Sentence Correction

kevincanspain,

Which one is better, E or B?

wat is resultant ....

it must be damaged cartilage and bone

it doesn't make sense that cartilage and bone modifying resultant disease...


Ans is E

EbrahimHashem wrote:I chose E too, but the official answer is B, which I'm not convinced about! The following is the official explanation for the answer:

"The lengthy intervening phrase characterized by cartilage and bone....the immune system masks the subject/verb problem. The singular subject autoimmune disease doesn't agree with the plural verb are . You can eliminate (A), (C) and (D). Choices (B) and (E) both use the correct singular verb ' , but only (B) is correct. (E) lacks the parallelism that (B) retains: that become damaged although...not actually attacked."

I got the question (and answer) from one of Kaplan online courses!

Any thoughts and comments on the official answer and explanation?

I didn't get the concept of ||ism here...request one of the experts to please explain

Ebrahim Hashem wrote: I chose E too, but the official answer is B, which I'm not convinced about! The following is the official explanation for the answer:

Yaa Ibrahim, I agree and I am not convinced yet.

Haaress wrote:Ebrahim Hashem wrote: I chose E too, but the official answer is B, which I'm not convinced about! The following is the official explanation for the answer:

Yaa Ibrahim, I agree and I am not convinced yet.

The key here is understanding what the sentence is saying and taking a step back from the mechanics. There is a causal relationship that is implied ("resultant"). Saying x is characterized by y means when there's x, there is always y. Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease, but an autoimmune disease is not always a rheumatoid arthritis.

The sentence we are looking at is saying that there is a type of autoimmune disease known as rheumatoid arthritis. And, this type of autoimmune disease is characterized by cartilage and bone that become damaged as a result of this disease. There is an indirect causal relationship here, and it's important to say cartilage and bone that BECOME damaged (the implication is that this damage happens as a result of the inflammation).

"...the resultant autoimmune disease, characterized by cartilage and bone that become damaged although they are not actually attacked by the immune system, is known as 'rheumatoid arthritis.'"

If you were to say, "...the resultant autoimmune disease, characterized by damaged cartilage and bone although they are not actually attacked by the immune system, is known as 'rheumatoid arthritis,'" you are disregarding the causation there and saying that the damaged cartilage and bone characterized the disease. But, they do not. The autoimmune disease is characterized by cartilage and bone that become damaged because of the inflammation.

I don't know if this helps at all.

Gio