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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 26 Jan 2021, 15:26
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TheUltimateWinner
Hats off..
the document is more closed to when formally asked than CONGRESS. So, why we don't consider the the document as when formally asked's referent?
Thanks..
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OA: Congress is required to call a convention to consider possible amendments to the document when [it is]...asked.
The words in brackets are omitted but implied.
The parallelism between the two clauses in blue -- each composed of SUBJECT + is + VERBed -- makes it crystal clear that CONGRESS is the intended subject of is asked.
Aside from the parallelism, common sense tells us the following:
Congress IS REQUIRED when Congress IS ASKED.
The sentence does not allow for any other logical interpretation.
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 26 Jan 2021, 15:52
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TheUltimateWinner

GMATNinja
Thanks for the explanation.
Shouldn't it be the wise decision to think of the singular verb 'lessens'? The word 'lessens' surely indicates that “species of catfish” is singular. So, use of 'their' is definitely wrong. Am I missing anything?
Also, in correct choice B, what is the subject of the verb 'lessens'?
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Hello TheUltimateWinner,

Although your question is not for me. I would like to chime in. :-)


In Choice B, the use of the plural verb "lessen" is correct indeed because the subject of this verb is the plural noun "thickened bones armor plates". The sentence says that although the recently discovered species of catfish is tiny, blind, and translucent, its vulnerability is lessened by thickened bones and armor plates on its sides. So, the sentence mentions two features that lessen the vulnerability of this species of catfish.


Hope this helps. :-)
Thanks.
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 26 Jan 2021, 22:28
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TheUltimateWinner
Hats off..
the document is more closed to when formally asked than CONGRESS. So, why we don't consider the the document as when formally asked's referent?
Thanks..

OA: Congress is required to call a convention to consider possible amendments to the document when [it is]...asked.
The words in brackets are omitted but implied.
The parallelism between the two clauses in blue -- each composed of SUBJECT + is + VERBed -- makes it crystal clear that CONGRESS is the intended subject of is asked.
Aside from the parallelism, common sense tells us the following:
Congress IS REQUIRED when Congress IS ASKED.
The sentence does not allow for any other logical interpretation.
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I got my expected answer, and it removes my confusion.
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 22 Feb 2021, 07:40
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TheUltimateWinner
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I don’t know why the GMAT thinks this is important, but there are a whole bunch of official SC questions that include words that could be either singular or plural: “media” or “data” or “deer” or diabetes, just to name a few. The key is that the GMAT will always give you some hint about whether these nouns are singular or plural in the sentence.

With that in mind…

Quote:
A. Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish lessens their vulnerability with thickened bones and armor plates on their sides.

Hopefully, the two uses of “their” jump off the page at you. Logically, “their” needs to refer back to a plural noun – in theory, “species of catfish.”

The trouble is, “species of catfish” is singular in this sentence. It’s pretty subtle, but the giveaway is the singular article “a”: “a… species of catfish” implies that we’re only talking about one species. So “their” is wrong.

Plus, the use of “being” is pretty goofy here. In general, it’s not cool to use “being” as a modifier – at the very least, it doesn’t seem to happen on the GMAT. And why would we say “though being tiny, blind, and translucent…” when we could just say “though tiny, blind, and translucent…”? The “being” serves no useful purpose.

So (A) is gone.

GMATNinja
Thanks for the explanation.
Shouldn't it be the wise decision to think of the verb 'has'? The word 'has' surely indicates that “species of catfish” is singular. So, use of 'their' is definitely wrong. Am I missing anything?
Also, in correct choice B, what is the subject of the verb 'lessens'?
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GMATNinja
Sir,
It seems that you've missed my post. May I have a feedback, please?
Thanks..
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 19 Mar 2021, 23:59
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GMATNinja
I don’t know why the GMAT thinks this is important, but there are a whole bunch of official SC questions that include words that could be either singular or plural: “media” or “data” or “deer” or diabetes, just to name a few. The key is that the GMAT will always give you some hint about whether these nouns are singular or plural in the sentence.

With that in mind…

A. Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish lessens their vulnerability with thickened bones and armor plates on their sides.
Hopefully, the two uses of “their” jump off the page at you. Logically, “their” needs to refer back to a plural noun – in theory, “species of catfish.”

The trouble is, “species of catfish” is singular in this sentence. It’s pretty subtle, but the giveaway is the singular article “a”: “a… species of catfish” implies that we’re only talking about one species. So “their” is wrong.

Plus, the use of “being” is pretty goofy here. In general, it’s not cool to use “being” as a modifier – at the very least, it doesn’t seem to happen on the GMAT. And why would we say “though being tiny, blind, and translucent…” when we could just say “though tiny, blind, and translucent…”? The “being” serves no useful purpose.

So (A) is gone.


GMATNinja
Thanks for the explanation.
Shouldn't it be the wise decision to think of the verb 'has'? The word 'has' surely indicates that “species of catfish” is singular. So, use of 'their' is definitely wrong. Am I missing anything?
Also, in correct choice B, what is the subject of the verb 'lessens'?
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GMATNinja
Sir,
It seems that you've missed my post. May I have a feedback, please?
Thanks..

