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Antecedent of 'it'?

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Antecedent of 'it'?

by crackgmat007 » Sat May 09, 2009 6:12 pm
Rivaling the pyramids of Egypt or even the ancient cities of the Maya as an achievement, the army of terra-cotta warriors created to protect Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor, in his afterlife is more than 2,000 years old and took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete them.
A. took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete them
B. took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete it
C. took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete
D. 700,000 artisans took more than 36 years to complete
E. to complete them too 700,000 artisans more than 36 years

Answer seems to be B, but what does 'it' refer to here?Image
Last edited by crackgmat007 on Thu May 14, 2009 9:23 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Antecedent of 'it'?

by Vemuri » Sat May 09, 2009 11:31 pm
I wonder what the army of terra-cotta warriors created. The non-underlined part of the sentence says the army created something (which I feel should be mentioned) to protect Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor.

Lets assume the army created XYZ. The sentence follows to say that it took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete it (here 'it' refers to XYZ)
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by crackgmat007 » Sun May 10, 2009 8:41 am
I feel the same. But are we allowed to make an assumption in the GMAT?
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by Vemuri » Sun May 10, 2009 9:09 am
crackgmat007 wrote:I feel the same. But are we allowed to make an assumption in the GMAT?
well, its not in the underlined part of the sentence, so we are not changing anything. Nevertheless, I am thinking its a typo error because a GMAT question will not have such missing words.
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by dendude » Mon May 11, 2009 10:01 am
The point required to answer this question is not that the army created anything, but the army itself being the creation.
Pls note that they are tera-cotta warriors, meaning the creation was of tera-cotta.
Tera-cotta is a type of material used in pottery etc.
I'm not sure if the GMAT expects us to know these things.

With this said, I would go with choice C instead of B. I somehow think the it is not required.
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by hk » Mon May 11, 2009 12:41 pm
Guys,

If you look closely at the non-underlined portion of the sentence, you will notice that the comparison is between creations - "Pyramids of Eqypt", "Ancient cities of Maya" and the "Army of Terra cotta warriors".

Hence there is no ambiguity in this sentence. This "Army of terra cotta warriors" is 2000 yrs old. The creation of the "Army" is singular and "It" correctly refers to this creation!!!

A classic GMAT trap to waste your precious time!!!
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by Vemuri » Mon May 11, 2009 6:00 pm
dendude wrote:The point required to answer this question is not that the army created anything, but the army itself being the creation.
Pls note that they are tera-cotta warriors, meaning the creation was of tera-cotta.
Tera-cotta is a type of material used in pottery etc.
I'm not sure if the GMAT expects us to know these things.

With this said, I would go with choice C instead of B. I somehow think the it is not required.
Thank you dendude for the clarification. The sentence now makes perfect sense :-)

The pronoun "it" is required to refer back to the "creation of the army", otherwise the sentence would stop abruptly & cause the reader to question why the artisans were required for more than 36 years.
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by scoobydooby » Mon May 11, 2009 9:54 pm
this is a gprep question and the OA is C.
crackgmat007, the OA might be messed up if you source the question from the sets.

we do not need the "it" at the end of the sentence.

army of terracotta warriers is some structure say X,

so X is more than 2,000 years old and took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete it.

if "it" refers to X, it seems to illogically say X took 700k artisans more than 36 years to complete X (itself). X is not creating itself, the artisans created X
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by Vemuri » Mon May 11, 2009 11:45 pm
scoobydooby wrote:this is a gprep question and the OA is C.
crackgmat007, the OA might be messed up if you source the question from the sets.

we do not need the "it" at the end of the sentence.

army of terracotta warriers is some structure say X,

so X is more than 2,000 years old and took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete it.

if "it" refers to X, it seems to illogically say X took 700k artisans more than 36 years to complete X (itself). X is not creating itself, the artisans created X
Hi Scoobydooby, thanks for pointing that the OA is C.

But, just for the sake of better understanding lets take a few cases on the placement of the pronoun "it" & what each of the sentences independently mean. Please correct my understanding:

Case I: army of terracotta warriers is more than 2,000 years old and it took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete.
Meaning: Here the pronoun "it" refers to "army of terracotta warriers". The sentence means that the 700K artisans took more than 36 years to complete the army of terracotta warriers.

Case II: army of terracotta warriers is more than 2,000 years old and took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to completeit.
Meaning: Here the pronoun "it" refers to "army of terracotta warriers", but the meaning of the sentence changes indicating that the army of terracotta warriers created itself.

Case III: army of terracotta warriers is more than 2,000 years old and took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete.
Meaning: The sentence means that the 700K artisans took more than 36 years to complete the army of terracotta warriers. There is no need for the pronoun to refer back to the army of terracotta warriers.
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by scoobydooby » Tue May 12, 2009 12:04 am
hey vemuri,
i think case I and III are fine.

case III
army of terracotta warriers is more than 2,000 years old and (it) took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete. the implicit "it" refers to the army of teracotta warriers.
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by thetrystero » Thu May 14, 2009 12:18 am
Rivaling the pyramids of Egypt or even the ancient cities of the Maya as an achievement, the army of terra-cotta warriors created to protect Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor, in his afterlife is more than 2,000 years old and took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete them.
A. took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete them
B. took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete it
C. took 700,000 artisans more than 36 years to complete
D. 700,000 artisans took more than 36 years to complete
E. to complete them too 700,000 artisans more than 36 years
C sounds right.

the army of terra-cotta warriors ... took artisans more than 36 years to complete.
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