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Nearly two tons of nuclear-reactor fuel

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Nearly two tons of nuclear-reactor fuel

by vk_vinayak » Tue Sep 04, 2012 3:10 am

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Nearly two tons of nuclear-reactor fuel have already been put into orbit around the Earth, and the chances of a collision involving such material increase greatly as the amount of both space debris and satellites continue to rise.

A. as the amount of both space debris and satellites continue to rise
B. as the rise continues in both the amount of satellites and space debris
C. as the amount of space debris and the number of satellites continue to rise
D. with the continually increasing amount of space debris and the number of satellites
E. with the amount of space debris continuing to increase along with the number of satellites

Provide explanations for each choice.

[spoiler]OA: C[/spoiler]
Last edited by vk_vinayak on Tue Sep 04, 2012 9:57 am, edited 1 time in total.
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by Kasia@EconomistGMAT » Tue Sep 04, 2012 8:15 am

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Answers A and B are incorrect. "Satellites" are countable. Therefore, it is incorrect to say "the amount of satellites."
Answer C is correct.
Answers D and E are much longer and redundant in comparison to answer C. Also they use "with" instead of "as", which is less favored in the GMAT. Moreover, answer E changes the intended meaning because of the use of "along with" instead of "and." The original sentence suggests that the number of satellites and the amount of space debris continue to rise and that these are two separate problems. Answer E states that the amount of debris is correlated with the number of satellites.
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by vk_vinayak » Tue Sep 04, 2012 9:12 am

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Hi Kasia,

Thanks for the reply.

When I read the phrase "chances ... increase" the first word that came to my mind is 'with' and I stuck with it, getting the answer wrong. You wrote that 'with' is less preferred on gmat. Is it a general trend or applies only to 'With Vs As' duel?

Also, what is 'as' used as here? Is it used in the sense of 'because' ? or it is just a plain old clause indicator?

If we have to, how do we write the correct response beginning with the word 'with'?
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by whats_in_the_store » Tue Sep 04, 2012 9:40 am

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What's the official answer? Though I prefer option C over D because the number of satellites in D looks bit isolated and lacks parallelism.
Last edited by whats_in_the_store on Tue Sep 04, 2012 8:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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by Mission2012 » Tue Sep 04, 2012 10:50 am

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HI Kasia,

Option "D" has present continues where as option A has simple present tense.
Shouldn't simple present tense preferred here?
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by Kasia@EconomistGMAT » Tue Sep 04, 2012 11:36 pm

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@vk_vinayak
"As" used in this context means "because."
"With" used in this type of a structure is not favored in the GMAT. "As" is a better choice.

@Mission2012
None of the answers uses the present progressive tense. The -ing form used is not a part of a conjugated verb.
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by ashish40 » Fri Apr 13, 2018 7:32 am

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@GMATGuruNY Please explain the error in option D.
Kasia@EconomistGMAT wrote:Answers A and B are incorrect. "Satellites" are countable. Therefore, it is incorrect to say "the amount of satellites."
Answer C is correct.
Answers D and E are much longer and redundant in comparison to answer C. Also they use "with" instead of "as", which is less favored in the GMAT. Moreover, answer E changes the intended meaning because of the use of "along with" instead of "and." The original sentence suggests that the number of satellites and the amount of space debris continue to rise and that these are two separate problems. Answer E states that the amount of debris is correlated with the number of satellites.
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by GMATGuruNY » Sun Apr 15, 2018 2:47 am

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ashish40 wrote:@GMATGuruNY Please explain the error in option D.
D: The chances...increase greatly with the...increasing amount.
Here, increase and increasing are redundant.
Eliminate D.
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by Akrita@Jamboree » Tue Apr 17, 2018 5:14 am

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vk_vinayak wrote:Nearly two tons of nuclear-reactor fuel have already been put into orbit around the Earth, and the chances of a collision involving such material increase greatly as the amount of both space debris and satellites continue to rise.

A. as the amount of both space debris and satellites continue to rise
B. as the rise continues in both the amount of satellites and space debris
C. as the amount of space debris and the number of satellites continue to rise
D. with the continually increasing amount of space debris and the number of satellites
E. with the amount of space debris continuing to increase along with the number of satellites

Provide explanations for each choice.

[spoiler]OA: C[/spoiler]
The intended meaning of the sentence here is to give a reason for the prediction of why " the chances of a collision involving such material increase greatly". This reason is given by words such as "as", "because", and "since" on the GMAT. "With" is a preposition and cannot be used to give reasons. Additionally, using "with" results, in most cases, in wordy, awkward, and unclear constructions. This is mainly because "with" - or any preposition - must be followed by a noun or an "-ing" noun phrase, and using a noun phrase always results in a clumsy construction. Additionally, the usage of "with" in this question makes it look like that given events are mutually exclusive and occurring together, and fails to establish a cause-effect relationship intended in the original sentence. Eliminate D and E

Answers A and B are incorrect. "Satellites" are countable. "Amount of" should only be used for uncountable nouns - for example, "amount of water", "amount of money", "amount of mud", etc. Therefore, "the amount of satellites", is incorrect. Additionally, "the amount of" is the main subject in Option A, and therefore the plural verb "continue" is incorrect. "The rise" as a noun is awkward in Option B.

This leaves us with option C, which uses "number of" for countable (satellites) and "amount of" for uncountable (space debris) correctly, and establishes the correct causal relationship between the two events:

Cause: the amount of space debris and the number of satellites continue to rise
Result: the chances of a collision involving such material increase greatly.

Also, in option C, "rise" is being used as a verb, resulting in a more active and direct construction, and the plural verb "continue" is correct since the subject "the amount..and the number..." is plural.

Hope this helps.
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