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Established in 1945 upon

by nailGmat2012 » Sun Jan 29, 2012 10:52 am
Established in 1945 upon the demise of the League of Nations, the United Nations' General Assembly, comprised of all the nations who are signatories to the UN charter, play a crucial role in sustaining international agreements concerning human rights, global trade, and environmental protection.

(A) nations who are signatories to the UN charter, play a crucial role in sustaining international agreements concerning human rights, global trade, and environmental protection

(B) signatories to the UN charter, plays a crucial role in sustaining international agreements concerning human rights, global trade, and protect the environment

(C) nations that are signatories to the UN charter, plays a crucial role in sustaining international agreements concerning human rights, global trade, and environmental protection

(D) nations, which were signatories to the UN charter, plays a crucial role in sustaining international agreements concerning human rights, global trade, and environmental protection

(E) nations that are signatories to the UN charter, is playing a crucial role in sustaining international agreements concerning human rights, global trade, and environmental protection

Why is D wrong?
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by Mike@Magoosh » Sun Jan 29, 2012 12:58 pm
Hi, there. I'm happy to give my 2¢ on this one. :)

I like the fact that you narrowed things down to (C) & (D). The singular subject "the United Nations' General Assembly" requires the singular verb "plays", so (A) & (E) are out. Answer (B) has the egregious parallelism mistake in the second part: "concerning human rights, global trade, and protect the environment." Yuck. (B) is out.

So that leaves (C) and (D). Let's look at the difference:

(C) . . . the United Nations' General Assembly, comprised of all the nations that are signatories to the UN charter, plays . . .
(D) . . . the United Nations' General Assembly, comprised of all the nations, which were signatories to the UN charter, plays . . .

This is subtle, but there's actually a logical difference in what's being said in these two. Consider the simpler sentences:

(1) All my friend who read books like Faulkner.
(2) All my friends, who read books, like Faulkner.

The first sentence implies I have some friends who read books and some who don't, and the ones who read like Faulkner. The second sentence says that all my friends read book and all of these friends also like Faulkner; it implies that I have no friends who don't read. --- To see that, it may help to remove what's between the commas --- "All my friends like Faulkner."

When you have "all" + noun + "who/that do X", it implies you are talking about every element of the group of these nouns who do X.

When you have "all" + noun + comma + subordinate clause, it implies you are talking every single one of those nouns, and everything else you say applies to all of them.

Back to the options:
(C) . . . the United Nations' General Assembly, comprised of all the nations that are signatories to the UN charter, plays . . .
(D) . . . the United Nations' General Assembly, comprised of all the nations, which were signatories to the UN charter, plays . . .

The first, (C), says that the UN Gen Assem. is comprised of that subset of nations which signed the charter. If a nation signed the charter, it's part of the UN Gen. Assem. If a nation didn't sign the charter, it's not part of the UN Gen. Assem. It implies there are nations in each category.

The second, (D), says the UN Gen. Assem. is comprise of all nations, period. Every single nation on Earth is in the General Assembly. Not only that, but they all signed the Charter.

That second one is incorrect, and changes the original meaning of the sentence. The prompt sentence, for all its flaws, made it clear it was talking about only a subset of nations, only those that signed the UN charter, not every single nation on earth. (C) gets that right, (D) flubs that.

That's why the answer is (C).

Does that make sense? Please let me know if you have any questions on what I've said here.

Mike :)
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by patanjali.purpose » Sun Jan 29, 2012 1:24 pm
mikemcgarry wrote:Hi, there. I'm happy to give my 2¢ on this one. :)

I like the fact that you narrowed things down to (C) & (D). The singular subject "the United Nations' General Assembly" requires the singular verb "plays", so (A) & (E) are out. Mike :)
E also has singular verb IS PLAYING - why would we drop E then. I do not find any noticable reason. Could you pls suggest.
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by Mike@Magoosh » Sun Jan 29, 2012 3:46 pm
Dear Patanjali.Purpose,

That's a great question.

You're right, the only difference between (C) & (E) is the difference between "plays" and "is playing".

That's a really subtle difference, the difference between the present and the present progressive.

The ordinary present tense is the default tense for anything that is true at the moment. It covers a wide variety of cases. "Mother cooks dinner" --- that could be something happening now, or something that happens long term, every night.

The present progressive is used to emphasize that (a) it is an action, and (b) it is happening right as we speak --- "Mother is cooking dinner" --- that means, exactly at the same time as I speak, the action is taking place. The present progressive is used when that kind of specificity is required in order to convey the meaning.

In this context, we are talking about the operation of the United Nation's General Assembly --- its action is to play "a crucial role in sustaining international agreements concerning human rights, global trade, and environmental protection." That's what the UN GA does in general. That's what it has been doing in an ongoing way since 1945.

