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recording system

by anant03 » Wed Sep 16, 2015 8:27 am
A recording system was so secretly installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office that even Theodore C. Sorensen, the white house counsel, did not know it exist.

A) A recording system was so secretly installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office that

B) So secret was recording system installation and operation in the Kennedy oval office

C) It was so secret that a recording system was installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office

D) A recording system that was so secretly installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office

E) Installed and operated so secretly in the Kennedy oval office was a recording system that

OAA

My question is in option [spoiler] C[spoiler] does IT serve as an EXPLETIVE? If no then please EXPERTS advise and correct me.

[/spoiler]
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by ceilidh.erickson » Wed Sep 16, 2015 2:37 pm
Please always post the source of your questions - this one is from GMATPrep.
A recording system was so secretly installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office that even Theodore C. Sorensen, the white house counsel, did not know it existed.

A) A recording system was so secretly installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office that
B) So secret was recording system installation and operation in the Kennedy oval office
C) It was so secret that a recording system was installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office
D) A recording system that was so secretly installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office
E) Installed and operated so secretly in the Kennedy oval office was a recording system that
In C, you're correct: "it" is an expletive (a word filling in the syntactic position of another). We can understand it to mean "the fact that a recording was installed was so secret..."

On the GMAT, this usage of "it" shows up a lot more often in wrong answers than right answers. The GMAT prefers "it" to be a pronoun standing in for a specific noun. The expletive "it" is usually a more roundabout way of phrasing an idea. C, for example, is not necessarily grammatically incorrect, it's just so complicated a structure that the meaning is unclear.

Did that answer your question?
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by anant03 » Wed Sep 16, 2015 9:58 pm
Hi Ceilidh ,

Thanks for your reply.


Can you please tell me when should we use an EXPLETIVE? Because I marked option C just because of EXPLETIVE.

Also please explain me why we choose A over C.

Thanks
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by GMATGuruNY » Thu Sep 17, 2015 4:16 am
anant03 wrote:Also please explain me why we choose A over C.
C: It was so secret that a recording system was installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office even Theodore C. Sorensen, the white house counsel, did not know it existed.
Here, the referent for the it in red is the following that-clause in red.
If we replace the it in red with the that-clause in red, we get:
That a recording system was installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office was so secret even Theodore C. Sorensen, the white house counsel, did not know it existed.
Here, so secret even is unidiomatic.
The correct idiom is SO X THAT Y, as in the following:
so secret THAT even Theodore C. Sorensen, the white house counsel, did not know it existed.
Eliminate C.
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by anant03 » Thu Sep 17, 2015 7:36 am
Hi Mitch ,

Thanks for the explanation, but I don't get this properly even though read many times.

Can you please explain more about this.

Also please explain that when should we use an EXPLETIVE ?

Your reply would be highly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.
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by thang » Thu Sep 17, 2015 7:56 pm
why E is wrong, pls help

because "so" is far from "stalled and operated"
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by thang » Thu Sep 17, 2015 8:00 pm
C is wrong because C contain two INDEPENDENT CLAUSES.

it is important that you learn gmat, gmat is hard

above sentence is similar to C

it is screte that this seystem is stalled , Mr,A dose not know it is exist.

two INdependent clauses withough connection , meaning connection and grammaticla connection
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by anant03 » Fri Sep 18, 2015 1:58 am
Hi Experts ,

Your reply on this would be highly appreciated.

Thanks,
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by GMATGuruNY » Fri Sep 18, 2015 2:00 pm
anant03 wrote:Hi Mitch ,

Thanks for the explanation, but I don't get this properly even though read many times.

Can you please explain more about this.
An alternate line of reasoning:

C: It was so secret that a recording system was installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office even Theodore C. Sorensen, the White House counsel, did not know it existed.
Here, the red portion and the blue portion each constitute a complete sentence that can stand on its own:
It was so secret that a recording system was installed and operated in the Kennedy oval office.
Even Theodore C. Sorensen, the White House counsel, did not know it existed.
Two complete sentences must be linked by a connector such as a conjunction or a semi-colon.
Eliminate C.
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