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Majority of the Talk

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by chaitanya.mehrotra » Sun Jul 17, 2011 12:08 pm
The majority of the talk was devoted to an account of the experimental methods used by investigators in the field.
a. ...
b. The greater part of the talk was
c. The bulk of the talk has been
d. A large amount of the talk has been
e. A predominance of the talk was

I chose A, but the correct answer is B. Why is A wrong ?
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by Chaitanya_1986 » Sun Jul 17, 2011 1:11 pm
The majority of the talk was devoted to an account of the experimental methods used by investigators in the field.
a. ...
b. The greater part of the talk was
c. The bulk of the talk has been
d. A large amount of the talk has been
e. A predominance of the talk was

See, Greater,bulk,majority,large are quantity words.....So they are wrong....talk cannot be quantified by those.....So predominance is the correct choice......So E is answer
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by lunarpower » Mon Jul 25, 2011 1:30 am
chaitanya.mehrotra wrote:The majority of the talk was devoted to an account of the experimental methods used by investigators in the field.
a. ...
b. The greater part of the talk was
c. The bulk of the talk has been
d. A large amount of the talk has been
e. A predominance of the talk was

I chose A, but the correct answer is B. Why is A wrong ?
what's the source of this problem?
wherever you got it -- do not use this source from this point onward.

this question is worthless; in fact, any of (a), (b), (c), (d) could be correct. (the only choice that's definitively wrong here is (e), which misuses the word "predominance".)
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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by chaitanya.mehrotra » Mon Jul 25, 2011 12:59 pm
lunarpower wrote:
chaitanya.mehrotra wrote:The majority of the talk was devoted to an account of the experimental methods used by investigators in the field.
a. ...
b. The greater part of the talk was
c. The bulk of the talk has been
d. A large amount of the talk has been
e. A predominance of the talk was

I chose A, but the correct answer is B. Why is A wrong ?
what's the source of this problem?
wherever you got it -- do not use this source from this point onward.

this question is worthless; in fact, any of (a), (b), (c), (d) could be correct. (the only choice that's definitively wrong here is (e), which misuses the word "predominance".)
Ron the source of this question is the beat the gmat SC resources ..
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by lunarpower » Mon Jul 25, 2011 3:11 pm
Ron the source of this question is the beat the gmat SC resources ..
yikes. well, it's still a horrible question, and a case could still be made for any of A/B/C/D. (both verb tenses are logical -- "has been" works if the talk is still going on; "was" works if the talk is over. also, all of the idioms in a/b/c/d are legitimate, although a couple of them are stylistically weird.)

is there an answer explanation given? if so, what does it say?
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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by smackmartine » Mon Jul 25, 2011 5:50 pm
IMO B

I totally agree to what Ron said, but many instructors say that we should not change the tense unless there is a shift in time. Keeping that in mind, I just cruised through options and rejected C and D (has been devoted--> present perfect compared to used) . Among A,B and E

E does not sound right because predominance is a "quality" and we are dealing with "some kind of quantity - countable/uncountable"

A - Majority of TALKS and not TALK (I am not sure on this but I have never seen a singular objects used with Majority. Eg. Majority of students ARE (plural usage) , while for singular usage --> In the election, the Majority HAS the power).

B is the winner.
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by cgoyal.gmat » Tue Jul 26, 2011 4:29 am
I think the issue is due to "majority" (used to describe countable things)is used here to describe something that is uncountable (talk).
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by lunarpower » Tue Jul 26, 2011 4:48 am
smackmartine wrote:I totally agree to what Ron said, but many instructors say that we should not change the tense unless there is a shift in time. Keeping that in mind, I just cruised through options and rejected C and D (has been devoted--> present perfect compared to used) . Among A,B and E
"used" here is not a past-tense verb -- it's a past participle (which functions as an adjective). such participles don't have tenses; they adapt to the tense of the clause to which they are attached.
therefore, there is no "change" in the tense, because there are no other verbs in the sentence besides was/has been.

given this context, basically *any* tense would be fine.
was --> the talk is over.
has been --> the talk is ongoing, and the sentence describes the part that has so far been given.
is (not in the choices, but workable) --> general discussion of the talk (perhaps from its authors).
E does not sound right because predominance is a "quality" and we are dealing with "some kind of quantity - countable/uncountable"
not sure what you mean here, but you're correct that "predominance" is wrong. (the easiest way to find out more about "predominance" is to consult a dictionary.)
A - Majority of TALKS and not TALK (I am not sure on this but I have never seen a singular objects used with Majority. Eg. Majority of students ARE (plural usage) , while for singular usage --> In the election, the Majority HAS the power).
it's true that "majority" is used with plurals in the majority of instances (heh), but it can also be used with singular / uncountable quantities.

in fact, the OG itself uses it in this way at times. e.g., see p. 37 of OG12, problem 29, in which "the majority of the coal" is mentioned.
Ron has been teaching various standardized tests for 20 years.

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