Sentence Correction

Hi Ron,

double the figure for 1977

In this sentence figure is compared with 1270 visitors. Is it ok to compare figure with 1270 visitors.
Also can were replace figure with "number" here.

Would option "double the number for 1977"

Rgds,

lunarpower wrote:I received a private message about this problem.

This problem is essentially a carbon copy of an old OG problem. It's in the 11th edition, near the beginning of the SC chapter.
The original sentence says:
A survey by the National Council of Churches showed that in 1986 there were 20,376 female ministers, almost 9 percent of the nation's clergy, twice as much as 1977

The other choices are basically the same as the ones here.

The correct answer is "double the figure for 1977".


Don't waste your time with this source. If you have the older OG edition, check that out instead.

In any case, this problem is likely not very important -- it was, after all, removed in the transition from the 11th to the 12th edition OG.


--

Thanks Ron for preempting my question.
Needless to say..but still awesome explanation

lunarpower wrote:If your next complaint is "it's not clear enough that we're talking about the percentage", then, yes, that's a valid point -- and that's almost certainly why the problem was removed from the OG.

The sentence in question here makes no sense:

According to the national safari park representatives, in June 2010 there were 1270 visitors, almost 70 percent of the total visitors, twice as much as December 2009.

What exactly does of the total visitors refer to? As lunarpower stated, the sentence is a hack job, and definitely sounds like one. :mrgreen: There are other problems with the sentence as well: a) "national safari park" should probably be capitalized if it refers to a specific park; b) "there were 1270 visitors" is vague--there were 1270 visitors exactly where?

To fix the sentence, you'd have to change it to something like this:

According to National Safari Park representatives, in June 2010 there were 1270 visitors to the park, almost 70 percent of the total visitors for the year....

A couple other points:

1) Concerning the redundancy that occurs in E), sometimes that's acceptable in English. For instance, it's fine to say I'm a friend of John's. But in most cases, as in E), this kind of redundancy is unacceptable.

C - double the figure for December 2009
D - double what it was in December 2009

2) In D), not only is "it" vague, using a verb here is also unnecessary. Choice C) is more concise, elegant, and forceful.

Anyway, as it stands, the original question should be put out to pasture--in the middle of the Mojave Desert.