GMAT Prep: Star Collapse

[lindaliu9273]

Hi instructor,

Is the only fault in E is the tense?

I am not sure about the two "its" in E. Can they clearly refer to the "a star's"?

Thanks a lot.

[tim]

It is clear what the "its" refers to, so that is not an issue. Generally you won't see the antecedent after the pronoun as we do here, but I wouldn't eliminate E on that basis alone.

[lindaliu9273]

It is clear what the "its" refers to, so that is not an issue. Generally you won't see the antecedent after the pronoun as we do here, but I wouldn't eliminate E on that basis alone.

Thanks a lot

[RonPurewal]

No problem.

[rustom.hakimiyan]

I was stuck between D and E and unfortunately picked E because of parallelism(or so I thought).

E -- Were is not for X, Y. -- X and Y being the causes of the star's collapse.

Why is that wrong? I know you briefly mentioned that the verb tense is wrong in E but i'm not sure I follow. "Have caused" implies that the result of the collapse is still evident today. Isn't that the actual meaning?

Edit: Another point to clarify -- "its" in option E is a valid pronoun because it's referring to the possessive "star's" and "its" can refer to possessives. Is my understanding correct?

[RonPurewal]

the tense in E is "would have caused", not "have caused".

(incidentally, if the verb were "have caused", you'd have an even easier elimination--subject-verb disagreement. "its weight have caused..."? nope.)


yes, the pronoun in e is fine.

[rustom.hakimiyan]

the tense in E is "would have caused", not "have caused".

(incidentally, if the verb were "have caused", you'd have an even easier elimination--subject-verb disagreement. "its weight have caused..."? nope.)


yes, the pronoun in e is fine.

So why is "would have caused" not correct? Doesn't that imply an ongoing event because "would" is "future from past/similar to will if we were talking about present"?

[RonPurewal]

"future from past/similar to will if we were talking about present"

^^ that's "would cause".

"would have ___ed" is used to speculate about the consequences of things that didn't actually happen.
e.g.,
yesterday i saw a nice table. if it had fit in my car, i would have bought it and taken it home. unfortunately, though, it was too big.

[RonPurewal]

also, as we're seeing here, general statements / rules about verb tenses (e.g., "future from past/similar to will if we were talking about present") tend to be extremely clumsy, hard to remember, and hard to understand.

you'll do much better with verb tenses if you just memorize a couple of simple examples for each tense. then, when you encounter those tenses later, you can make analogies to the examples that are already in your head.

[gmatkiller_24]

Hi, Ron

how can you figure out that Were it not for the fusion-powered heat and radiation that rush from its core is something happening in the present?

I have some troubles of understanding this inverted structure. Can it be interpreted as " if X does not happen?"


thanks!

[RonPurewal]

Hi, Ron

how can you figure out that Were it not for the fusion-powered heat and radiation that rush from its core is something happening in the present?

the "were..." doesn't determine the timeframe of the sentence; the sentence is in the present because "rush" is in the present.

[RonPurewal]

I have some troubles of understanding this inverted structure. Can it be interpreted as " if X does not happen?"

you have the basic idea, but this is more accurate if you change "happen" to "exist".

Were it not for xxxx, BAD THING would happen.
If xxxx didn't exist, BAD THING would happen.

[RajanA556]

Dear Ron,

While solving this question today, I eliminated A, B, and E as I felt that these options have modifier errors and that 2nd part should start with ''a star''.

Am I correct?

Thank you so much.

Regards ,
Rajan Agrawal

[RajanA556]

Dear Ron,

I think somehow my question is missed.Could you please consider my question?

Thank you so much!!

Regards,
Rajan

[RonPurewal]

Dear Ron,

While solving this question today, I eliminated A, B, and E as I felt that these options have modifier errors and that 2nd part should start with ''a star''.

Am I correct?

Thank you so much.

Regards ,
Rajan Agrawal

those are not actual errors, since the beginning part ('Were it not for xxxx') modifies the entire situation described in the following sentence.
(in fact, it's impossible for this modifier to describe just a noun. think about what it means: 'if this stuff didn't exist then _____.' you can't fill that blank with a noun.)

on the other hand, the 'its' is clearly meant to describe a star. so, even though this doesn't rise to the level of 'right vs. wrong', it is still objectively better to begin the main sentence with 'a star', and objectively worse to begin it with any other word.