The development of a new jumbo rocket that is expected to carry the Un

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Hi Honorable Expert,
MartyTargetTestPrep, GMATNinja, GMATGuruNY, AjiteshArun, VeritasPrepHailey, BrightOutlookJenn,
The whole sentence seems absurd to me! It seems that there is an ellipsis here The core sentence could be (if I don't miss anything):
A newly developed jumbo rocket will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle can (be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit) , and (will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit) at a lower cost.
Why we don't have a subject (jumbo rocket) after , and?
This sentence resembles the following one:
They ate mango, and drink four glasses of water.
Shouldn't we put a subject after , and?
Isn't it absurd, sir?

The sentence you provided is correct in terms of parallelism.
They ate mango, and drink four glasses of water.
The stem starts with "They". after it it starts with (1) ate mango (2) drink four glasses of water

Put both of them in front of "They" separately: They(1) and; They (2).

If the meaning they want to convey and grammatically correct then we should not repeat the subject in the second part of parallelism. This will be tested again and again on the GMAT.

I'm eagerly expecting feedback from my honorable experts! Appreciating your help, experts.

GMATGuruNY
It seems that you missed post. May I have your feedback sir?
Thank you so much...

The development of a new jumbo rocket that is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle and at a lower cost.


(A) The development of a new jumbo rocket that is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle and at a lower cost. X

-comparing 'heavier load of instruments' and 'space shuttle'

(B) The development of a new jumbo rocket is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration and be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit at a lower cost than the space shuttle. X

-the major error here is the sentence says the rocket is expected to deliver the space shuttle

(C) The new development of a jumbo rocket, which is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration, will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit at a lower cost than the space shuttle. X

-same issue as B)

(D) A newly developed jumbo rocket, which is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration, will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle can, and at a lower cost. CORRECT

(E) A newly developed jumbo rocket, which is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration, will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle and to cost less. X

GMATNinja AjiteshArun MartyTargetTestPrep AndrewN

I got caught up in this question (b/w options A & D)
Don't you think option D has following issues:

1. A newly developed jumbo rocket, which.......
That clause as used in option A would be more apt.

2. A newly developed jumbo rocket will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle can
The use of ellipsis in option A is better.
Use of "can" is unnecessary in option D.

Also I am a little doubtful about the use of , and at a lower cost.
I understand that ",and" or any other conjunction (but, or, etc.) does not necessarily separate clauses from each other; those conjunctions can also separate verbs or verb phrases or items in a list (>=3).
Therefore can we write option D as below?
A newly developed jumbo rocket will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle can, and will be able to deliver at a lower cost than the space shuttle can.

For starters, let's be clear that, regardless of anything else going on in (A), (A) is clearly incorrect.

Here's (A).

(A) The development of a new jumbo rocket that is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle and at a lower cost.

Notice that (A) says, "The development ... will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle and at a lower cost."

Since "The development" cannot "deliver instruments," the meaning conveyed by (A) is clearly nonsensical.



Here's (D).

(D) A newly developed jumbo rocket, which is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration, will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle can, and at a lower cost.

A restrictive clause might be better there, but a nonrestrictive one is OK as well.


The use of "can" in (D) is necessary to communicate that the space shuttle "can" deliver in the present, as opposed to the future, when the new rocket "will deliver." Also, the presence of "can" helps to make clear the point is not that the instruments are heavier than the space shuttle.



I guess so. That "at a lower cost" part isn't great. It's not well connected to the rest of the sentence. So, we choose (D) because it's the best version rather than because it's a perfect version.

Hi MartyTargetTestPrep
Thank you for the answers. Could you please clarify one more thing.
From the above quoted statement, do you mean that
Without explicitly writing "can" in the end, the statement would become ambiguous:

1. A newly developed jumbo rocket will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle can deliver
2. A newly developed jumbo rocket will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than a newly developed jumbo rocket will be able to deliver the space shuttle.

and therefore option A can be eliminated because of these 2 apprehensions. (there is no "can" in the end in option A.)

Hello ShekGMAT,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, your reasoning is broadly correct, here - the absence of "can" in Option A does make it a bit more ambiguous in terms of meaning - but, Option A features a much clearer meaning error in its use of the clause "The development...will be able to deliver...", which illogically suggests that the "development" of the rocket, rather than the rocket itself, will be able to deliver instruments into orbit.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
Experts' Global Team

Those are the two possible meanings I was thinking of. At the same time, even without "can," which meaning the sentence is meant to convey is pretty clear. For that reason I said that "the presence of 'can' helps to make" the meaning clear. So, I wouldn't say that we can eliminate (A) because there's no "can."

Hey ShekGMAT

Happy to share my views on this interesting question.


You're somewhat correct in your analysis; however, I feel you're missing an important nuance. Allow me to elaborate by comparing choice D with choice E, which is slightly better than choice A in this respect.

D: A newly developed jumbo rocket, which is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration, will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle can, and at a lower cost.

E: A newly developed jumbo rocket, which is expected to carry the United States into its next phase of space exploration, will be able to deliver a heavier load of instruments into orbit than the space shuttle and to cost less.

Let's ignore the incorrect phrase 'to cost less' at the end of choice E and focus solely on the missing 'can'.

Shortening D & E further, we get:

D: A newly developed jumbo rocket will be able to deliver a heavier load than the space shuttle can.
E: A newly developed jumbo rocket will be able to deliver a heavier load than the space shuttle.

The problem with the missing 'can' in choice E is that 'the space shuttle' is now being interpreted as a reference for the amount of weight the new rocket will be able to carry. In other words, the newly developed rocket will be able to transport more weight than that of a space shuttle.


But this is incorrect because, logically, the author intends to compare the newly developed jumbo rocket with the space shuttle in the aspect of the amount of weight they can transport and the respective costs involved.

This is why, we must place 'can' after 'space shuttle' to avoid this miscommunication and ensure the comparison remains strictly between the new rocket and the existing space shuttle.


I hope this improves your understanding.


Happy Learning!

Abhishek

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