The fact of some fraternal twins resembling each other greatly and

A rapid-fire fix: The most important aspect of this question is to contrast between two dimensions of a particular phenomenon of the fraternal twins' looks, for which the use of a change - direction transition marker of contrast is essential. In this context, B is the only choice that depicts the conjunction 'while' to mark the contrast. All other choices simply use 'and', a same-direction conjunction. Hence, they are all incorrect.

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In option A and B, what does 'they' refer too? I eliminated both the options thinking that they can refer to either twins or fraternal-twin pairs, hence there is ambiguity in the usage. Can you please help? daagh

(B) That some fraternal twins resemble each other greatly while others look quite dissimilar highlights an interesting and often overlooked feature of fraternal-twin pairs, namely that they vary considerably on a spectrum of genetic relatedness.

(B) That some fraternal twins resemble each other greatly while others look quite dissimilar highlights an interesting and often overlooked feature of fraternal-twin pairs, namely that they vary considerably on a spectrum of genetic relatedness.

Hi AndrewN

Could you please throw some light on the usage of namely?
Namely is adverb so it can modify previous noun, adjective, verb etc.

In Option B
1. If we remove that , the sentence would still be grammatically correct?
1b. Namely sounds more like i.e. ( but we don't use that after i.e. , so why in B we still use that after namely?

2. After namely, Can we have sub-ordinate clause, independent clause, phrase, noun, adjective, adverb etc. in general? please suggest with some example


Thanks! Sir

Hey guys,

This thread is a perfect example of the dangers of the "never pick _________" philosophy (which I think started with the word "being"). There's a correct application of any word in the dictionary, so those always/never rules that I see discussed on here are typically pretty problematic. The key is to understand the situations that work/don't work for certain words or constructions.

"That" as the beginning of a sentence here is correct, and even if it feels awkward the other choices are so woefully incorrect (as Stuart described above).

"It" in C and D is a pronoun without an antecedent (there isn't a clear prior noun to take its place), so they're incorrect. E is illogical - to say that "Because of gravity, this fact means..." would be an awfully illogical sentence - a fact can't be dependent upon itself.

A is also illogical in addition to being unidiomatic. Using the present-tense verbs "resembling" and "looking" doesn't logically work as a scientific fact - choice B, with the more-logical indicative tense "twins resemble...and look" states a clear fact worthy of proving or highlighting a scientific phenomenon. The present-tense verbs in A suggest a temporary situation. A also features a structural error at the end: "...feature of fraternal-twin pairs, namely they" requires a spacer such as "that" to set up the pronoun "they" as a subject.


Most importantly here, remember that the same types of errors are tested repeatedly - pronouns, verb tenses, etc. - so let those be your decision points before you try to eliminate sentences based on one-off idiomatic rules. Idioms are tricky in that they're often quite situational ("i before e except after c..."), so train yourself to look for the more-systematic decision points first.

Hi,

can we add also that the usage of "and" is incorrect but "while" is proper since the context reflects a negation/ contradiction post "and"?
some fraternal twins resembling each other greatly and others looking quite dissimilar

Hello again, imSKR. I will respond below, in-line.


If that were removed from the latter part of the sentence, the sentence would no longer be correct, unless you used additional punctuation:

That some fraternal twins... feature of fraternal-twin pairs; namely, they vary considerably...

In the original sentence, that serves to subordinate what would otherwise be an independent clause. The that clause in its entirety serves as a noun to define what is an interesting and often overlooked feature of fraternal-twin pairs. You asked about the role of namely. It effectively serves in the capacity of a colon here, one that would indicate that a definition of a term was about to follow. You cannot use both a colon (in this capacity) and namely: doing so would create a redundancy.

That some fraternal twins... feature of fraternal-twin pairs: they vary considerably...


Yes, if you think of what may follow a colon—a single word, a phrase, or either a dependent or independent clause—you will appreciate how flexible namely allows the rest of the sentence to be. By the way, touching on 1b above, namely is a derivative of the Latin phrase videre licit, which is often translated as it is permitted to see. Over time, the phrase got mashed together into videlicet and abbreviated in writing as viz (sometimes with a period). The most common translations of this abbreviation are, in modern terms, namely or that/which is to say.

I hope that helps. Please let me know if you have further questions, and thank you for seeking my opinion on this one. I always love delving into arcane linguistic matters.

- Andrew

Yes, if you think of what may follow a colon—a single word, a phrase, or either a dependent or independent clause—

That some fraternal twins... feature of fraternal-twin pairs: they vary considerably..

Hi AndrewN sir

Another query please:

You said



Q: If we replace namely with colon then the sentence is correct with or without that ?
1. That some fraternal twins resemble each other greatly while others look quite dissimilar highlights an interesting and often overlooked feature of fraternal-twin pairs: that they vary considerably on a spectrum of genetic relatedness.
2. That some fraternal twins resemble each other greatly while others look quite dissimilar highlights an interesting and often overlooked feature of fraternal-twin pairs: they vary considerably on a spectrum of genetic relatedness.
3. That some fraternal twins resemble each other greatly while others look quite dissimilar highlights an interesting and often overlooked feature of fraternal-twin pairs, that is to say that they vary considerably on a spectrum of genetic relatedness.

Note: At least this time, the meaning is clear to me that modifier after comma is referring to overlooked feature.

Thanks