Sentence Correction

Source: MGMAT CAT verbal

Although the Argentine ant is neither poisonous nor predatory, individual colonies cooperate in a super-colony so large that its collective appetite can become a competitive threat to bird, lizard, and other insect populations.
a) individual colonies cooperate in a super-colony so large that its collective appetite can become a competitive
b) individual colonies cooperate in a super-colony of such size, its collective appetite can become a competing
c) individual colonies cooperate in a super-colony so large as to cause its collective appetite to become a competitive
d) such is the size of the cooperative super-colony comprising individual colonies, its collective appetite can become a competing
e) there is so much size to the individual colonies' cooperative super-colony that its collective appetite can become a competitive
I will post the official answer in the next reply.
My question is not about the answer, but rather about modifiers. Specifically, I am having trouble identifying whether a sentence is a modifier; in the previous sentence, for example, "Although the Argentine ant is neither poisonous nor predatory, individual colonies" I thought that the first phrase "Although the Argentine ant is neither poisonous nor predatory," should be followed by the subject "it" after the comma or anything that would refer to "Argentine ant" but the sentence was followed by individual colonies which made me think that it is incorrect. Similarly, I thought that the following construction was incorrect:
"Long before it was fashionable to be an expatriate, Josephine Baker made Paris her home "
my logic here was that the first sentence modifies something, but then it was followed by "Josephine Baker". I thought that the sentence is incorrect (but it's an OG answer to an SC)

Third example
As the cost of wireless service has steadily dropped over the last year and as mobile phones have become increasingly common, many people are finding that they can avoid toll charges on their home phones

In this sentence, I also thought that the first part "As the cost of wireless service has.....common" modifies many people

I can see that my logic is following the same pattern and that I am doing the same mistake over and over again. Would you please help me understand what it is that I am doing wrong? what are modifying phrases or sentences and how can I tell when a phrase is a modifier? I have searched the internet and could not find any conclusive answers.
Thanks in advance!!![/spoiler]

OA is




A

Hi tnaim,

I am no expert but I think you are unable to differentiate between modifiers and clauses, to be specific, subordinate clauses.

You may want to go through the following URLs to get better understanding:
https://www.chompchomp.com/terms/clause.htm
https://www.chompchomp.com/terms/subordinateclause.htm
https://www.chompchomp.com/terms/modifier.htm

HTH

A

Although the Argentine ant is neither poisonous nor predatory - is a subordinate clause and just adds extra information to the main clause, which in this case comes after the comma

But here...the answer choices don't even lend themselves to your way of thinking. Here the idiom is So ___ That ___.

A - has so ___ that ____
B - can become a competing threat to...? wrong
C - so large as to? wrong
D - changes meaning...
E - so much size? wrong and passive voice

I think that's correct

hardik.jadeja wrote:Hi tnaim,

I am no expert but I think you are unable to differentiate between modifiers and clauses, to be specific, subordinate clauses.

You may want to go through the following URLs to get better understanding:
https://www.chompchomp.com/terms/clause.htm
https://www.chompchomp.com/terms/subordinateclause.htm
https://www.chompchomp.com/terms/modifier.htm

HTH

Is there a way to recognize a Modifier and a sub Clause?

actually a sub-clause will usually start with one of those words in the Sub-Ord clause link above...

FightWithGMAT wrote: Is there a way to recognize a Modifier and a sub Clause?

Modifiers describe a word or make its meaning more specific. If you want to identify a modifier then you need to see whether that part of the sentence is modifying any noun or verb of the sentence. You can learn this by practice.

The confusion arises because a modifier can be a clause, but only adjective clause and adverb clause can act as modifiers, not the sub clause(If i am correct. Experts, please confirm.). If you want to differentiate between a modifier and a sub clause, then I suggest you learn to recognize different types of clauses.

The easiest trick to identify a sub clause is:
A subordinate clause will begin with a subordinate conjunction or a relative pronoun. Lists of subordinate conjunctions and relative pronouns can be found here: https://www.chompchomp.com/terms/subordinateclause.htm

subordinate conjunction + subject + verb = subordinate clause = incomplete thought.

subordinate clause + main clause = Complete thought.

HTH.

