When they try to arrange a collection to form a history

Question

When they try to arrange a collection to form a history, museum  curators, unlike textbook writers, are limited to the works they  possess.

(A) curators, unlike textbook writers, are limited to the works they

(B) curators, unlike textbook writers' limitations, depend on the works they

(C) curators are limited to the availability of works, unlike textbook writers, that they

(D) curator's limitations restrict them to works that they, unlike textbook writers,

(E) curators are limited to the works, which they, unlike textbook writers,

chetan2u · Answer

hi  subhamgarg91  in ref to your pm,

whenever we use THAT as a relative pronoun, it generally restricts the NOUN we are talking about..
But whenever the removal of THAT does not alter the meaning, THAT can be omitted..
This sentence is one such case..
they possess are also modifying/refering to 'works'..

But if a sentence says- 
When they try to arrange a collection to form a history, museum  curators, unlike textbook writers, are limited to the works   that are validated in the history books.
you cannot drop that here

another example where THAT can be dropped
Mr X said  that  he was going to the market

subhamgarg91 · Answer

Hi Chetan2u,

Thanks for the explaination.
Can you provide me the link where this rule is explained in detail?

r0ckst4r · Answer

Can someone explain to me when a pronoun has a clear antecedent and when it doesn't? The rules for pronouns in this regard are very vague to me.

The correct answer uses a pronoun, they, which can refer to textbook writers, or the subject (museum curators). For this reason,I chose the answer E. Although E is not perfect (GMAT standards of brevity and fluency), it does not commit a pronoun error and hence in my eyes is the correct answer.

Can someone please explain 
1) why E is incorrect (maybe the which needs to be a that)
2) When they can be used and clearly refer to one antecedent when multiple of them are clearly present. Please do not simply mention that pronouns always refers back to the subject, because I have seen problems where the pronouns actually refer to modifiers and other subjects.

bhartiyaayus · Answer

Answer should be A.

Like to like comparison in A

In E - which they makes the sentence unnecessarily wordy.

r0ckst4r · Answer

My question still has not been answered. Can anyone provide some insight?

EducationAisle · Answer

Hi r0ckst4r,  pronoun ambiguity  should not be a  reason  to eliminate an option in the first place. In A actually, the pronoun usage is very decent:

-  textbook writers  is the Noun-subject of one clause
-  they  is the Pronoun-subject of the other clause

From a pure  parallelism/symmetry  perspective, a  Pronoun-subject  of one clause can be considered to refer to  Noun-subject  of another clause.

Hence,  they  can be considered to refer to  textbook writers .

In any case, GMAT is quite  liberal , when it comes to pronoun ambiguity.

The  intended  meaning is that textbook writers have access to an almost unlimited information, while museum curators are limited by the works they possess. So, clearly, textbook writers are at an  advantage .

E says:  ....curators are limited to the works, which they, unlike textbook writers, they possess.

This is basically suggesting that museum curators possess works that textbook writers  don’t ! So, option E is actually suggesting as if textbook writers are at some kind of a  disadvantage  (because they don’t possess those works). Hence, it  distorts  the meaning.

p.s. Our book    EducationAisle Sentence Correction Nirvana    discusses  Pronoun ambiguity , its application and examples in significant detail. If someone is interested, PM me your email-id, I can mail the corresponding section.

r0ckst4r · Answer

Thanks for the explanation! I forgot to check the most important rule - illogical meaning. The meaning of E is completely incorrect. In the end I think the GMAT may be liberal with pronoun references, but the best answer choice is always relative. (Thats what being the best means right?). In this question, they could have referred to textbook writers, but it was strongly implied to refer to the subject given the structure of the sentence. Furthermore, it is clearly the best answer as we can rule our (E) for changing the intended meaning of the sentence.

sayan640 · Answer

Since we need 'persons' to refer to "they" , "curators" should be preferred.

So left with options A ,C, E.

In option C , "When they try to arrange a collection to form a history, museum curators are limited to the availability of works " is a clause and 
"unlike" operator should not be used to compare this clause with "textbook writers". "Unlike X and Y " is the correct idiom where X and Y are nouns.
So Option C is incorrect .

Option E changes the meaning. ALso "Unlike" is used to compare nouns. Here "unlike" is used to compare "they" and "textbook writers".
The intended meaning is that museum curators has limited works and textbook writers has unlimited works.
Here in option E , it means , that museum curators possess only those limited number of works which textbook writers do not possess.

Option A conveys the intended meaning and is the correct answer.

VeritasKarishma   generis   chetan2u   mikemcgarry   GMATNinja

Can you please check whether my explanation is correct or not and also throw some more light on option A , C and E ?

GMATNinja · Answer

sayan640 , this looks great! You covered most of it, but I'll add one thought:

Comparing (A) and (C), we have "curators are limited to the works" (choice A) versus "curators are limited to  the availability  of works". Which works can be used for a collection? Only, of course, the works that the curators possess. The curators are choosing among the works themselves, so it makes more sense to say that the curators are "limited  to the works ", not that the curators are "limited to the  availability  of the works". If we wanted to use "availability", it would be better to say something like, "In arranging a collection, curators are limited BY the availability of the works." This is not a smoking gun, but it's another vote in favor of (A).

Otherwise, your explanation was spot on!

VerbalBot · Answer

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When they try to arrange a collection to form a history

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When they try to arrange a collection to form a history

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