Although today's question was significantly harder than yesterday's (for you), tonight's task of picking a winner is significantly easier than yesterday (for me), because only one of you got it right. For the record, the correct answer is A, and the winner is aspirant_gmat.
Everyone was correct in noticing that there is a Comparisons issue here. We need to compare "traditions" to "traditions." (B) leaves this unclear and (C) is a straightforward error, because it erroneously compares "traditions" to "development."
In (E), we have to make sure that the grammar, not just the logic, tells us what the correct comparison is. Consider the following example sentence:
"I like beer more than you."
Does this mean "I like beer more than you like beer" or "I like beer more than I like you?" It's unclear. "you" could be parallel to "beer" OR it could be parallel to "I." And, while the first meaning is more likely on the GMAT, I can certainly think of a number of people whom I do not like as much as I like beer
So, this is the problem with E. How do we know, from the grammatical structure alone, whether it's
Max Weber claimed that the
traditions that theodicean societies, civilizations in which people feel a need to reconcile the imperfections of the world with a "perfect" divinity, develop are more likely to result in religious adherence than
traditions of non-theodicean societies
or
Max Weber claimed that the traditions that theodicean societies, civilizations in which people feel a need to reconcile the imperfections of the world with a "perfect" divinity, develop are more likely to result in
religious adherence than
traditions of non-theodicean societies
? We can't know, and therefore (E) is wrong.
What about (D)? Well, now we're going to look more closely at exactly what the first part of the comparison (the non-underlined part) is, and as some of you pointed out, we ignore the modifying clause set off by commas. Let's just read the sentence after the "that" and without the modifying phrase and simplifying the unimportant words in the comparison:
...traditions that theodicean societies develop are more likely to result ... than ______
The word "do" in (D) harkens back to "develop," which is a distortion; the traditions aren't the subject of the verb "develop," but in fact the object. Furthermore, "do" is NOT parallel to "are likely to result." If you're going to use "do" in a comparison, you have to be able to repeat the entire verb after "do" for it to work. Could we say "...than non-theodicean societies' traditions do likely to result"? Definitely not. Lastly, (D) distorts the meaning, and in fact so do (C) and (E): the traditions are not so much "of" non-theodicean societies as they are
developed by them.
Most of you thought that the word "are" made the Comparison wrong in (A). This is incorrect. We are switching the order of the subject/verb in the second part of the comparison, but the order isn't important: what matters is that
it's the exact same subject-verb structure. Consider this example sentence:
The students worked far harder on the question than did their teacher.
This is a CORRECT parallel comparison. "The students worked" is parallel to "did their teacher" -- the order is different, but still parallel.
So, in the sentence, which is correct as written, I'll highlight the relevant parallel parts, to show that (A) is, in fact, correct:
Max Weber claimed that
the traditions that theodicean societies, civilizations in which people feel a need to reconcile the imperfections of the world with a "perfect" divinity,
develop are more likely to result in religious adherence than
are those that non-theodicean societies develop.
Where the blue construction is parallel to the green construction, and "those" properly stands in for "traditions" in the second clause, with parallel verb forms ("are") and parallel modifying clauses ("that...develop").
Kudos also to jaymw, whose explanation is terrific and who really gets to the important core of most of the answer choices, but nevertheless picked the wrong answer -- I still recommend reading his explanation above. Also kudos to hitesh888, who correctly selected A, but gave no explanation.
Not only is this a hard question, but GMAT test-takers are
always less confident picking (A) when it's the correct answer. Remember, when (A) is the answer,
it will never be a "good" sentence that you're happy with as soon as you read it. This would be too easy! But just because it seems wrong doesn't mean it is wrong.
Congratulations to aspirant_gmat, whose excellent explanation (far shorter than mine) is below. The Knewton Verbal Challenge Week continues on Monday, so have a great weekend, and stay tuned on Monday morning at 9am EST for the next challenge question, and your next opportunity to win!
GO JETS!
aspirant_gmat wrote:Max Weber claimed that the traditions that theodicean societies, civilizations in which people feel a need to reconcile the imperfections of the world with a "perfect" divinity, develop are more likely to result in religious adherence than are those that non-theodicean societies develop.
(A) are those that non-theodicean societies develop
(B) what non-theodicean societies develop
(C) non-theodicean societies' development would
(D) non-theodicean societies' traditions do
(E) traditions of non-theodicean societies
I think the author wants to compare 'the traditions that theodicean societies develop' with 'the traditions that non-theodicean societies develop'.
So one of the strongest contenders, E (traditions of non-theodicean societies) is out because it misses 'develop'.
B) what non-theodicean societies develop
'what'- doesn't refer to traditions, so B is out.
C) non-theodicean societies' development would
Here, 'non-theodicean societies' development' is being compared with 'the traditions', So C is out.
D) non-theodicean societies' traditions do
Awkward construction.
Now between B and A, I think A is a better option:
The sentence can be rewritten as -
Max Weber claimed that
the traditions that theodicean societies, <X> , develop are
more likely <to result in religious adherence> than
are those<traditions> that non-theodicean societies develop.
Here the comparison is between 'the traditions that theodicean societies develop' and 'those<traditions> that non-theodicean societies develop', and the sentence structure is proper(X are more likely to do<something> than are Z).
Answer: A
