The chance of winning a lottery is as good, in the eyes of many cynics

Question

The chance of winning a lottery is as  good, in the eyes of many cynics, as that of being hit by lightning .

A. good, in the eyes of many cynics, as that of being hit by lightning
B. much as that of being hit, in the eyes of many cynics, by lightning
C. well as that of being, in many cynics' eyes, hit by lightning
D. much as that of having been hit by lightning, in the eyes of many cynics
E. high, in many cynics' eyes, as that of lightning hitting

nahid78 · Answer

Understood meaning: many cynics think that 
- The chance of X is the same The chance of Y

A. Good/bad is not an issue
B. As much as - Correct idiom. 
C. AS well as as means AND. not acceptable in this case.
D. Having been hit (Wrong time period). 
E. lightning hitting is not parallel to The chance of winning

Can someone please confirm whether "As high as" is acceptable?
and The shift of "in the eyes of many cynics" at the end in option D justified?

Thanks in advance.
My answer: B

milanrajb · Answer

I think its E.

As with the term "Chance", I have heard high chance of wining, but never heard of Much/more/good chance of winning.

I would request and expert to validate

chaitanyapatil · Answer

There is no error in the sentence, therefore the sentence is correct as it is. 
The chances of happening of some event are as good, in someone's eyes, as that of happening of some other event.

Let me ask you a question what is in the eyes of cynics? the chance correct?
B gives an illogical meaning, because of the wrong placement of the appositive phrase enclosed within two commas. Only answer A is the correct choice as it is clear and simple in language and meaning.
Answer Choice B is just non-sense, in B, the appositive (,......,) modifies the preceding noun "hit", and the appositive is supposed to modify "chances" or some quality of the chances "good" in this case (speaking from a meaning point of view)

The rule is that the apposotive phrase modifies the preceding noun. In all other choices, there are meaning or grammar-related errors.

ExpertsGlobal5 · Answer

Hello  milanrajb ,

We hope this finds you well.

To answer your query, the adjective "good" CAN be used to modify the noun "chance", but "much" and "more" cannot.

We hope this helps.
All the best!
Experts' Global Team

Bunuel · Answer

Official Explanation:

Read the Original Sentence Carefully, Looking for Errors:

This sentence contains no grammatical errors and is clearly written. The sentence correctly compares the "chance" of one event to the chance (represented by the pronoun 'that") of another event. The wording "as good ... as"is correct. Since there are no clear errors, evaluate each answer choice to confirm that (A) is the correct answer.

Scan and Group the Answer Choices:

Each of the answer choices rewords the underlined portion in a significantly different way, so move on to evaluate them one by one.

Eliminate Wrong Answer Choices:

(B) and (D) change the comparison “as good ... as” to “as much ... as,” which is not idiomatically correct in reference to “chance”; one chance is not as much than another; it is higher or better than another.

(C) changes the comparison “as good ... as” to “as well ... as," which does not work because "well" is an adverb and cannot describe a noun ("chance"). You would say, I pick lottery numbers as well as my Uncle George, but not, My chance of winning the lottery is as well as that of Uncle George .

Like the original sentence, (E) uses the word "that," and it uses an idiomatically correct comparison (“as high ... as”). However, it replaces “being hit by lightning” with “lightning hitting." It's unclear what or whom the lightning is hitting. This choice seems to compare the odds of winning the lottery to the odds of lightning hitting anything, which, since lightning strikes something somewhere every day, changes the meaning of the sentence.

Therefore, (A) is correct. The sentence is indeed correct as written.

TAKEAWAY:  Make sure adjectives (e.g., good, high) are used to compare nouns and adverbs (e.g., well) are used to compare verbs or adjectives.

thakurarun85 · Answer

Is not B means that there are chances of hitting in eye by the lightning?

VerbalBot · Answer

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The chance of winning a lottery is as good, in the eyes of many cynics

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The chance of winning a lottery is as good, in the eyes of many cynics

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