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What about wordiness?!

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What about wordiness?!

by thegmatbeater » Sun May 25, 2008 7:41 am
39. Because of his closed head injury, Dr. Connors has not and possibly never will be able to practice medicine again.

(A) has not and possibly never will be able to practice
(B) has not and possibly will never be able to practice
(C) has not been and possibly never would be able to practice
(D) has not and possibly never would be able to practice
(E) has not been able to practice and possibly never will be able to practice


The answer is E, my answer is C..I think repeating "able to practice" is unnecessary?
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by s_raizada » Mon May 26, 2008 1:16 pm
The problem is use of would which means 'not certian'. The original meaning is lost.

If you look at the original setence author uses 'will', meaning that author is is certain that dr will never be able to practice.
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by rattanas » Tue May 27, 2008 12:35 am
i believe "possibly" itself mentions uncertainity ..either we use will or would;;the situation is uncertain in both cases......

Can we use "and" with two conjunctions/verbs/prepositions...
has been and possibly never ...sounds not gud to use
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by barron » Tue May 27, 2008 4:32 am
my answer is C

what is OA?
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by senthil » Fri May 30, 2008 5:35 pm
CAN SOME STALWARTS explain why option E and not option C.. here AND in E repeats " able to practise" ???? AT times we use AND avoiding such repetition...
Please explain with clear demarcation :roll:
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by anju » Fri May 30, 2008 6:17 pm
I know why C is not a correct answer:
C has would be able to which means uncertainty and possibly also means uncertainty and hence C cannot be a correct choice.

I do not know why correct choice is B even when there is a repetition. Anu thoughts GMAT GURUs?
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by jasonc » Fri May 30, 2008 7:33 pm
answer is E

verb tense issue - 'never will' is require, not 'never would'
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by rey.fernandez » Fri May 30, 2008 9:07 pm
The word "would" has lots of uses, and one of them is to express something in the future from the point of view of the past.

Example: Last week she said we would go to the concert today.

In the problem, the present perfect tense "has not been" suggests that we are talking about an event that started in the recent past and that runs into the present moment. So if we wish to express a future thought from this point on, we need a future tense. That's why the correct answer, E, uses the simple future tense "will be able..."

Regarding the repetition, it's not necessary to repeat "able to practice", but it does emphasize parallel structure -- something the GMAT values.

Also, there is a concision trap in this sentence... the correct answer happens to be the wordiest. Always leave concision to the end, after you've dealt with grammatical issues and clarity issues.

Rey

Rey
Rey Fernandez
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Manhattan GMAT
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