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10 Jan 2021, 00:55
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D
Be sure to select an answer first to save it in the Error Log before revealing the correct answer (OA)!
Difficulty:
45%
(medium)
Question Stats:
58% (01:20) correct
42%
(01:36)
wrong
based on 458
sessions
History
Date
Time
Result
Not Attempted Yet
However much United States citizens may criticize the perils of capitalism and that the democracy is corrupted, it is rare to find organized national movements for a structure other than democracy.
A) However much United States citizens may criticize the perils of capitalism and that the democracy is corrupted,
B) Although United States citizens may agree capitalism is danger¬ous and democracy is corrupted,
C) Despite criticism by United States citizens to the extent of the perils of capitalism and corruption of democracy,
D) However much United States citizens may criticize the perils of capitalism and the corruption of democracy,
E) However many United States citizens had criticized the perils of capitalism and corruption of democracy,
10 Jan 2021, 00:57
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OFFICIAL EXPLANATION
THE PROMPT
Autocracy, cult of personality, and bigotry are a potent brew.
• Meaning?
No matter how much U.S. citizens may criticize capitalism and democracy, it is rare to find organized national movements that pursue any structure other than democracy.
→ Yes, the writer of this sentence conflated capitalism and democracy.
The second part of the sentence does not mention capitalism.
One of my fields is political economy. Democracy does not require capitalism, a fact that may explain the writer's omission of capitalism from the second part of the sentence.
I mention this fact because a really well-written sentence would not "leave 'capitalism' hanging."
(I am trying to teach you pieces of rhetorical construction as we go.)
THE OPTIONS
• Parallelism error: a noun phrase is not parallel to a that-clause
→ Citizens criticize two things that are joined by the parallelism marker and, but those two things are not parallel.
→ That is, the perils [of capitalism] and that the democracy is corrupted are not parallel
ELIMINATE A
→ Agree is a reporting verb in this case and must be followed by that.
→ Here and here are lists of reporting verbs.
(In other contexts, agree can be followed by an infinitive.)
ELIMINATE B
→ The italicized phrase makes this sentence nonsensical. The phrase means nothing in this context.
→ What, exactly, is "criticism to the extent of the perils"? Answer: nothing. There's no such thing.
(Here is some information about "to the extent of." The phrase can be used—just not this way.
• the perils of capitalism and the corruption of democracy are parallel direct objects of the verb may criticize
• However much is an adverb phrase that modifies may criticize.
It does not matter how much U.S. citizens criticize aspects of capitalism and democracy: [no other political structure will take the place of democracy, an implied assertion that is backed up by the fact that] it is rare to find large groups pushing for any structure other than democracy.
(These sentences were written in 2012 and updated in 2019. January 6, 2021 might have changed their minds. Just sayin'.)
KEEP
→ For countable nouns such as U.S. citizens, we use however many to mean no matter how many
→ For uncountable nouns such as the extent to which citizens criticize things, we use however much.
Extent is a degree or a magnitude. It's not countable.
• wrong verb tense
→ had criticized is past perfect, a tense that we use to describe the earlier of two actions in the past. No past action is signaled here.
→ Almost always, we need at least one simple past tense verb, timestamp, or sequence word in the sentence to describe the later-in-time event.
We do not have any of those three items.
→ The second part of the sentence uses the present tense is.
Corrected: However many U.S. citizens had criticized the perils of capitalism and the corruption of democracy, it was rare to find organized national movements for a structure other than democracy.
ELIMINATE E
The answer is D.
Notes
Just for the record: be aware that occasionally I find fairly well-written SC questions whose official explanations are incorrect and/or whose options do not test what the authors believe that the options test.
Such is the case in this instance.
I write my own OEs and do not use their OEs for a reason.
I also correct (i.e., change) the incorrect options.
Perhaps it would be wise to think twice about quoting the OEs that you find for questions—especially when such quotation is done without explanation or attribution . . . especially when there is a very good chance that the OE and/or options are wrong.
