Sentence Correction

Source - Platinum Gmat

Heightened land erosion, caused by human activity, has many negative effects including the following: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and the introduction of harmful chemicals to the ocean's environment.


A) including the following: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and the introduction of harmful chemicals to the ocean's environment.

B) including: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and harmful chemicals entering the ocean's environment.

C) including: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and the introduction of harmful chemicals to the ocean's environment.

D) including the following: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and harmful chemicals entering the ocean's environment.

E) including the following: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, certain fish populations rising, certain fish populations falling, and the introduction of harmful chemicals to the ocean's environment.

OA Later

imo D looks parallel

A looks best to me.

including followed by colon is incorrect. Rule out B and C.

E - certain fish populations rising, certain fish populations falling - What on earth is this? imbalance of the fish population is a million times better.

D - Actually D breaks parallelism

Heightened land erosion, caused by human activity, has many negative effects including the following -
1) algae blooms - noun
2) coral reef destruction - noun
3) imbalance of the fish population - noun
4) harmful chemicals entering the ocean's environment. - verb (entering is critical here)

This is corrected in A by using the introduction of harmful chemicals to the ocean's environment. (noun phrase)

What is the OA?

ya niks i agreed with you.

IMO C:

including the following : redundancy, A, D E out

Between B and C : C is parallel. Hence C

OR

only A and C are giving parallelism, A has redundancy. Hence C

whats d Oa?

OA is A

https://www.platinumgmat.com/practice_gm ... ion_id=183

reply2spg wrote:Source - Platinum Gmat

Heightened land erosion, caused by human activity, has many negative effects including the following: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and the introduction of harmful chemicals to the ocean's environment.


A) including the following: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and the introduction of harmful chemicals to the ocean's environment.

B) including: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and harmful chemicals entering the ocean's environment.

C) including: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and the introduction of harmful chemicals to the ocean's environment.

D) including the following: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, imbalance of the fish population, and harmful chemicals entering the ocean's environment.

E) including the following: algae blooms, coral reef destruction, certain fish populations rising, certain fish populations falling, and the introduction of harmful chemicals to the ocean's environment.

OA Later

A and C are the contenders as BDE all have ||ism errors.
Out of A and C , I choose A because in C including is incorrectly followed by a colon as a colon cannot follow "including","such as", "like" etc.

OA is A. I have few questions about including.

1. why colon (:) after 'including' is incorrect?
2. whether 'including the following' is correct or just 'including' is correct?
3. Is comma correct before including or no comma is also correct?

I have a lots of confusion about including, so please help me.

Can somebody please help me in this?

reply2spg wrote:OA is A. I have few questions about including.

1. why colon (: ) after 'including' is incorrect?
2. whether 'including the following' is correct or just 'including' is correct?
3. Is comma correct before including or no comma is also correct?

I have a lots of confusion about including, so please help me.

1. why colon [:] after 'including' is incorrect?

This is because colon and including perform the same function in the sentence. So use of both together leads to redundancy.

Also, keep the following rule in mind. - Use a colon [ : ] before a list or an explanation that is preceded by a clause that can stand by itself.
E.g. 1. There is only one thing left to do now: confess while you still have time. - Correct.
2. I enjoy water sports including: water polo, swimming and diving. - Incorrect

Do you see the difference now?

2. whether 'including the following' is correct or just 'including' is correct?

Both of them are correct. However, following is followed by a colon while including is not.

Check these out -
1. Bob has visited many countries, including France, Russia and Germany. - Correct.
2. Bob has visited many countries, including the following: France, Russia and Germany. - Correct.
3. Bob has visited many countries including: France, Russia and Germany - Incorrect

3. Is comma correct before including or no comma is also correct?

Use of comma before including depends on whether the part after the comma is necessary to the meaning of the sentence. If yes, then comma shouldn't be there. If no, then comma should be there. However, in most cases, the part after including is an additional information, so comma use is preferred.

E.g. 1. All on the plane were alive, including the pilot.
2. Henry Belafonte treated his fans to some of his classics, including "Jamaica Farewell," at the festival.

Hope this helps.

Thanks Niks. Only 3rd question is bit confusing to understand. If you have more examples can you elaborate them?

niksworth wrote:1. why colon [:] after 'including' is incorrect?

This is because colon and including perform the same function in the sentence. So use of both together leads to redundancy.

Also, keep the following rule in mind. - Use a colon [ : ] before a list or an explanation that is preceded by a clause that can stand by itself.
E.g. 1. There is only one thing left to do now: confess while you still have time. - Correct.
2. I enjoy water sports including: water polo, swimming and diving. - Incorrect

Do you see the difference now?

2. whether 'including the following' is correct or just 'including' is correct?

Both of them are correct. However, following is followed by a colon while including is not.

Check these out -
1. Bob has visited many countries, including France, Russia and Germany. - Correct.
2. Bob has visited many countries, including the following: France, Russia and Germany. - Correct.
3. Bob has visited many countries including: France, Russia and Germany - Incorrect

3. Is comma correct before including or no comma is also correct?

Use of comma before including depends on whether the part after the comma is necessary to the meaning of the sentence. If yes, then comma shouldn't be there. If no, then comma should be there. However, in most cases, the part after including is an additional information, so comma use is preferred.

E.g. 1. All on the plane were alive, including the pilot.
2. Henry Belafonte treated his fans to some of his classics, including "Jamaica Farewell," at the festival.

Hope this helps.

As said, the use of comma before including is decided by the importance of the phrase after including.

In majority of the cases, including is followed by something which is not essential to the core of the sentence.

Some Google results -
1) Geneticists are interested in variations in the human DNA sequence because these underlie human diversity, including susceptibility to disease.

2) A Presidential daily briefing mentioned patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York.

In both the cases the red part is providing extra information. So comma is required before including here. Note that including is acting as a preposition here (more specifically marginal preposition)

Now, consider the following sentence

1) Thank you for including me in your team of legal advisors.

Here the phrase after including is essential to the meaning of the sentence, so comma is absent. Note that including is playing the role of a verb here.

Takeaway:
1. If including is acting as a preposition in a sentence, use a comma before it.
2. If including is acting as a verb, do not put comma before it.