Thank you Money9111 and hardik for your replies. I have just actually realized that I did not properly explain my thought process when dealing with the sentences above. I am going to rexplain:
"Although the Argentine ant is neither poisonous nor predatory, individual colonies". here, I read the first part "although...predatory", but then the beginning of the second part "individual colonies" makes me think that the first phrase should modify "individual colonies" and when I could not establish that the first part "as..predatory" modifies "individual colonies", then I thought that's a dangling modifier.
so it goes like this: I look at the first word after the comma, try to see if the first part correctly relates and modifies the first word after the comma, and if not, then I would consider it incorrect.
same applies to:
"Long before it was fashionable to be an expatriate, Josephine Baker made Paris her home "
here josephine Baker was the fist word in the second part of the sentence, but then the first part itself does not logically relate to Josephine (as least I don't see it), again making me think it's incorrect

Third example
As the cost of wireless service has steadily dropped over the last year and as mobile phones have become increasingly common, many people are finding that they can avoid toll charges on their home phones

Hardik, thanks for the links. I wonder whether I can just rely on the keywords (subordinate conjunction keyword such as after although, once, as) to identify whether a sentence is a modifier? if that's the case, how can we explain "Long before it was fashionable to be an expatriate, Josephine Baker made Paris her home"? . The first part does not contain any keywords to indicate that it is a subordinate conjunction. Even if we consider the word "Long" an adverb, I am still not able to see how this adverbial clause would relate to the second part!!
frustrating, I can tell you that much!!!l

tnaim wrote:Thank you Money9111 and hardik for your replies. I have just actually realized that I did not properly explain my thought process when dealing with the sentences above. I am going to rexplain:
"Although the Argentine ant is neither poisonous nor predatory, individual colonies". here, I read the first part "although...predatory", but then the beginning of the second part "individual colonies" makes me think that the first phrase should modify "individual colonies" and when I could not establish that the first part "as..predatory" modifies "individual colonies", then I thought that's a dangling modifier.
so it goes like this: I look at the first word after the comma, try to see if the first part correctly relates and modifies the first word after the comma, and if not, then I would consider it incorrect.
same applies to:
"Long before it was fashionable to be an expatriate, Josephine Baker made Paris her home "
here josephine Baker was the fist word in the second part of the sentence, but then the first part itself does not logically relate to Josephine (as least I don't see it), again making me think it's incorrect

Third example
As the cost of wireless service has steadily dropped over the last year and as mobile phones have become increasingly common, many people are finding that they can avoid toll charges on their home phones

Hardik, thanks for the links. I wonder whether I can just rely on the keywords (subordinate conjunction keyword such as after although, once, as) to identify whether a sentence is a modifier? if that's the case, how can we explain "Long before it was fashionable to be an expatriate, Josephine Baker made Paris her home"? . The first part does not contain any keywords to indicate that it is a subordinate conjunction. Even if we consider the word "Long" an adverb, I am still not able to see how this adverbial clause would relate to the second part!!
frustrating, I can tell you that much!!!l

tnaim,

I think you didn't get my point. Let me try again.

If a sentence is divided in two parts, then you cannot just assume that the first part is a modifier and it has to modify the first word after the comma. In your first example, you assumed that the first part of the sentence "Although..predatory" is a modifier and so the word immediately after the comma has to be the one that this modifier is modifying. The error you are making here is that "Although..predatory" isn't a modifier in the first place and so the word immediately after the comma doesn't have to be something that the first part of the sentence("Although..predatory") must modify.

"Although..predatory" is a sub clause and it provides additional information to the main clause "individual colonies..insect populations". Sub clauses do not modify a noun or a verb and since "Although..predatory" is a sub clause, it cannot modify 'individual colonies'.

tnaim wrote:"Long before it was fashionable to be an expatriate, Josephine Baker made Paris her home "
my logic here was that the first sentence modifies something, but then it was followed by "Josephine Baker".

Well here "Long before..an expatriate" isn't a sub clause, in fact it's an adverbial modifier, if I am correct. Adverbial modifiers modify verbs, adjectives or adverbs denoting time, place, manner, degree, quantity etc. In this example "Long before..an expatriate" is denoting a time period. The thing about adverbial modifiers is that they don't have to touch the part of the sentence they modify. Adverbial modifiers are placed in a sentence in such way as to avoid ambiguity regarding which word it is modifying. Again if I am correct then, adverbial modifier denoting time is usually placed either at the beginning of the sentence or at the end. But keep in mind that this isn't a rule. Its a just practice that usually doesn't create ambiguity in the sentence.

tnaim wrote:As the cost of wireless service has steadily dropped over the last year and as mobile phones have become increasingly common, many people are finding that they can avoid toll charges on their home phones

In this sentence, I also thought that the first part "As the cost of wireless service has.....common" modifies many people

Again you assumed here that the first part is a modifier and it has to modify the word immediately following the comma. As I said earlier, if a sentence is divided in two parts, then you cannot just assume that the first part is a modifier and it has to modify the first word after the comma. If the first part isn't a modifier or if its an adverbial modifier, as it was in the previous example, the word immediately following the comma can be anything depending on the structure of the sentence. "As the cost...increasingly common" is sub clause and it doesn't modify any noun or a verb in the sentence but, in fact, it just provides additional information to the main clause "many people...home phones".

