along with therby because of which it provides ambigious reasoning there may be other reasons this may be one among many

(B) While admitting that the burning of fossil fuels raise the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and cause an increase in the level of global temperature, some climatologists argue that both these effects are contributing to an abundance of plant mass and thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, bringing down the temperature
This gives us the reasoning as though the climatologists argument is what's leading to heightened consumption of co2 level

(C) While admitting that the burning of fossil fuels has raised the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and has caused an increase in the level of global temperature, some climatologists have argued that both these effects have contributed to an abundance of plant mass and thereby have lead to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, having brought down the temperature
Similar reasoning as b and wrong use of tenses

(D) Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels raises the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and causes an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects contribute to an abundance of plant mass, thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, and bringing down the temperature
This nails the reasoning as feels like the fit let us hang onto it

(E) Some climatologists, while admitting that the burning of fossil fuels raise the level of CO2 in the atmosphere and cause an increase in the level of global temperature, argue that both these effects are contributing to an abundance of plant mass and thereby leading to heightened consumption of CO2 levels, bringing down the temperature
This has tense issues such as 'cause an increase '
Hence IMO D

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