TheUltimateWinner, I am no expert by sharing my thoughts -
1. The word "has" of course indicates a singular subject, but the thing is "has" doesn't appear in all the options.
2. The subject of lessen is "thickened bones and armour plates"
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 07 Oct 2021, 08:53
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Thanks for this. I have a specific question on whether "tiny, blind and translucent" can refer back to a species. Shouldn't it refer to a catfish or many catfish? Doesn't 'catfish' being part of a preposition "sepecies of catfish", stop it from being the subject of the clause?


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NandishSS
Quote:
Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish lessens their vulnerability with thickened bones and armor plates on their sides.


B. Though tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish has thickened bones and armor plates on its sides that lessen its vulnerability.


HI GMATNinja, mikemcgarry, MagooshExpert (Carolyn), GMATGuruNY, EducationAisle, generis

Here Though tiny, blind, and translucent is it not modifying a recently discovered
Hi NandishSS,

Happy to help :) Here, "tiny, blind, and translucent" has to modify a noun, so it will logically modify the nearest noun. "A recently discovered" is not a noun -- the next noun is "species of catfish". "Recently discovered" is also modifying "species of catfish". So all of these modifiers are modifying "species of catfish" :)

Hope that helps! :)
-Carolyn
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 26 Oct 2021, 06:01
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Zarky
Thanks for this. I have a specific question on whether "tiny, blind and translucent" can refer back to a species. Shouldn't it refer to a catfish or many catfish? Doesn't 'catfish' being part of a preposition "sepecies of catfish", stop it from being the subject of the clause?
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Hello Zarky,

We hope this finds you well.

Having gone through your query and the question, we believe that we can help resolve your doubt.

Here, "tiny, blind and translucent" can correctly modify "species"; such a modification conveys that all animals of this species share the relevant traits. Further, you are correct that "catfish" being part of a prepositional phrase means that it is not the subject of the sentence; the subject of the sentence is "species". Please consider the following example "Most species of bats are nocturnal." - here, the subject is not "bats"; it is "Most species of bats", and the adjective "nocturnal" can refer to species to describe a characteristic shared by all members of the species.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 02 Mar 2022, 09:28
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish lessens their vulnerability with thickened bones and armor plates on their sides.


A. Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish lessens their vulnerability with thickened bones and armor plates on their sides.

B. Though tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish has thickened bones and armor plates on its sides that lessen its vulnerability.

C. A recently discovered species of catfish has thickened bones and armor plates on its sides that lessen their vulnerability, though tiny, blind, and translucent.

D. Thickened bones and armor plates on their sides lessen the vulnerability of a recently discovered species of catfish that is tiny, blind, and translucent.

E. Tiny, blind, and translucent, thickened bones and armor plates on its sides lessen the vulnerability of a recently discovered species of catfish.


Verbal Question of The Day: Day 279: Sentence Correction


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Verbal QOTD 02.03.2022



(A) Subject verb disagreement. It doesn't matter if we don't know whether "a species of catfish" is singular or plural, the verb "lessens" (a singular verb? does not agree with the plural pronoun "their". Eliminate A.

(B) Perfect!!

(C) The plural pronoun "their" doesn't have a well-defined plural noun to refer back to. Additionally "has" and "their" contradict on singular/plural. Eliminate C.

(D) "is" and "their" contradict on singular/plural. Eliminate D.

(E) "Tiny, blind, and translucent" seems to ridiculously modify "thickened bones and armor plates" instead of the "recently discovered species of catfish". Eliminate E.

Hence, B is our perfect answer.

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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 15 Jul 2022, 21:08
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[quote="sayantanc2k"]Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish lessens their vulnerability with thickened bones and armor plates on their sides.


A. Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish lessens their vulnerability with thickened bones and armor plates on their sides.

B. Though tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered species of catfish has thickened bones and armor plates on its sides that lessen its vulnerability.
- Correct. both modifiers modify the N in a correct manner

C. A recently discovered species of catfish has thickened bones and armor plates on its sides that lessen their vulnerability, though tiny, blind, and translucent.

D. Thickened bones and armor plates on their sides lessen the vulnerability of a recently discovered species of catfish that is tiny, blind, and translucent.
SV Agreement error

E. Tiny, blind, and translucent, thickened bones and armor plates on its sides lessen the vulnerability of a recently discovered species of catfish.
- Grammatically incorrect
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 20 Aug 2022, 01:12
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D. Thickened bones and armor plates on their sides lessen the vulnerability of a recently discovered species of catfish that is tiny, blind, and translucent.

"that is tiny, blind and translucent" - What's the subject for "is"? Catfish or species?

In such cases, "that" refers to catfish or species?
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 22 Aug 2022, 09:38
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D. Thickened bones and armor plates on their sides lessen the vulnerability of a recently discovered species of catfish that is tiny, blind, and translucent.

"that is tiny, blind and translucent" - What's the subject for "is"? Catfish or species?

In such cases, "that" refers to catfish or species?
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Either could make sense, but because we're dealing with the singular "is", we know we're talking about one entity. It seems to be more logical for the one recently discovered species of catfish to be "tiny, blind, and translucent," than for catfish, in general, to possess these qualities. If we were talking about catfish generally, the sentence likely would have said, "catfish are tiny, blind, and translucent."

The takeaway: test-takers often panic when they see the construction, "X of Y that," because they're not sure if "that" is describing X or Y. There's no rule that will tell you this, but we can use the verb accompanying "that" and the general context to figure out what the modifier likely refers to.

I hope that helps!
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Though being tiny, blind, and translucent, a recently discovered speci 15 Oct 2023, 19:16
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