To capture that sense of: was happening, is happening, and will continue to be happening, we use the simple present tense: "plays"

If we were to use the present progressive "is playing" --- that would imply that, although this action of the UN's GA was currently happening, it wasn't always --- perhaps this full action only started recently, for example, and does not stretch all the way back to 1945. In this way, using the present progressive would alter the meaning of the sentence.

We are not trying to say that this action happens or doesn't happen at any specific time. By contrast, we are simply trying to say: this is what the UN's GA does. Period. In such a context, the present progressive is incorrect, and only the simple regular present tense is possible.

Here's free practice SC where the present progressive comes into play in the answer choices.

https://gmat.magoosh.com/questions/1184

That link should lead to a free video explanation of the answer after you submit your answer to the question.

Does that make sense? Please let me know if you have any more questions on this.

Mike :)
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by patanjali.purpose » Sun Jan 29, 2012 4:15 pm
mikemcgarry wrote:Dear Patanjali.Purpose,

The ordinary present tense is the default tense for anything that is true at the moment. It covers a wide variety of cases. "Mother cooks dinner" --- that could be something happening now, or something that happens long term, every night.

The present progressive is used to emphasize that (a) it is an action, and (b) it is happening right as we speak --- "Mother is cooking dinner" --- that means, exactly at the same time as I speak, the action is taking place. The present progressive is used when that kind of specificity is required in order to convey the meaning. Mike :)
Thanks. It makes sense.

C vs D - I agree with the logic you mentioned. In addition to that, I believe 'were signatories VS are signatories' gives clues that C is better. WERE implies past activity while ARE signifies present activity.
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by Mike@Magoosh » Sun Jan 29, 2012 4:54 pm
Dear Patanjali.Purpose,

Good eye, catching the "are signatories" vs. "were signatories" difference of (C) and (D).

I would say, though, I don't believe that this, by itself, would determine the answer.

For example, when one says: "Spain is a signatory to the such-and-such treaty", we are making no claim that that the signing is happening right now, or today, or anything like that. All we are saying is: this treaty exists, and Spain at some point signed it. In other words, somewhere, the physical treaty exists, and Spain's signature exist on it. To say "is" does imply that the treaty is still in effect and Spain still abides by it, but it places no great restraints on when the signing happened.

For something that was signed 60+ years ago, and by which all parties still abide, it is correct to say either
(a) these nations are signatories of the Charter
or
(b) these nation were signatories of the Charter

Insofar as the Charter itself exist somewhere with all those signatures still on it, we can use the present tense. Insofar as the actually signing happened 60+ years ago, we can use the past tense. Either is correct, and just has a subtly different emphasis, either of which is correct in this instance.

Does that make sense?

Mike :)
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by patanjali.purpose » Sun Jan 29, 2012 5:54 pm
mikemcgarry wrote:Dear Patanjali.Purpose,

Good eye, catching the "are signatories" vs. "were signatories" difference of (C) and (D).

I would say, though, I don't believe that this, by itself, would determine the answer.

For example, when one says: "Spain is a signatory to the such-and-such treaty", we are making no claim that that the signing is happening right now, or today, or anything like that. All we are saying is: this treaty exists, and Spain at some point signed it. In other words, somewhere, the physical treaty exists, and Spain's signature exist on it. To say "is" does imply that the treaty is still in effect and Spain still abides by it, but it places no great restraints on when the signing happened.

For something that was signed 60+ years ago, and by which all parties still abide, it is correct to say either
(a) these nations are signatories of the Charter
or
(b) these nation were signatories of the Charter

Insofar as the Charter itself exist somewhere with all those signatures still on it, we can use the present tense. Insofar as the actually signing happened 60+ years ago, we can use the past tense. Either is correct, and just has a subtly different emphasis, either of which is correct in this instance.

Does that make sense?

Mike :)
Thanks a lot. Thanks for your time and help.
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by LalaB » Mon Jan 30, 2012 4:29 am
mikemcgarry wrote:
The first, (C), says that the UN Gen Assem. is comprised of that subset of nations which signed the charter. If a nation signed the charter, it's part of the UN Gen. Assem. If a nation didn't sign the charter, it's not part of the UN Gen. Assem. It implies there are nations in each category.

The second, (D), says the UN Gen. Assem. is comprise of all nations, period. Every single nation on Earth is in the General Assembly. Not only that, but they all signed the Charter.

That second one is incorrect, and changes the original meaning of the sentence. The prompt sentence, for all its flaws, made it clear it was talking about only a subset of nations, only those that signed the UN charter, not every single nation on earth. (C) gets that right, (D) flubs that.

That's why the answer is (C).
Mike,thanks for this precious post.
u said, that D changes the meaning.

"Established in 1945 upon the demise of the League of Nations, the United Nations' General Assembly, comprised of all the nations, who are signatories to the UN charter"

if it were comma before the word "who", then D would have been correct, right?
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