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Tropical bats

by src_saurav » Fri May 29, 2015 9:40 am
26. Tropical bats play important roles in the rain forest
ecosystem, aiding in the dispersal of cashew, date,
and fig seeds; pollinating banana, breadfruit, and
mango trees; and indirectly help produce tequila by
pollinating agave plants.
(A) pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees;
and indirectly help produce
(B) pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees;
and indirectly helping to produce
(C) pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees;
and they indirectly help to produce
(D) they pollinate banana, breadfruit, and mango
trees; and indirectly help producing
(E) they pollinate banana, breadfruit, and mango
trees; indirectly helping the producing of


Correct answer is B i chose D because i wanted adverb indirectly close to a verb so ignored b..what is your reason.
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by Spencer@Prep4GMAT » Fri May 29, 2015 1:16 pm
src_saurav wrote:26. Tropical bats play important roles in the rain forest ecosystem, aiding in the dispersal of cashew, date, and fig seeds; pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and indirectly help produce tequila by pollinating agave plants.

Here we have a series of participial modifiers describing how tropical bats play important roles in the rain forest ecosystem. What's a participial modifier? It's a phrase acting as an adjective or adverb modifying the sentence that came before and separated by a comma.

For example: He jumped into the water, closing his eyes as he did so.

The difference in this question is that there are 3 participial modifiers separated by semicolons. It's important grammatically for such a series to be parallel. To simplify things, imagine the original sentence as 3 separate sentences:

1) Tropical bats play an important role in the rain forest ecosystem, aiding in the dispersal of cashew, date, and fig seeds.

2) Tropical bats play an important role in the rain forest ecosystem, pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees.

and...

3) Tropical bats play an important role in the rain forest ecosystem, indirectly help produce tequila by pollinating agave plants.

Notice how the third sentence doesn't work. It's because the verb, help, is not a participle. So the first two parts of the series were participial modifiers, and the third part is not. In fact, it's a verb without a subject. (What would make sense for (3) is this: Tropical bats play an important role in the rain forest ecosystem: they indirectly help produce tequila by pollinating agave plants.)

On to the answer choices:

(A) pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and indirectly help produce

Incorrect. Pollinating is parallel with aiding, but help is not, as discussed above.

(B) pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and indirectly helping to produce

Correct. This gives us aiding...; pollinating...; and indirectly helping.... So, we have 3 participles, with the last verb, helping, simply modified by an adverb. This works because they are parallel.

(C) pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and they indirectly help to produce

Incorrect. Aiding...; pollinating...; and they indirectly help.... By adding a subject and using the present tense verb, the third part is not parallel.

(D) they pollinate banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and indirectly help producing

Incorrect. Aiding...; they pollinate...; and indirectly help.... Here we have 3 elements that are not parallel: participle, subject + present tense, present tense.

(E) they pollinate banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; indirectly helping the producing of

Incorrect. Aiding...; they pollinate...; indirectly helping.... The 3 elements are not parallel: participle, subject + present tense, participle. Moreover, the last element should be preceded by and.

Correct answer is B i chose D because i wanted adverb indirectly close to a verb so ignored b..what is your reason.
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by kutlee » Fri May 29, 2015 11:42 pm
Hi Spencer, than you for the explanation. Is the use of semicolon justified here?
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by GMATGuruNY » Sat May 30, 2015 2:59 am
kutlee wrote:Hi Spencer, than you for the explanation. Is the use of semicolon justified here?
The SC above is SC26 in the OG13.
The usage of semi-colons in the OA is correct.

Here, bats are responsible for the following LIST of actions:
aiding in the dispersal of cashew, date, and fig seeds
pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees
indirectly helping to produce tequila by pollinating agave plants.
The phrases in red are quite long and include COMMAS.
When entries in a list are especially long and/or include commas, SEMI-COLONS may serve to separate the entries.
The result here is the OA:
Tropical bats play important roles in the rain forest ecosystem, aiding in the dispersal of cashew, date, and fig seeds; pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and indirectly helping to produce tequila by pollinating agave plants.
The usage of semi-colons makes it easier to discern where one entry in the list ends and another begins.
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by Crystal W » Fri Apr 22, 2016 12:47 pm
Spencer@Prep4GMAT wrote:
src_saurav wrote:26. Tropical bats play important roles in the rain forest ecosystem, aiding in the dispersal of cashew, date, and fig seeds; pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and indirectly help produce tequila by pollinating agave plants.

Here we have a series of participial modifiers describing how tropical bats play important roles in the rain forest ecosystem. What's a participial modifier? It's a phrase acting as an adjective or adverb modifying the sentence that came before and separated by a comma.

For example: He jumped into the water, closing his eyes as he did so.

The difference in this question is that there are 3 participial modifiers separated by semicolons. It's important grammatically for such a series to be parallel. To simplify things, imagine the original sentence as 3 separate sentences:

1) Tropical bats play an important role in the rain forest ecosystem, aiding in the dispersal of cashew, date, and fig seeds.

2) Tropical bats play an important role in the rain forest ecosystem, pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees.

and...

3) Tropical bats play an important role in the rain forest ecosystem, indirectly help produce tequila by pollinating agave plants.

Notice how the third sentence doesn't work. It's because the verb, help, is not a participle. So the first two parts of the series were participial modifiers, and the third part is not. In fact, it's a verb without a subject. (What would make sense for (3) is this: Tropical bats play an important role in the rain forest ecosystem: they indirectly help produce tequila by pollinating agave plants.)

On to the answer choices:

(A) pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and indirectly help produce

Incorrect. Pollinating is parallel with aiding, but help is not, as discussed above.

(B) pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and indirectly helping to produce

Correct. This gives us aiding...; pollinating...; and indirectly helping.... So, we have 3 participles, with the last verb, helping, simply modified by an adverb. This works because they are parallel.

(C) pollinating banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and they indirectly help to produce

Incorrect. Aiding...; pollinating...; and they indirectly help.... By adding a subject and using the present tense verb, the third part is not parallel.

(D) they pollinate banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; and indirectly help producing

Incorrect. Aiding...; they pollinate...; and indirectly help.... Here we have 3 elements that are not parallel: participle, subject + present tense, present tense.

(E) they pollinate banana, breadfruit, and mango trees; indirectly helping the producing of

Incorrect. Aiding...; they pollinate...; indirectly helping.... The 3 elements are not parallel: participle, subject + present tense, participle. Moreover, the last element should be preceded by and.

Correct answer is B i chose D because i wanted adverb indirectly close to a verb so ignored b..what is your reason.
About Choice E, I agree with you, but the explanation on OG is "Although this version maintains parallelism throughout, the phrase helping the producing is an incorrect to construction in English." Do you think OG makes a mistake?Thanks in advance!
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