kvitkod wrote:As a result of the ground-breaking work of Barbara McClintock, many scientists now believe that all of the information encoded in 50,000 to 100,000 of the different genes found in a human cell are contained in merely three percent of the cell's DNA.
(A) 50,000 to 100,000 of the different genes found in a human cell are contained in merely
(B) 50,000 to 100,000 of the human cell's different genes are contained in a mere
(C) the 50,000 to 100,000 different genes found in human cells are contained in merely
(D) 50,000 to 100,000 of human cell's different genes is contained in merely
(E) the 50,000 to 100,000 different genes found in a human cell is contained in a mere

OA E. [spoiler]This sentence has been posted and discussed several times. The reasons for choice E are mere/merely and is/are.[/spoiler]
Could smb explain, what does THE/no THE at the beginning of the choices mean? When do we use THE before the figures?

Whether the phrase "all of XXX" (eg "all of the information") has always single, rather than plural meaning?

Thank you in advance,

Brian@VeritasPrep wrote:Great reply, Atul - really impressive!

I'd just add this to the initial question about the word "the" at the start of the correct answer. If you look at it logically, without the word "the", the sentence basically says:

...the information encoded in some of the genes is contained...

Because we don't know whether that 50,000 to 100,000 is all or just some of the cells. And that's an awkward setup - is 50-100,000 a limited number of genes? In that case, this is a fairly small discovery. Is it most of the genes but not all? Then what do we know about the rest?

Logically, "the" makes sense because it makes for a perfectly clear meaning: "all of the information in all of the many genes found in a human cell" - that's ground-breaking research!