In her book to explain in it how dangerous a culture of silence can be

Question

In her book to explain in it how dangerous a culture of silence can be, The Fearless Organization by Amy Edmondson  quoted the crash between two Boeing 747 planes in the Canary Islands in 1978, one of the deadliest accidents in history, which happened because a co-pilot chose not to question his captain’s decision.

A. In her book to explain in it how dangerous a culture of silence can be, The Fearless Organization by Amy Edmondson
B. Explaining how dangerous a culture of silence can be, Amy Edmondson, in her book The Fearless Organization,
C. Amy Edmondson, in her book The Fearless Organization, explained how dangerous a culture of silence can be and
D. To explain how dangerous a culture of silence can be, Amy Edmondson, in her book The Fearless Organization,
E. That the culture of silence can be dangerous is explained in her book The Fearless Organization; Amy Edmondson

Kunal112 · Accepted Answer

Hello

I'll try and explain
When in doubt between 2 options, ALWAYS go by the intended meaning of the sentence. 
This piece of advice did sound a bit odd to me also, but trust me it helps a lot

Coming back to the question, 
Option B : This starts with "Explaining.....". The meaning of this sentence is that the author quoted a crash WHILE explaining how dangerous a culture of silence can be.
However, the logical meaning is that, since she wanted TO EXPLAIN something, she quoted an example
Option D clearly informs the reader that her intention was to explain something and in order to explain that thing, she quoted an example

To represent Goal/Plan/Purpose/Desire/Intention, you should always use 'to + verb' (This is just extra information)

Hope this helps

globaldesi · Answer

I am confused between B and D.
I feel somehow D is better but sill can not find a convincing reason to reject B also

rohit8865 · Answer

Per intent of sentence D would be correct

Ans D

TrevorKleeTutor · Answer

B is incorrect because we don't want "Explaining..." to describe Amy Edmonson alone. Unfortunately, any reader is going to make that mistaken assumption.

D makes the meaning much more clear.

harsha3699 · Answer

I am still not convinced why D is better than B. Could someone explain please..  GMATNinjaTwo

Shubham1213372 · Answer

I choose answer D over B,because whenever a sentence starts with To Explain or To XYZ ,a direct object is require after the comma in the sentence.

Please correct me if my approach is wrong.

harsha3699 · Answer

Thanks a lot Kunal. This explains the query.

Posted from my mobile device

rsrighosh · Answer

I chose D over B because of the following reason

Meaning 
Amy wanted to explain how dangerous a culture of silence can be.
How she wanted to explain? She quoted an incident from her book The Fearless Organization by Amy Edmondson.
What was the incident? the crash between two Boeing 747 planes in the Canary Islands in 1978, one of the deadliest accidents in history, which happened because a co-pilot chose not to question his captain’s decision.

Explanation 
Amy's main action is to explain something. And she wanted to explain by quoting something from her book

Option B:- 
 Explaining how dangerous a culture of silence can be, Amy Edmondson, in her book The Fearless Organization,

The meaning is entirely changed and actually nonsensical
Here meaning says... she quoted something by explaining how dangerous a culture of silence can be.

Had it been the sentence was

Quoting the crash between two Boeing 747 planes in the Canary Islands in 1978, one of the deadliest accidents in history, which happened because a co-pilot chose not to question his captain’s decision, Amy Edmondson explained how dangerous a culture of silence can be in her book The Fearless Organization

This would have still made some sense.

Option D:- 
 To explain how dangerous a culture of silence can be, Amy Edmondson, in her book The Fearless Organization,
 
This is giving the intended meaning of the sentence.

HDL9996 · Answer

Explaining - means present continuous - which intends that the action would end in future. Hence its wrong

arvind910619 · Answer

I was also stuck between B and D. Correct answer is D.

D uses infinitive to express the intent or goal of the author clearly. She wanted to highlight the culture of silence that is why she wrote the book. 
B on the other hand has long noun modifier at the beginning. There is no intent in B. It says that while explaining culture of silence in her book she quoted the crash between two Boeing 747 planes in the Canary Islands in 1978, one of the deadliest accidents in history, which happened because a co-pilot chose not to question his captain’s decision.

egmat  any other reason to eliminate Choice B will be of great help. Grammar wise I see no error with choice B.

chughkartikey · Answer

"in her book The Fearless Organization" is modifying what exactly?

aash932 · Answer

egmat  , @empowergmat ,  bb  , GMATNinja 
Can anyone please explain that why option C is wrong?
 Actually I was struck between C and D !!

PranaviKr · Answer

I choose option D because the tense is correct and it makes a meaningful sentence.

pratikpokharkar · Answer

Hi, Let me try this!!

Option C says Amy Explained .......... and Quoted ........... So it makes two activities parallel.

As per the intended meaning , Amy wanted to explain .....(something) and hence she quoted ....(Something). Her intent is shown correctly in Option D using infinitive form of verb (to explain).

Option C try to indicate two independent activities hence it is wrong.

VerbalBot · Answer

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In her book to explain in it how dangerous a culture of silence can be

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In her book to explain in it how dangerous a culture of silence can be

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