1000 SCs

[ratheen22]

168.Because the Earth’s crust is more solid there and thus better able to transmit shock waves, an earthquake of a given magnitude typically devastates an area 100 times greater in the eastern United States than it does in the West.

(A) of a given magnitude typically devastates an area 100 times greater in the eastern United States than it does in the West
(B) of a given magnitude will typically devastate 100 times the area if it occurs in the eastern United States instead of the West
(C) will typically devastate 100 times the area in the eastern United States than one of the comparable magnitude occurring in the West
(D) in the eastern United States will typically devastate an area 100 times greater than will a quake of comparable magnitude occurring in the West
(E) that occurs in the eastern United States will typically devastate 100 times more area than if it occurred with comparable magnitude in the West

answer is D and not A as I thought.

Why? because of the tense or some other reason.

TIA,
Ratheen

[dbernst]

Rathleen, the reason why answer choice A is difficult to eliminate is that its clarity (intended meaning), rather than its correctness (provable grammatical construction) is questionable. Choice A contains two implications that are less clear than those in choice D: first, choice A, by using the pronoun "it," seems to indicate that there is one country-wide earthquake that causes damage in both the East and the West rather than the intended two separate earthquakes of comparable magnitude. second, the phrase "of a given magnitude" implies that this magnitude could be any magnitude as long as it is identical in both east and west.

Typically, answer choices that rely on clarity of meaning and conciseness are more difficult to eliminate than those that rely on grammatical correctness. Fortunately, the large majority of incorrect sentence correction answer choices can be eliminated based solely on grammatical errors.

Hope that helps.

-dan

[ratheen22]

Thanks a lot, Dan.