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include vs including

by sulabh » Wed Jun 11, 2008 10:15 am
The principal feature of the redesigned checks is a series of printed instructions that the company hopes will help merchants confirm a check’s authenticity, which includes reminders to watch the endorsement, compare signatures, and view the watermark while holding the check to the light.
A. which includes reminders to watch the endorsement, compare signatures, and
view
B. which include reminders for watching the endorsement, to compare signatures
and view
C. by including reminders for watching the endorsement, comparing signatures, and
viewing
D. including reminders to watch the endorsement, comparing signatures and viewing
E. including reminders to watch the endorsement, compare signatures, and view
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by netigen » Wed Jun 11, 2008 10:29 am
Ans should be E

including correctly acts as the modifier and the underlined part is parallel
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by sulabh » Wed Jun 11, 2008 11:34 am
In A 'which' also acts as modifier and A is also parallel ??
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by loki.gmat » Wed Jun 11, 2008 12:09 pm
A - "a series of printed instructions" is plural. hence includes is incorrect.

Thanks!
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by gmatinjuly » Thu Jun 12, 2008 2:46 am
Agree with Loki

To watch is correct : eliminate B/C
D not parallel
E : awkward including

also its information that can be taken off so which is more apt.

A correct answer series of printed instruction which includes ….right tense
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by sulabh » Thu Jun 12, 2008 2:47 am
OA is E
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by Rashmi1804 » Tue Mar 24, 2009 2:56 am
I picked C....because i perceived it as ... " the feature is a series of instructions that X hopes will help Y confirm authenticity...BY including A,comparing B and Viewing C. AS IN Y CONFIRMS THE AUTHENTICITY BY DOING A,B AND C.

But the OA is E...and E is defntly a very good GMAT construction but wht does this sentence mean ????
I broke my head over it, yet not able to figure out what includes what or who does what including what ?

Could somebody pleaseeeeeeeeee explain the meaning of this sentence.....
I would be very thankful.....because there are couple of questions from this type i have encountered so far....
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by Jatinder » Tue Mar 24, 2009 6:59 am
Rashmi1804 wrote:I picked C....because i perceived it as ... " the feature is a series of instructions that X hopes will help Y confirm authenticity...BY including A,comparing B and Viewing C. AS IN Y CONFIRMS THE AUTHENTICITY BY DOING A,B AND C.

....
Not quite actually...We are not confirming the authenticity by doing A, B and C; we are just describing in the last part what all authenticity includes. but the latter is not the cause of "confirming the authenticity"
A - "a series of printed instructions" is plural. hence includes is incorrect.
Well, i am quite sure that "which" can not modify "a series of printed instructions", which is quite far.

"Which" intends to modify "a series of printed instructions" but it can not bcoz of the huge distance.

E is correct as the present participle correctly modifies the action of the preceding clause

HTH
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by gmat740 » Tue Mar 24, 2009 3:17 pm
The principal feature of the redesigned checks is a series of printed instructions that the company hopes will help merchants confirm a check’s authenticity, which includes reminders to watch the endorsement,

While going through the question, this is what I thought.

The principal feature is singular so we will use singular verb(Includes)
So my answer A

And I am not able to eliminate it.

Please help
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by Rashmi1804 » Wed Mar 25, 2009 1:54 am
gmat740 : As jitendar mentioned above, Which is too far from THE PRINCIPLE FEATURE to modify it.

Usually WHICH modifies the 1. noun that is preceding WHICH
2. Subject of a prepositional phrase, preceding
WHICH

Also, the three phrases at the end of the sentence are modifying the Check's autenticity....so a participle " -ing form" is approriate..
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by gmat740 » Wed Mar 25, 2009 4:41 am
Hello Again,
In MGMAT book, I have read a technique which states that, we can strike out the phrase in between the Subject and the verb so as to check if there is Subject-verb agreement or not.

Nothing has been told about the distance

How do we say that if the distance is affecting or not??

Please shed some light on this topic as I am really getting confused!! :shock: :shock:
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by Rashmi1804 » Wed Mar 25, 2009 5:06 am
you are right!! modifier phrase can be striken off...to clearly check if there is subject-verb agreement...

BUT!! Most of the time IN GMAT, WHICH modifies the noun preceding it...or the subject of the prepositional phrase preceding it.

when there is a WHICH after a modifier phrase that follows(modifies) a noun...... WHICH MODIFIES A NOUN THAT IS IN THE MODIFIER PHRASE...NOT THE NOUN THE MODIFIER PHRASE IS MODIFYING.


example: Ice-cream parlour, located beside X, which is a park is , perhaps, the most popular ice-cream shop in the city .

