Sentence Correction

Researchers found that the human body can use protein derived from whey more efficiently than it can use /protein from other sources such as soy,eggs or drinking milk./

A
B protein from other sources like soy,eggs or drinking milk
C protein from other sources such as soy,eggs or milk
D protein which it has derived from other sources such as soy,eggs or drinking milk
E its protein from other sources such as soy,eggs or drinking milk.


Please help me as I am getting stuck in this problem.
Varun

We need 'such as' here(Question is specifying examples).So left with A,C & E. Now, C misses 'drinking' and E has ambigous 'its'.So IMO answer is A.

I agree that such as is better than like. However, I like that C doesn't use "drinking." As a result, the list "soy, eggs, and milk" is parallel. I'd say pick C.

I think 'Drinking milk' is used as a noun here.

Yes, "drinking milk" is a noun phrase. But because the list is not "eating soy, eating eggs, and drinking milk," I see "soy, eggs, and milk" as superior. Moreover, you could argue that milk is the source of protein, not the drinking of the milk.

My pick is C

I get your point but I still don't agree with you.Consider this example:
We need clean drinking water. Here 'drinking water' is noun.This doesn't mean that we need clean 'drinking of water'. Similarly in the question it is 'Drinking milk' is source of protein and not 'drinking of milk'.

I get your point but I still don't agree with you.Consider this example:
We need clean drinking water. Here 'drinking water' is noun.This doesn't mean that we need clean 'drinking of water'. Similarly in the question it is 'Drinking milk' is source of protein and not 'drinking of milk'.

It's possible for "drinking water" to behave in two different ways.

In the example you gave, the noun is actually just "water." "Drinking" is used an adjective. It's common to say "drinking water" because it helps to clarify exactly what kind of water you mean: specifically water for consumption instead of, say, rainwater or water for watering crops, or for washing a car.

Consider the example "Due to his injury, even everyday acts such as drinking water are very painful." Here, the word "drinking" is a gerund -- an "-ing" word that acts as a noun. Notice that in this example, the meaning is in fact "the drinking of water." "Due to his injury, even everyday acts such as the drinking of water are very painful."

So, in option A, I read "drinking milk" as in the injury example above. In other words as "the drinking of milk" -- a gerund. And that's just one reason why I think A is wrong: the drinking of milk is not the source of protein, it's the milk itself that is the source.

Though perhaps technically correct, it's unusual to say "drinking milk" using "drinking" as an adjective to describe "milk." It might be more common if we needed to distinguish "drinking milk" from other kinds of milk, but I can't think of any other kinds, nor is that a common usage.

The big point here, however, is that the list "soy, eggs, and milk" is more parallel than "soy, eggs, and drinking milk." It would be more parallel even if you interpret "drinking" to be an adjective.

IMO A

Reaon: C changes the meaning of the original sentence, by flirting with the original noun 'drinking water'. I think C includes other kinds of water like rain water percolated into the human body, water drank unintentionally while swimming etc. etc. But choice A clearly states that no, it is refering only to drinking water and no other forms of water. So, if we are changing that to only water we are giving a whole new meaning to the sentence.

Admittedly, this is quite a contentious question, lets hope it doesn't come on the actual GMAT.

Arabian Baba, read the original problem again. You'll notice that there's no mention of drinking water. It reads "drinking milk."

Thanks a lot for helping me out... C is the OA.. The reason given is the same as mentioned earlier, parallelism among soya,eggs and milk...

However I had marked D.. My doubt was since the main sentence says protein derived from whey, shouldnt the underlined portion also contain derived from, ie protein derived from milk, soya and eggs..

Basically I am confused about the need for parallelism in usage of derived from..

Varun

Varun,

You raised a good point. How ever, there is no need to used derived from again. In the underlined part (which you did not underline ) in A & C it says protein from X, Y, Z. It is implicit that the protein is derived from X , Y , Z

Makes sense?

As far as drinking milk and milk are concerned, I will go for C because I felt that drinking milk is redundant.

Also I could not think of milk in its original form (not the one thats contaminated by accident or by intention) non drinkable or non usable for making other dairy products.

Can some one think of such milk? Rey used a perfect example of drinking water & non drinkable water.(such as sea water is non drinkable)

All said, Is this Q typical of GMAT or atypical??

Ok chidcguy, it does make sense, though SC is really

doing+noun is considered ambiguous and not accepted on gmat because doing can be a gerund or adjective.

we need "the" or other word to make clear doing is gerund or adjective ,on gmat land

gmat only test doing+noun for paralalism.

make it simple, pls read "sentence correction 101" for more on this