What, for example, does "changes the meaning" mean?
To what meaning are we referring?
Now, if an option creates illogical or nonsensical meaning, we say so.
And we say why.
Alternatively, in the very rare case that the nonunderlined part commits us to a particular meaning that insertion of the option contradicts, then "changes the meaning" is fair game, but we still must explain that the nonunderlined part commits us to XYZ meaning, which option ___ contradicts because ______.
We can infer the intended meaning from all five options and ultimately from the grammatical and most rhetorically effective sentence.
The grammatical and stylistically superior option contains the intended meaning.
There is nothing special about option A.
I know that many (most?) of you are taught that the meaning of option A must not be changed.
Please, stop believing that myth.
I've written other posts about this issue.
Use GMAT Club's awesome search function to find those posts.
A few of you did not consult (or perhaps wisely did not repeat) the incorrect OE.
Those of you who got 90% of the explanation correct and did not repeat the inaccurate other OE get kudos.
I gave fair warning a couple of posts ago.
COMMENTS
zhanbo , although I PMed you with the answer so that I could avoid giving away the OA, I'll answer here, too: yes, option B would be correct if the word that were included.
Excellent question.
Sumi1010 , thanks for being helpful.
Your answer and analysis are thoughtful, as usual.
I am glad to see veterans along with occasional visitors.
(This far-flung SC Butler crew is pretty awesome, if you ask me.)
As always, I extend a standing invitation to aspirants to post.
Take a risk!
In the United States at the moment, seditious thugs operating in an uncontrolled pandemic remind me that tomorrow is not guaranteed.
So live today.
And stay as safe as you can, please.
Project SC Butler: Sentence Correction (SC1)
THE PROMPT
Quote:
Or maybe not so rare.
Autocracy, cult of personality, and bigotry are a potent brew.
• Meaning?
No matter how much U.S. citizens may criticize capitalism and democracy, it is rare to find organized national movements that pursue any structure other than democracy.
→ Yes, the writer of this sentence conflated capitalism and democracy.
The second part of the sentence does not mention capitalism.
One of my fields is political economy. Democracy does not require capitalism, a fact that may explain the writer's omission of capitalism from the second part of the sentence.
I mention this fact because a really well-written sentence would not "leave 'capitalism' hanging."
(I am trying to teach you pieces of rhetorical construction as we go.)
THE OPTIONS
Quote:
• Parallelism error: a noun phrase is not parallel to a that-clause
→ Citizens criticize two things that are joined by the parallelism marker and, but those two things are not parallel.
→ That is, the perils [of capitalism] and that the democracy is corrupted are not parallel
ELIMINATE A
Quote:
→ Agree is a reporting verb in this case and must be followed by that.
→ Here and here are lists of reporting verbs.
(In other contexts, agree can be followed by an infinitive.)
ELIMINATE B
Quote:
• Nonsensical
→ The italicized phrase makes this sentence nonsensical. The phrase means nothing in this context.
→ What, exactly, is "criticism to the extent of the perils"? Answer: nothing. There's no such thing.
(Here is some information about "to the extent of." The phrase can be used—just not this way.
Quote:
• I do not see any errors
• the perils of capitalism and the corruption of democracy are parallel direct objects of the verb may criticize
• However much is an adverb phrase that modifies may criticize.
It does not matter how much U.S. citizens criticize aspects of capitalism and democracy: [no other political structure will take the place of democracy, an implied assertion that is backed up by the fact that] it is rare to find large groups pushing for any structure other than democracy.
(These sentences were written in 2012 and updated in 2019. January 6, 2021 might have changed their minds. Just sayin'.)
KEEP
Quote:
• However many is just fine.
→ For countable nouns such as U.S. citizens, we use however many to mean no matter how many
→ For uncountable nouns such as the extent to which citizens criticize things, we use however much.
Extent is a degree or a magnitude. It's not countable.
