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OG12 Q 92

by GMATMadeEasy » Tue May 24, 2011 11:05 am
The energy source on Voyager 2 is not a nuclear reactor, in which atoms are actively broken apart;
rather a kind of nuclear battery that uses natural radioactive decay to produce power.
(A) apart; rather
(B) apart, but rather
(C) apart, but rather that of
(D) apart, but that of
(E) apart; it is that of

OA is B

Could we use here Not X but Y ? Are both interchangeable ?
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by Ashley@VeritasPrep » Tue May 24, 2011 9:01 pm
Hi there,

Yep, you could certainly substitute a simple "not X but Y" here. The "rather" is always optional after the "but," and its function is really just to emphasize the distinction between the X and Y. For instance, I'd probably say, "He's not a child, but a teenager," since I don't care too much about making a very big point of the distinction. But I'd probably say, "This was not an unfortunate accident, but rather a malicious, premeditated crime," because I really want to emphasize the distinction between what it was and what it was not. That's subjective, though, and grammatically you're safe either way.

Cheers!
Ashley Newman-Owens
GMAT Instructor
Veritas Prep

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