Sentence Correction

The Audubon Society and other conservation groups, concerned over what they have perceived to be the serious threatening of the environment as posed by the policies of the government, are preparing for a major political effort.
(A) have perceived to be the serious threatening of the environment as
(B) perceived as the serious threat to the environment as
(C) perceive being the serious threat to the environment
(D) are perceiving as the serious threatening of the environment
(E) perceive as the serious threat to the environment

OA is [spoiler]E)[/spoiler]

Actually perceived as is an idiom ..... A, C are eliminated....ARE perceiving progressive sentence is not needed here....So down to B or E.....How to get from these two ....please help

perceive to - view towards to - redundant [Wrong]

Could any one tell why E and not B

Chaitanya_1986 wrote:Could any one tell why E and not B

I preferred E over B considering the tense of word perceive.

B has perceived, which is past, signifying concern over something which was perceived in the past and in no more perceived. Moreover, the word 'as' at the end of option B distorts the sentence.

E hs perceive, present, signifying concern over something which is still valid.

Thus E.

concerned.. perceived... two verbs .. which activity happened first.. we cant judge..

Here `posed by the policies of the `is a past participle modifier that seems to modify the environment . The environment posed by policies ? Absurd ! How come E ? or is is there a typo in E . There should be an "as " at the end of E

bubbliiiiiiii wrote:

Chaitanya_1986 wrote:Could any one tell why E and not B

I preferred E over B considering the tense of word perceive.

B has perceived, which is past, signifying concern over something which was perceived in the past and in no more perceived. Moreover, the word 'as' at the end of option B distorts the sentence.

E hs perceive, present, signifying concern over something which is still valid.

Thus E.

there seems to be only a meaning difference between B and E . that they perceived in the past doesnt make the sentence wrong ?

Hey guys,

Thanks for the invite to chime in!

My take - the biggest difference between B and E is the logic of the verbs used. With E, there's no room for doubt, as the timeline looks like:

Currently, these groups perceive gov't policies to be a threat to the environment, so they are (currently) preparing for a major political effort.

The indicative tense "perceive" shows that this is a current perception and it's fully consistent with the "are preparing" fact that this is all happening now.

B is a little different in that "perceived" is past-tense and therefore less consistent with the timeframe. Has that perception changed? If so, why are they currently preparing the political effort? "Perceive" as a verb is more of a lasting verb than a one-time event. You "learn" something once; you "perceive" it until something changes. So a past-tense "perceived" really indicates that that perception has ceased or at least changed in some way...logically, then, B is a little off.

Now - I doubt that this is an official question and that the GMAT would require that specific of knowledge of "perceive" as a verb. As a lifelong English speaker/reader I caught that distinction and saw E as a significantly better choice than B right away, but the GMAT isn't much for requiring that nuanced of knowledge of English parlance. So here I think the big takeaway for everyone is "pay attention to the logical timeline given by verb tenses" and not necessarily "you have to know the verb 'perceive'".

I'd also take a little issue with the subject of this post - to me this is much more a verb tense question than it is an idiom question. And I'd just caution everyone against seeing each SC question as a "unique snowflake" with one particular idiom rule that applies to one particular word...you just can't know all those nuances and you don't really have to. Try to use the word "idiom" as infrequently as possible when you study SC and you'll train yourself to think much more systematically as a result. The systematic approach is much simpler and more effective.