There are some cases in which "which" modifies the noun before modifier phrase that is between the noun and WHICH. these type of questions are very rare on GMAT as far as i kno...

However...In the above question....WHICH might as well refer to Check's authenticity....so WHICH in Option B or A is ambiguous.
A more precise form is E....this modifies the noun " a series of printed instructions" not the check's authencity as i mistook initially.

One example of the last case of WHICH, which is rare on GMAT is...
"From the bark of the paper birch tree the Menomini crafted a canoe about twenty feet long and two feet wide, with small ribs and rails of cedar, which could carry four persons or eight hundred pounds of baggage ........"

here which is modifying the noun CANOE which is before such a longggggg modifier phrase highlighted in blue.

I think the only way to get through these kind of rare Qs of gmat is to understand the meaning of the sentence and then decide what "WHICH" modifies!! :-)
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by itheenigma » Sat Aug 13, 2011 4:11 am
Awesome thanks!
But I'm sure there is a more generic rule for this, taking into consideration the exceptions too.
Experts please help!

Also, I'd change the placement of the comma in ex you gave -
Ice-cream parlour, located beside X, which is a park , is perhaps, the most popular ice-cream shop in the city .
Rashmi1804 wrote:you are right!! modifier phrase can be striken off...to clearly check if there is subject-verb agreement...

BUT!! Most of the time IN GMAT, WHICH modifies the noun preceding it...or the subject of the prepositional phrase preceding it.

when there is a WHICH after a modifier phrase that follows(modifies) a noun...... WHICH MODIFIES A NOUN THAT IS IN THE MODIFIER PHRASE...NOT THE NOUN THE MODIFIER PHRASE IS MODIFYING.


example: Ice-cream parlour, located beside X, which is a park is , perhaps, the most popular ice-cream shop in the city .

There are some cases in which "which" modifies the noun before modifier phrase that is between the noun and WHICH. these type of questions are very rare on GMAT as far as i kno...

However...In the above question....WHICH might as well refer to Check's authenticity....so WHICH in Option B or A is ambiguous.
A more precise form is E....this modifies the noun " a series of printed instructions" not the check's authencity as i mistook initially.

One example of the last case of WHICH, which is rare on GMAT is...
"From the bark of the paper birch tree the Menomini crafted a canoe about twenty feet long and two feet wide, with small ribs and rails of cedar, which could carry four persons or eight hundred pounds of baggage ........"

here which is modifying the noun CANOE which is before such a longggggg modifier phrase highlighted in blue.

I think the only way to get through these kind of rare Qs of gmat is to understand the meaning of the sentence and then decide what "WHICH" modifies!! :-)
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by e-GMAT » Mon Aug 15, 2011 11:05 am
Gauging from the discussion in this thread, the following two points are being discussed here:
1: What does "including" modify?
2: What does "which" modifier modify?

So I will address both these here:

"Including" is not your typical comma + verb-ing modifier. It does not modify the preceding clause. It in fact modifies the noun. Now this noun need not necessarily be the closest noun. It can be far away noun as well and not necessarily a part of the preceding noun phrase.

In this sentence "including" modifies "printed instructions". It basically presents example of the instructions.
Offical Questions with similar usage:
1: OG12#120. In this sentence comma + including modifies the noun - personality traits. In this sentence, this noun happens to be placed close to the modifier.

2: GMATPrep Question
1)A study by the Ocean Wildlife Campaign urged states to undertake a number of
remedies to reverse a decline in the shark population, which includes the
establishment of size limits for shark catches, closing state waters for shark fishing
during pupping season, and requiring commercial fishers to have federal shark
permits.
A. which includes the establishment of size limits for shark catches, closing
B. which includes establishing limits to the size of sharks that can be caught, closing
C. which include the establishment of size limits for shark catches, the closing of
D. including establishing size limits for shark catches, closing
E. including the establishing of limits to the size of sharks that are caught, the closing of

Here in the correct choice D "comma + including" modifies the far away noun - remedies.

So keep this exception in mind. comma + including modifies noun and the noun may be placed little far away i.e. the noun may be separated from the modifies by other modifiers.

Now coming to second issue: Which modifiers or other noun modifiers
Yes, the relative pronoun modifiers modify the closest noun. But they may also modify slightly far away noun. However, there are certain restrictions. For example, there should not be any ambiguity in reference. The modifiers that are placed between the modified noun and the relative pronoun modifier should actually modify this noun.

See this post for more details on this and some examples from OG that exemplify such constructions.
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