I am no expert and I may not have put across my point really well. If you are still confused I think you should PM one of the experts.

lunarpower wrote:

tnaim wrote:Source: MGMAT CAT verbal

Although the Argentine ant is neither poisonous nor predatory, individual colonies cooperate in a super-colony so large that its collective appetite can become a competitive threat to bird, lizard, and other insect populations.
a) individual colonies cooperate in a super-colony so large that its collective appetite can become a competitive
b) individual colonies cooperate in a super-colony of such size, its collective appetite can become a competing
c) individual colonies cooperate in a super-colony so large as to cause its collective appetite to become a competitive
d) such is the size of the cooperative super-colony comprising individual colonies, its collective appetite can become a competing
e) there is so much size to the individual colonies' cooperative super-colony that its collective appetite can become a competitive
I will post the official answer in the next reply.
My question is not about the answer, but rather about modifiers. Specifically, I am having trouble identifying whether a sentence is a modifier; in the previous sentence, for example, "Although the Argentine ant is neither poisonous nor predatory, individual colonies" I thought that the first phrase "Although the Argentine ant is neither poisonous nor predatory," should be followed by the subject "it" after the comma or anything that would refer to "Argentine ant" but the sentence was followed by individual colonies which made me think that it is incorrect. Similarly, I thought that the following construction was incorrect:
"Long before it was fashionable to be an expatriate, Josephine Baker made Paris her home "
my logic here was that the first sentence modifies something, but then it was followed by "Josephine Baker". I thought that the sentence is incorrect (but it's an OG answer to an SC)

Third example
As the cost of wireless service has steadily dropped over the last year and as mobile phones have become increasingly common, many people are finding that they can avoid toll charges on their home phones

In this sentence, I also thought that the first part "As the cost of wireless service has.....common" modifies many people

I can see that my logic is following the same pattern and that I am doing the same mistake over and over again. Would you please help me understand what it is that I am doing wrong? what are modifying phrases or sentences and how can I tell when a phrase is a modifier? I have searched the internet and could not find any conclusive answers.
Thanks in advance!!![/spoiler]

the mistake is that these modifiers are ENTIRE CLAUSES, with THEIR OWN SUBJECTS AND VERBS, but you're applying a rule that's meant for initial modifiers that don't have their own subjects.

off the top of my head, there are three different kinds of modifiers that follow this rule; note that none of them contains its own subject and verb:

1) present participles (all of these are -ING -- no exceptions!)
ex: coming home from school, the wind blew me off my bike --> wrong, unless the wind was "coming home"
ex: coming home from school, i was blown off my bike by the wind --> correct

2) past participles (mostly -ED; lots of irregular exceptions)
ex: Thrown from his bike by the impact, ... --> must be followed by the PERSON who was thrown from his bike.

3) appositives (noun + modifiers)
ex: The most famous Catalan guitarist in decades, ... --> must be followed by the name of a catalan guitarist.

--

clauses with their own subjects and verbs (such as those in your examples) don't follow this rule.

prepositional phrases also don't follow this rule (ex: in 1994, i graduated from high school is a perfectly good sentence).

Ron,

Let me clarify these points with some examples:

Although not good in verbal, he worked very hard to get a good score.

Because he is not very good in verbal, the student try to follow the instructor carefully.

Because of bad verbal, the student puts much effort to learn the concepts

If he is not very good in verbal, the instructor will try to make him learn good concept.

Analyzing the verbal knowledge, one has to work accordingly.

Puzzled by the complicated verbal questions, the GMAT aspirant starts/ started working hard.

You can add few more to make the picture clear.

Hardik and fightwithgmat, THANK you for your time and your replies!!much appreciated!
Ron!! We, beatthegmat forum members and MGMAT students, are just lucky to have you with us!!!you have saved me a lot of time and confusion!!