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SC - SV agreement

by karthikpandian19 » Mon Jul 02, 2012 7:15 pm
The villagers' sighting ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been attributed by many present psychologists and physicians to mass hysteria and psychosomatic disorders.


(A) sighting ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been

(B) sighting of ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been

(C) sightings of ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 has been

(D) sighting ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 has been

(E) sighting of ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 are
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by vk_vinayak » Mon Jul 02, 2012 8:24 pm
karthikpandian19 wrote:The villagers' sighting ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been attributed by many present psychologists and physicians to mass hysteria and psychosomatic disorders.


(A) sighting ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been

(B) sighting of ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been

(C) sightings of ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 has been

(D) sighting ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 has been. Shouldn't it be The Villagers' sighting of ghosts and demons instead of The Villagers' sighting ghosts and demons ?

(E) sighting of ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 are
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by karthikpandian19 » Mon Jul 02, 2012 9:02 pm
Once you raise the doubt i am confused......Me too thinking on the same lines of you.......
But this is as per the source Knewton


Can any GMAT Experts clarify?


vk_vinayak wrote:
karthikpandian19 wrote:The villagers' sighting ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been attributed by many present psychologists and physicians to mass hysteria and psychosomatic disorders.


(A) sighting ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been

(B) sighting of ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 have been

(C) sightings of ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 has been

(D) sighting ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 has been. Shouldn't it be The Villagers' sighting of ghosts and demons instead of The Villagers' sighting ghosts and demons ?

(E) sighting of ghosts and demons during the Salem witch trials of 1692 are
Regards,
Karthik
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by karthikpandian19 » Mon Jul 02, 2012 9:09 pm
Btwn the OA is D

and OE is

In this sentence, the subject sighting is a gerund (it stands for "the act of sighting") and so functions as a singular noun. Remember that verbals are always singular when they function as nouns and must agree with singular verbs. In this case, the plural verb have does not agree with the singular sighting.

Choice D changes the plural verb have to the singular has so that it agrees with the singular gerund subject sighting. Choice D is correct.

Choice B retains the original subject-verb agreement error. The preposition of after sighting, though not incorrect, is not necessary.

Choice C changes the singular verbal sighting into the plural sightings, but the plural subject sightings does not agree with the singular verb has.

Choice E contains a subject-verb agreement error, because the plural verb are does not agree with the singular verbal sighting.
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by vk_vinayak » Mon Jul 02, 2012 9:58 pm
Lucky, there wasn't an additional answer choice similar to D but containing 'Of'!

@Experts, what exactly is the difference between:

His sighting ghosts is attributed to hysteria.

AND

His sighting of ghosts is attributed to hysteria.

And when do we prefer one to another?
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by karthikpandian19 » Mon Jul 02, 2012 10:36 pm
As from my understanding,

sighting of ghosts - Here "sighting" is a gerund
sighting ghosts - Here "sighting" is a participle.....

But i would like experts to clarify the statement and concept, as this would require adding the "of" in the answer choice D. (becoz the answer choice D, as of now is Plural subject with singular verb)

vk_vinayak wrote:Lucky, there wasn't an additional answer choice similar to D but containing 'Of'!

@Experts, what exactly is the difference between:

His sighting ghosts is attributed to hysteria.

AND

His sighting of ghosts is attributed to hysteria.

And when do we prefer one to another?
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by Bill@VeritasPrep » Tue Jul 03, 2012 10:13 am
In "sighting ghosts," sighting is not a participle; a participle is a verb form used as an adjective. It's still a gerund, modified by the possessive "villagers' ".
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by GMATGuruNY » Tue Jul 03, 2012 10:30 am
I posted an explanation here:

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by lunarpower » Sun Jul 08, 2012 7:28 pm
i received a private message about this thread.
vk_vinayak wrote:Lucky, there wasn't an additional answer choice similar to D but containing 'Of'!

@Experts, what exactly is the difference between:

His sighting ghosts is attributed to hysteria.

AND

His sighting of ghosts is attributed to hysteria.

And when do we prefer one to another?
ok ... make sure you get this first:

THIS DIFFERENCE WILL NOT BE TESTED ON THE EXAM. FOR THE PURPOSES OF THE EXAM, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT IT.

--

this is a very "writerly" difference, waaaayyy beyond the scope of anything that is going to be tested on the gmat. however, because (a) i'm a writer and (b) i like talking about things that aren't the same all the time, i will go ahead and give you a discussion.

basically, this is the difference:

1/
possessive + VERBing + object
--> used to discuss the notion that this actually happened, not the way in which it happened.
vs.
2/
possessive + VERBing + of + object
--> used to discuss HOW it happened, rather than the simple fact that it did.

e.g.
Your playing that song was a disgrace.
--> this means that the the fact that you played the song in the first place was disgraceful. i.e., even if you played the song with absolute technical perfection, it's still a disgrace that you played it at all.
vs.
Your playing of that song was a disgrace.
--> this means that you really screwed up the song. your decision to play the song itself wasn't disgraceful, but your awful technique was.

another example:
Your singing the national anthem made me cry with emotion.
--> i cried just because it was the national anthem itself; i.e., i cried because of what the anthem stands for, not because of how you sang it.
Your singing of the national anthem made me cry with emotion.
--> i cried because of how you sang it. (... with such feeling, or whatever.)

--

also note that, if there's a dedicated noun form of the verb (like "treatment" instead of "treating", etc.), then that's the form that will appear in #2, but NOT in #1.

e.g.
The doctor's treating foreign patients was controversial.
--> you still use -ING here
--> this sentence means that it was controversial for the doctor to treat these patients at all, regardless of how he/she actually treated them.

The doctor's treatment of foreign patients was controversial.
--> here, you use the dedicated noun form "treatment"
--> this sentence means that the way in which the doctor treated the patients was controversial.

--

again, you don't have to know any of the above, but i enjoy the occasional discussion of "writerly" stuff.

also -- i've noticed that, if the title of the thread is "good problem from [source]" -- like the thread cited above -- then it is exponentially more likely that we are actually dealing with a bad problem. specifically, a problem that tests Things You Simply Don't Have To Know.
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by vk_vinayak » Sun Jul 08, 2012 8:38 pm
lunarpower wrote: ok ... make sure you get this first:

THIS DIFFERENCE WILL NOT BE TESTED ON THE EXAM. FOR THE PURPOSES OF THE EXAM, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT IT.
Ron, thanks for the explanation and advice. Now I know the "difference" (though it gets fizzled out in seconds in my head) between these two usages, and relieved that this "difference" will not be tested on the GMAC. Phew!
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