• wrong verb tense
→ had criticized is past perfect, a tense that we use to describe the earlier of two actions in the past. No past action is signaled here.
→ Almost always, we need at least one simple past tense verb, timestamp, or sequence word in the sentence to describe the later-in-time event.
We do not have any of those three items.
→ The second part of the sentence uses the present tense is.
Corrected: However many U.S. citizens had criticized the perils of capitalism and the corruption of democracy, it was rare to find organized national movements for a structure other than democracy.
ELIMINATE E
The answer is D.
Notes
Just for the record: be aware that occasionally I find fairly well-written SC questions whose official explanations are incorrect and/or whose options do not test what the authors believe that the options test.
Such is the case in this instance.
I write my own OEs and do not use their OEs for a reason.
I also correct (i.e., change) the incorrect options.
Perhaps it would be wise to think twice about quoting the OEs that you find for questions—especially when such quotation is done without explanation or attribution . . . especially when there is a very good chance that the OE and/or options are wrong.
What, for example, does "changes the meaning" mean?
To what meaning are we referring?
Now, if an option creates illogical or nonsensical meaning, we say so.
And we say why.
Alternatively, in the very rare case that the nonunderlined part commits us to a particular meaning that insertion of the option contradicts, then "changes the meaning" is fair game, but we still must explain that the nonunderlined part commits us to XYZ meaning, which option ___ contradicts because ______.
We can infer the intended meaning from all five options and ultimately from the grammatical and most rhetorically effective sentence.
The grammatical and stylistically superior option contains the intended meaning.
There is nothing special about option A.
I know that many (most?) of you are taught that the meaning of option A must not be changed.
Please, stop believing that myth.
I've written other posts about this issue.
Use GMAT Club's awesome search function to find those posts.
A few of you did not consult (or perhaps wisely did not repeat) the incorrect OE.
Those of you who got 90% of the explanation correct and did not repeat the inaccurate other OE get kudos.
I gave fair warning a couple of posts ago.
COMMENTS
zhanbo , although I PMed you with the answer so that I could avoid giving away the OA, I'll answer here, too: yes, option B would be correct if the word that were included.
Excellent question.
Sumi1010 , thanks for being helpful.
Your answer and analysis are thoughtful, as usual.
I am glad to see veterans along with occasional visitors.
(This far-flung SC Butler crew is pretty awesome, if you ask me.)
As always, I extend a standing invitation to aspirants to post.
Take a risk!
In the United States at the moment, seditious thugs operating in an uncontrolled pandemic remind me that tomorrow is not guaranteed.
So live today.
And stay as safe as you can, please.
General Discussion
10 Jan 2021, 01:26
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Bookmarks
My answer is (D). It took me 02:09.
(A) "and that the democracy is corrupted" is not parallel with "the perils of capitalism".
(B) I actually want to like (B) because "although" is straightforward. Keep it for now.
(C) The use of "to the extent of" may not be appropriate. I am not very sure.
(D) No issues found. Keep for now.
(E) Verb tense (Past perfect) is not compatible with Simple present used in the main clause.
Between (B) and (D), I feel that (B) is too extreme. All US citizens may agree that democracy is corrupted? (D) is more measured.
Also, someone may dismiss (B) as it changes the original meaning of option (A). I, however, am reluctant to believe that option (A) necessarily convey intended meaning of the author.
(A) "and that the democracy is corrupted" is not parallel with "the perils of capitalism".
(B) I actually want to like (B) because "although" is straightforward. Keep it for now.
(C) The use of "to the extent of" may not be appropriate. I am not very sure.
(D) No issues found. Keep for now.
(E) Verb tense (Past perfect) is not compatible with Simple present used in the main clause.
Between (B) and (D), I feel that (B) is too extreme. All US citizens may agree that democracy is corrupted? (D) is more measured.
Also, someone may dismiss (B) as it changes the original meaning of option (A). I, however, am reluctant to believe that option (A) necessarily convey intended meaning of the author.
( don’t we use much with uncountable and many with countable
