sc, comma+doing , not easy

[RonPurewal]

you too.

[RickyH486]

Pronouns are always a function of intended meaning. You can't memorize mechanical rules for this sort of thing.

E.g.,
My grandfather bought literally thousands of bottles of aspirin, just to ensure that his family would never run out of it even in the event of a nuclear disaster.
"It" = aspirin. (Grandad didn't want to run out of aspirin. "Running out of bottles" wasn't the issue.)

Hi Ron: Great explanation from you as always. I am just wondering if your sentence says "My grandfather bought literally thousands of bottles of aspirin, just to ensure that his family would never run out of them even in the event of a nuclear disaster.", would it still be correct? My thought process in this case "them" is referring back to "bottles of aspirin"-I see your sentence is better than mine but I just want to confirm if my understanding of how to determine the referent of the pronoun using context is correct. Thanks.

[RonPurewal]

again, the point is not "running out of bottles"; the point is "running out of aspirin".
your version conveys the wrong meaning, so, it's wrong.

if your question is "Does them adequately refer to bottles?" then, sure... but the sentence still doesn't make sense, so it's still wrong.

[MeiS116]

why "collections of music" match with "it" rather than "them". Is that simply because of the meaning? say, "collections" cannot be transfer, copy or alter, only "music" can?

Thanks!

[RichaChampion]

Mr Purewal,

In option B, which is also the correct answer I need to understand few things -

transferring, copying and altering are they acting as a verb+ing modifier modifying the preceding clause?

Since digital recording offers essentially perfect reproduction - on compact discs, digital audiotapes, or digital videodiscs - audiophiles can accumulate vast collections of music, transferring them from one format to another, copying it, and digitally altering it with little effort and not damaging the sound quality.

As far as I know "-" can be used just like semicolon to separate 2 clauses or just like a comma. Here dash is used twice and I am unable to decide the flow of the sentence that in what capacity is "-" is used here.

[RonPurewal]

whichever choice you've copied there ^^, it's definitely not the correct one (there's nothing for "them" to stand for... among other things)

please double-check that transcription.

[RichaChampion]

Oh I am so sorry it looks like that I just posted the Option A instead of option B.

Since digital recording offers essentially perfect reproduction - on compact discs, digital audiotapes, or digital videodiscs - audiophiles can accumulate vast collections of music, transferring it from one format to another, copying it, and digitally altering it with little effort and no damage to the sound quality.

P.S. This is option B now.

[RonPurewal]

transferring, copying and altering are they acting as a verb+ing modifier modifying the preceding clause?

yes.

[RonPurewal]

I am unable to decide the flow of the sentence that in what capacity is "-" is used here.

the two dashes surround the modifier "on compact discs, digital audiotapes, or digital videodiscs". thus, their role is to block off that modifier.
this job would normally be done by a pair of commas, but the dashes help with clarity (since there are already commas within that modifier).

i'm curious—what was the difficulty you had in figuring this out? it's plain to see that the two dashes are surrounding that modifier, so, i'm not sure what could have caused confusion here.
what confused you? what else did you think the dashes might be doing?

[RichaChampion]

I am unable to decide the flow of the sentence that in what capacity is "-" is used here.

the two dashes surround the modifier "on compact discs, digital audiotapes, or digital videodiscs". thus, their role is to block off that modifier.
this job would normally be done by a pair of commas, but the dashes help with clarity (since there are already commas within that modifier).

i'm curious—what was the difficulty you had in figuring this out? it's plain to see that the two dashes are surrounding that modifier, so, i'm not sure what could have caused confusion here.
what confused you? what else did you think the dashes might be doing?

Ron Sir,

Actually, so far I had the notion that "-" is used to separate two sentences just like ";" does. I searched many google and many forums and realized that it can be used in many other forms too and this was like a new information to me as a Non-native speaker. The more I studied about this dash, the more confused I was. After interacting to you and studying your solutions from more than 2 years I knew one fact that you always give precise information, and also warn not to dive too deeper with grammar as GMAC test limited concepts that's why I put forward this question to you.

[RonPurewal]

oh hmm... ok.
well, the context is clear enough that you should be able to figure out the role of the punctuation, WITHOUT having to poke around a bunch of random forums.
• there are 2 dashes
• those 2 dashes are, very clearly, surrounding a modifier
• therefore... you can deduce that the purpose of the dashes is to block off that modifier.

speaking more generally, when you're looking at a CORRECT answer, you should ALWAYS be able to figure out HOW THINGS WORK in that sentence... just from using the intended meaning (which you can figure out with common sense), along with the structure that's there.

you're more than welcome to ask on this forum, of course -- but, the context clues should be strong enough to let you ascertain how stuff works.