" WHICH " .

[supshalu]

Hailed as a key discovery in the science of evolution, the fossils of a large scaly creature resembling both a fish and a land-animal provide evidence of a possible link in the evolutionary chain from water-based to land-based organisms.


A) the fossils of a large scaly creature resembling both a fish and a land-animal provide evidence of

B) the fossils of a large scaly creature, which resembles both a fish and a land-animal, provides evidence of


For the above mentioned question the answer is A. I understand why it is.
The answer could have been B had there been the verb "PROVIDE".. as per explanation given in the test

However, I have a problem understanding "WHICH" effects.
Will WHICH always refer to the noun placed just before it?
Is it because "the fossils of... creature" is placed before "WHICH" can we deduce that B will be right.. ( I think so because the sentence states "the fossils of A , which ...... .." )

OR

Should we always deduce that the presence of WHICH will refer to the noun immediately before it.. here : CREATURE and that is another reason why B is out..

[supshalu]

Hi Stacey/Ron,

Can you please help me on this

[anubhav_gaur]

Hailed as a key discovery in the science of evolution, the fossils of a large scaly creature resembling both a fish and a land-animal provide evidence of a possible link in the evolutionary chain from water-based to land-based organisms.


A) the fossils of a large scaly creature resembling both a fish and a land-animal provide evidence of

B) the fossils of a large scaly creature, which resembles both a fish and a land-animal, provides evidence of


For the above mentioned question the answer is A. I understand why it is.
The answer could have been B had there been the verb "PROVIDE".. as per explanation given in the test

However, I have a problem understanding "WHICH" effects.
Will WHICH always refer to the noun placed just before it?
Is it because "the fossils of... creature" is placed before "WHICH" can we deduce that B will be right.. ( I think so because the sentence states "the fossils of A , which ...... .." )

OR

Should we always deduce that the presence of WHICH will refer to the noun immediately before it.. here : CREATURE and that is another reason why B is out..

If you notice, the word "which" is placed just after the comma. Hence in such cases, "which" always modifis the noun placed just before the comma.

However, you cannot hold this true for all sentences. There are quite a few sentences where the placement of "which" is farthere away from the noun that is modified.

hope this helps

[supshalu]

Oh k

So you mean to say of the sentences of this type wherein WHICH refers to PAINTING in first sentence and PRESENTATION in second sentence
So basically we need to decide on the basis of CONTEXT

The framed painting of the Statue of Liberty, which was dusty, has been removed for cleaning.

The presentation on bridges, which was informative, has really sparked interest in engineering careers.

WIll the same hold for "THAT" ???

[RonPurewal]

Oh k

So you mean to say of the sentences of this type wherein WHICH refers to PAINTING in first sentence and PRESENTATION in second sentence
So basically we need to decide on the basis of CONTEXT

The framed painting of the Statue of Liberty, which was dusty, has been removed for cleaning.

The presentation on bridges, which was informative, has really sparked interest in engineering careers.

WIll the same hold for "THAT" ???

the gmat tends to write sentences in which "which" stands for the ELIGIBLE noun that's closest to the comma.
by "eligible", i mean that the noun has to AGREE IN TERMS OF SINGULAR/PLURAL with the FOLLOWING VERB.

here's a CORRECT example:

the box of nails, which is on the counter, is to be used on this project.

in this case, "which" CANNOT refer to "nails", since the verb "is" is singular. therefore, the nearest eligible noun is "box (of nails)". so, "which" unambiguously stands for that.

in our observation, the gmat has been VERY good about this.
whenever i've seen a "which" that refers to "X (preposition) Y" rather than just Y, it has ALWAYS been the case that X was singular and Y was plural (or X was plural and Y was singular), and the verb had a form that matched X and didn't match Y.

so your 1st example would be wrong, because "which was dusty" would refer by default to the statue (statue = singular; was = singular).
even if you choose to view this sentence as ambiguous, rather than flat-out wrong, that doesn't change the fact that there is a problem.

your 2nd example would be correct, because "bridges" is ineligible to be the referent of "which was" (bridges = plural; was = singular).
therefore, "which" refers by default to the presentation on bridges.

[anoo.anand]

the fossils -- in this case it is plural

what is the singular form of "FOSSILS"

is it not that --- if we use "THE FOSSILS" -- that means it is SINGULAR ??

[gorav.s]

Why do you need a singular form of fossils here?
As per Ron explanation this sentence has fossils - plural , and then creature - singular , and hence the first - X is plural - correctly fitting with "provide".

A is correct,

Also which is non essential modifier and we do nto require its presence here - as in sentence B.

Thanks

[RonPurewal]

what is the singular form of "FOSSILS"

the singular is fossil.

is it not that --- if we use "THE FOSSILS" -- that means it is SINGULAR ??

no.
"a/an" can only go with the singular, but "the" can go with either singular or plural.

[elevinty]

between these two options, why A is better:
- the fossils of a large scaly creature resembling both a fish and a land-animal provide evidence of

- the fossils of a large scaly creature resemble both a fish and a land-animal and provide evidence of

[rohit801]

Here "resembling both a fish.." acts as a modifier, modifying fossils. The latter construction:

"the fossils of a large scaly creature resemble both a fish and a land-animal and provide evidence of.." has superflous parallelism.

The context of the sentence doesn't mean that the fossils do 2 actions: 1. Resemble something and 2. Provide evidence of something. For items to be paralle, they have to be similar in context also. EX:
1. Jack improved his tennis game by exercising and eats pizza at night. Here we don't need "eating pizza at night" as these 2 are independent thoughts and not related ideas.

2. Had we tried to mention 2 ways in which Jack improved his tennis game, then these list items would be parallel. Ex:
Jack improved his tennis game by exercising and lifting weights...

[elevinty]

what you are trying to say is both of the last items are not on the same level, hence we dont use "and" so we can differentiate between the two.
Thanks, kudos

[tim]

Actually i think what Rohit is trying to say is that it depends on context and what you mean the sentence to say. Stripped of any external context, both your examples are equally valid..

[divineacclivity]

Experts, could you explain why the answer can't be C. Thanks in advance.

C. a large scaly creature, whose fossils resemble both a fish and a land-animal, provides evidence of

Is it because the discovery can't be the large creature whose fossils resemble a fish n an animal?

[tim]

the official explanation for the problem sums things up pretty nicely. was there something about this explanation that seemed inadequate to you?

[divineacclivity]

I'm sorry but I couldn't find option C being discussed even on going thru the posts all over again :(. I see mainly two choices and "noun, which" being discussed here. Am I missing something?