Hi rx_11,
Recently one of e-GMAT customers, posted a similar query related to when pronouns are considered ambiguous and when they are not. I believe that the following response will help you address your concerns as well. This response contains a framework for approaching pronouns, and then this framework is applied to 2 OG sentences.
The key to understanding pronouns is to understand the meaning of the sentence. That being said, I understand your frustration since GMAT does not follow a stringent rule set for pronouns as it does for other elements such as SV, Verbs, Modifiers, Parallelism. Thus, here is what I suggest:
"¢ Understand the meaning of the sentence and determine which is the best possible logical antecedent for the pronoun. (For e-GMAT customers, this is covered in the example of car and tree in Pronoun Concept )
o Pay close attention to the subject of the main clause as that is typically the prime focus of the sentence and hence pronouns have the propensity to refer to the subject. Again, no hard and fast rule.
o However, the above becomes an accepted practice, when there are two parallel clauses and the second clause uses a pronoun. In this case, the antecedent is the subject of the preceding clause. This ensures parallelism in the sentence. The two subjects are the same entities.
"¢ Next, check for the number of the pronoun.
o If the pronoun is singular, then look for other singular nouns that the pronoun could mistakenly refer to.
1. Look for the relative location and structural role that these nouns play.
"¢ If any of these nouns play similar role as the logical antecedent does, then there may be pronoun ambiguity.
"¢ If all of these nouns are much less important or too far away from the pronoun in question, then there may not be any pronoun ambiguity.
Now we will apply the above "framework" to the two OG-12 questions:
Q#91:
Nobody knows exactly how many languages there are in the world, partly because of the difficulty of distinguishing between a language and the sublanguages or dialects within it, but those who have tried to count typically have found about five thousand.
1. What is the logical antecedent of "it"?
Lets first understand what the sentence is talking about:
"¢ No one knows the exact number of languages in the world
"¢ This is because of the difficulty of distinguishing between two things:
o A language
o Sublanguages and dialects within it.
From the context of the sentence, it will only make sense if we say that sublanguages and dialects within that language. Thus "language" is the only logical antecedent for the pronoun "it".
2. Now that we know the logical antecedent for the pronoun, lets list out the possible singular nouns that this pronoun could refer to rule out any possible ambiguity.
"¢ World
"¢ Language
It will not make sense for "it" to refer to world. Also, world is too far away from the pronoun and in fact it is in a logically different part of the sentence. Thus, "language" is the only logical antecedent for this pronoun. Hence no pronoun ambiguity.
Furthermore, since some people might think that "it" refers to "dialects", notice that it will not make sense to say the following:
Distinguish between
"¢ A language
"¢ And sublanguages and dialects within the dialects/sublanguages (As in Microsoft Excel, circular reference is incorrect in English language as well!!!)
So in this sentence, we went purely by the meaning and decided the logical antecedent for the pronoun. Then we looked for other possible references that could be made to determine if there is any scope of ambiguity.
Q#78- Fossils of the arm of a sloth found in Puerto Rico in 1991, and dated at 34 million years old, made it the earliest known mammal of the Greater Antilles Islands.
What is the logical antecedent?
Lets first understand what the sentence is talking about:
"¢ Certain fossils were found in Puerto Rico in 1991 and are 34M years old.
"¢ The presence of these fossils indicate that sloth is the earliest known mammal of GA islands.
Errors:
1. SV-Make sense - The fossils did not make sloth the earliest known mammal. In fact, presence of these fossils prove this fact. Thus, SV do not make sense
2. Pronoun Reference:
Thus, from the meaning, the logical antecedent is "sloth".
Are there other potential antecedents - Lets search for singular nouns that can be referred to by this pronoun:
"¢ Arm
"¢ Sloth
Notice here that both the above nouns play similar roles in the sentence - they describe the fossils. Thus, structurally they are at the same level in the sentence. Thus, even though it does not make logical sense for "it" to refer to "arm" since arm cannot be the mammal, it still creates an ambiguity.
To summarize, I suggest that you apply the framework above on OG or GMAT Prep sentences to gain confidence in this concept. I suggest you take up at least 10 Official Sentences that deal with pronoun errors and analyze each choice very carefully to understand usage of pronouns.
Now coming to the sentence in your post. Both versions are correct. IMO, GMAT will not give these two choices in a SC question. I suggest you apply the above framework on choice 1 and see if you feel that third pronoun is ambiguous.
Let me know if you have any other questions.
Regards,
Payal
