V04-41

Question

Whereas pure science is mainly concerned with the discovery of new truths and makes few, if any, attempts to discern the  best options between their potential uses , applied science involves the application of existing truths to concrete problems.

A. best options between their potential uses
B. best options between its potential uses
C. best of the options among their potential uses
D. best options among its potential uses
E. best options among their potential uses

Bunuel · Answer

Official Solution:

Whereas pure science is mainly concerned with the discovery of new truths and makes few, if any, attempts to discern the  best options between their potential uses , applied science involves the application of existing truths to concrete problems.

A. best options between their potential uses
B. best options between its potential uses
C. best of the options among their potential uses
D. best options among its potential uses
E. best options among their potential uses

A. "Among" is used to refer to a group / collection, whereas "between" is used to refer to distinct objects. Examples:
  
 Among these colors, I like red the best  is correct
 
 Between red, blue and green, I like red the best  is correct
 
 Since here a group is referred to, “between”  is wrong.
  
B. “Between” is used incorrectly as explained in option A above. Singular pronoun “its” wrongly refers to the plural antecedent “truths”. The implied meaning is that each truth discovered has multiple uses, not that discovery (as a whole of all the truths) has multiple uses - few attempts are made to discern the best option among the uses of each truth (or in plural “best options among the uses of the truths”). Thus the pronoun should be "their" referring to "truths".
 
C. The word “of” is wordy and unnecessary. Multiple scientific truths are discovered - each of them has one best option (among many potential uses). Thus many truths must have many best options among many potential sets of uses - it does not make sense to say that all these truths have only one best option (i.e. all of them have that same use). Hence option C is incorrect.
 
D. The pronoun “its” is wrong as explained in option B above.
 
 E. CORRECT.  Eliminates all the errors described above. “Among” is correctly used to refer to a group. Plural pronoun “their” is correctly used to refer to plural antecedent “truths”.

Answer: E

jwang27 · Answer

This question makes you pick between two very strange issues:

D) pronoun "its" can correctly refer to "the discovery...." However, the rest of the sentence is slightly awkward, but not necessarily wrong.

E) pronoun "their" is referring to a noun INSIDE a prepositional phrase, which is GENERALLY considered a no-no. The OG has done this on occasion, but it is always kind of strange and difficult to justify.

shanks2020 · Answer

AndrewN

I could not decide btw Options D and E. Went for D, since it made sense for Its to refer to Pure science's potential uses.
However, their also logically refers to truths' potential uses.
Can you help me how to tackle these situations where both options look grammatically and logically fine?

AndrewN · Answer

Hello,  shanks2020 . I would suggest you replace the pronoun in question with its logical referent and see which version of the sentence is harder to argue against:

(D)  Whereas pure science is mainly concerned with the discovery of new truths and makes few, if any, attempts to discern the  best options among   potential uses ...

(E)  Whereas pure science is mainly concerned with the discovery of new truths and makes few, if any, attempts to discern the  best options among   potential uses ...

The fact that the  its  in (D) could logically refer to two different singular nouns is problematic; their  in (E) connects to  truths . Moreover, the logical progression of ideas in (E) is clearer. It names what is discovered in  truths  and then comments on them; (D) jumps back and forth and makes the reader do more work to figure out what the sentence is driving at. For these reasons, the safer option is (E).

I hope that helps. Thank you for thinking to ask me.

- Andrew

Pankaj0901 · Answer

Hi  AndrewN  - I have a silly question here. I eliminated option E as structurally "their" should refer to the closest plural antecedent which is "options". But since the meaning is weird, I rejected E without even thinking for a second that "their" could also refer to a bit farther plural antecedent which is "truths". I selected option D. Why is the nearest antecedent logic not applicable in option E? What am I missing here. Thanks in advance.

AndrewN · Answer

You have to be careful,  Pankaj0901 , not to follow grammar so closely that you miss out on the logical meaning that is conveyed by the sentence  as a whole . I am guessing you tested (E) in the following manner without considering the rest of the sentence.

attempts to discern the best options among   potential uses

As a parallel, think of studying plants to find potential remedies for ailments. Such a sentence might adopt a similar construct:

attempts to discern the best remedies from among their potential uses

Grammatically, you might point to  remedies  as the closest plural noun, but then why would the sentence be talking about deriving remedies from  plants ? Again, consider the whole sentence. A strictly grammatical approach will help you answer many questions correctly, but at the same time, many upper-level questions rely more on the clear and concise expression of vital meaning to arrive at a correct answer. (With this in mind, I wrote  this question  for the 12 Days of Christmas Competition a couple months ago. My explanation is right beneath the question itself.)

I hope that helps. Thank you for following up from one of my earlier posts. I like to add clarity to the discussion as often as needed.

- Andrew

rocky620 · Answer

AndrewN  sir

I chose option D over E.

The discovery (of something) can have multiple potential uses (in some fields).
 The truths  on the other hand (in option E) are the absolute facts (about something). How can we decide on  among the best options about  their  potential uses , when we know that the truths can either be good or bad (for someone/some field), what kind of uses are we talking about?
Even if we say that there are potential uses, the word among will be wrong (because there are only two options: Good & Bad).

Kindly Help.

AndrewN · Answer

Hello,   rocky620  . I have discussed answer choices (D) and (E) in my first post in the thread, as well as (E) more above. I think the distinction you have created between "good or bad" truths is too narrow in scope. I read the word more as a synonym for  facts  or even the singular  knowledge  (although we still have to acknowledge the plurality of the actual word used). The sentence seems to be driving at the notion that,  of all the possible applications of accepted scientific facts or current knowledge , pure science as a field does not really concern itself with deciding how to harness such potential. A theoretical physicist, for example, might be more interested in the mathematics behind quantum physics than in seeing through the development of, say, a quantum computer. Since the application of a scientific discovery could go in any of a number of directions,  among  is fitting to describe  potential uses .

To be clear, it is not as if I am saying that (D) is a poor answer choice, that it could not work, just that (E) is the safer bet, since  their  has a clear referent (in  truths ) and the sentence is easier to follow, as I explained in my first post in the thread.

I hope this helps. Thank you for thinking to ask.

- Andrew

Bunuel · Answer

The question or/and solution has been revised and edited. Thank you  sayantanc2k  !!!

ManoramaS · Answer

Bunuel ,

Can you please help me in understanding that why their is not referring to discovery of new truths and makes few(this is also plural and logical)

Whereas pure science is mainly concerned with the discovery of new truths and makes few, if any, attempts to discern the best options among their(discovery of new truths and makes few)
potential uses, applied science involves the application of existing truths to concrete problems.

ShaunakSawant · Answer

How can this statement be correct - "Between red, blue and green, I like red the best is correct"
As we know between is used for comparison between 2 things and among for more than 2.

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