Neolithic period

[rahul.s]

What was as astonishing as the practice of trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls, has been the use of new technology, like three-dimensional computer mapping, to help neurosurgeons perform difficult and delicate operations

A) What was as astonishing as the practice of trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls,

B) As astonishing as practicing trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls,

C) No less astonishing than the practice of trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls,

D) The practice of trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls, is none the less astonishing than

E) Trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls, has been no less astonishing as

OA: C

[gmattarget700]

A, D, E are easy to eliminate

Seems, I am very good at identifying top two options but then take time to decide on final one

Now, between B and C...honestly, I dont have clear explanation why B is not correct but I chose C ... I just took everything between comma off and tried to check the continuity of the sentence...C "sounded" better...

sorry, I am still trying to get hold of all the rules....lets wait for some good explanation

One suggestion: pls don't provide OA with the question itself..let it run through some brainstorming first...

[thephoenix]

i opted c beliveing my ear.....and use of coorect idiom no less than,
for the same reason E is out(no less ...as is incorrect)
but truly speaking i need to understand reasons for eliminating options...
exp pls help

moreover i have one doubt regarding the use of like ...i think 3-D computer mapping is quoted as example ...and therefore such as should be used
again exp pls help

[nervesofsteel]

B) As astonishing as practicing trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls, has been the use of new technology

C) No less astonishing than the practice of trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls, has been the use of new technology

parallelism hence C...

[gmatmachoman]

B) As astonishing as practicing trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls, has been the use of new technology

C) No less astonishing than the practice of trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls, has been the use of new technology

parallelism hence C...

Agreed C is better than E.

[dmitriyaleyev]

B) As astonishing as practicing trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls,

C) No less astonishing than the practice of trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls,

Between B and C:

B. practicing trepanation?????? - is the procedure as astonishing as practicing trepanation????????? doesnt make any sense.
C. THE practice of trepanation - is the procedure as astonishing as the practice of trepanation? - RIGHT.

Hence C

[lunarpower]

this problem is exactly the same as #36 in the first edition purple verbal supplement, with some inconsequential words changed.

what's the source of this problem?
to the original poster -- did you make this up yourself, in order to avoid the issues associated with copying og questions?

--

in any case, the parallelism here is fairly simple to resolve and immediately boils the problem down to two choices, (a) and (c). as with many other examples of parallelism, however, the primary difficulty lies not in resolving the issue, but in finding it in the first place.
in other words, once you notice that these two constructions are supposed to be parallel, it's fairly easy to pick out the examples that aren't -- but noticing this in the first place is the difficulty!

[mgmt_gmat]

IMO (C)...


No less. than... is the correct idiom here.

[lunarpower]

IMO (C)...


No less. than... is the correct idiom here.

be careful when you say things such as "THE correct idiom". often, there is more than one idiom that may be used in a given situation. just because one idiom is correct, do not assume that all other idioms are wrong.

in this case, "as ADJ as" (where the adjective is "remarkable") is every bit as acceptable as an idiom.

[rahul.s]

this problem is exactly the same as #36 in the first edition purple verbal supplement, with some inconsequential words changed.

what's the source of this problem?
to the original poster -- did you make this up yourself, in order to avoid the issues associated with copying og questions

i can't quite recollect the source, but i think this problem is from knewton's diagnostic test.

[lunarpower]

this problem is exactly the same as #36 in the first edition purple verbal supplement, with some inconsequential words changed.

what's the source of this problem?
to the original poster -- did you make this up yourself, in order to avoid the issues associated with copying og questions

i can't quite recollect the source, but i think this problem is from knewton's diagnostic test.

hmmm.

if that's the case, then they are skating dangerously close to copyright violation -- if i were them, i would watch it.
they didn't even bother to scramble the order of the answer choices!

[lunarpower]

received a private message asking me to comment.

the most important way to reduce the answer choices to this problem is to use PARALLELISM.
remember that parallelism is the most frequently tested type of error on the test.
also remember that, if you don't recognize parallelism when you see it, you may attempt to attack one half of a parallel structure as if it were a genuine split between the answer choices. this can often prove to be disastrous, since you may have two or more options that are perfectly correct on their own, but only one of which is properly parallel to the other half of the structure.

in this problem, parallelism is necessary, since the sentence is making a comparison between two practices (in terms of how astonishing those practices are).
the NON-underlined portion of the parallel structure is "the use of new technology". therefore, the underlined portion of the parallel structure must contain a wording with similar grammatical form.
if we isolate that portion of each answer choice -- the portion referring to the practice of trepanation, which is parallel to the use of technology -- then we see:
(a) the practice of trepanation
(b) practicing trepanation
(c) the practice of trepanation
(d) the practice of trepanation
(e) trepanation
of these, "the practice of trepanation" is clearly most parallel to "the use of new technology", so we can IMMEDIATELY eliminate (b) and (e).

more comments on this topic later.

[thephoenix]

moreover i have one doubt regarding the use of like ...i think 3-D computer mapping is quoted as example ...and therefore such as should be used
again exp pls help

more comments on this topic later.

hey RON my question is still unanswered
What was as astonishing as the practice of trepanation, a surgical procedure popular during the Neolithic period that involved drilling holes into patients' skulls, has been the use of new technology, like three-dimensional computer mapping, to help neurosurgeons perform difficult and delicate operations

how like is used for quoting examples
and b/n A and C how to eliminate A
thanks

[lunarpower]

how like is used for quoting examples

you're right -- that's just incorrect. it should be "such as".

(ironic, when there are errors in problems that are essentially plagiarized from the official source!)

and b/n A and C how to eliminate A
thanks

* parallelism: you can't have both "was" (past tense) and "has been" (present perfect tense) referring to the same thing in the same time period.

* meaning: if you say "WHAT was as astonishing...," the implication is that the following thing(s) is/are the ONLY thing(s) that have ever been that astonishing. this is not a reasonable meaning.
note that choice (c) just makes a comparison between the astonishing qualities of the two practices, with no such claim to exclusivity.
although i seriously doubt that you will ever have to use this nuance of meaning to make a decision on the gmat, here are two illustrative examples anyway:
these papers were on the table --> (there could also have been other things on the table)
these papers are what was on the table --> (nothing else was on the table)

[thephoenix]

thanks a ton RON