Yellow jackets number among the 900 or so species of the

[vinaykumarbhatia]

Ron sir

can u pls explain what does "almost all females" in option C refers to ????

[RonPurewal]

Ron sir

can u pls explain what does "almost all females" in option C refers to ????

what are you asking? are you asking a question about the grammatical assignment of that phrase, or are you asking about context?

also, don't forget that (c) is an incorrect answer choice.

[jingtengliu]

1.Could anyone tell me where is the conj in this sentence?
2.Where is the Verb in the first sentence(Yellow jackets....social wasps)?

thx all

[RonPurewal]

1.Could anyone tell me where is the conj in this sentence?

"conj"?
if you mean "conjunction", there isn't one. instead, there is the modifier construction explained in this post earlier in the thread:
post10963.html#p10963

PLEASE DO NOT ABBREVIATE. thank you.

2.Where is the Verb in the first sentence(Yellow jackets....social wasps)?

in that part, "number" is a verb.

[jp.jprasanna]

How can we eliminate A and E ? Why are they wrong?

Check the second post in this thread, by "Guest", for an explanation of what is wrong with A.

For E, check the parallelism--"society that is highly cooperative, organized, and it consists . . ."

Hi Jamie - Thanks for your explanations.

"society that is highly cooperative, organized, and it consists . . ."

I understand we CANT compare a phrase that starts with "that" to one that starts with "when , where , which, or who" - Pls correct me if I'm wrong.

But my doubt here with regards to parallelism is that the "it" here just redundant or wrong? (I also see there is a meaning problem here with the use of "AND" but I just wanted to understand the parallelism error)

Here subject for "consist" is society which is already the subject of the previous clause right so would the be below a correct variant?


living in a society that is highly cooperative, organized and consists of almost all

Few more general Qs

Although the tomato ..... , it....
the tomato ..... ; it....
Here it refers to subject of the previous clause,


The beetle feeds ....... and it runs.......
Here the "it" is considered redundant.... hence wrong?


Thanks in advance :-)

Cheers

[anubhavgilhotra]

I have question about connecting two independent clauses without the use of conjunction:

Yellow jackets number among the 900 or so species of the world’s social wasps, (Complete Clause)

wasps that live in a highly cooperative and organized society consisting almost entirely of females"”the queen and her sterile female workers.( Clause)

I can see we can connect two independent clauses without the conjunction but under what circumstances we can do that.

[jp.jprasanna]

I have question about connecting two independent clauses without the use of conjunction:

Yellow jackets number among the 900 or so species of the world’s social wasps, (Complete Clause)

wasps that live in a highly cooperative and organized society consisting almost entirely of females"”the queen and her sterile female workers.( Clause)

I can see we can connect two independent clauses without the conjunction but under what circumstances we can do that.

Hi- This is not a separate clause but a modifier explained in the previous page - post10963.html#p10963

Example :

During early stages of our lives we must find a focus to be successful, A FOCUS that is beyond the mechanics of earning a living.


Option B correct answer here -
B.wasps that live in a highly cooperative and organized society consisting almost entirely of

The above is modifier hence this answer is Not a Run-ON.

Independent Clause + Independent Clause should be connect with a Coordinating (and,or,but ...) or Subordinating Conjunctions (although , while .....) or A SEMICOLON (X is Y ; A is B)otherwise they are run - on.

happy to be corrected if I'm wrong.

Cheers

[RonPurewal]

living in a society that is highly cooperative, organized and consists of almost all

still incorrect, because it's impossible for all three items to be parallel.

if you interpret the first and third items as verbs -- "is..." and "consists..." -- then those items are fine, but "organized" spoils the party because it's not a verb.

if you interpret the first and second items as adjectives -- "cooperative" and "organized" -- then those items are fine, but now the last item spoils the party because there's no way it can be parallel to an adjective(s).

The beetle feeds ....... and it runs.......
Here the "it" is considered redundant.... hence wrong?

if you're making a parallel structure like this -- in which the beetle is already the subject of both verbs -- then, yes, it's considered redundant to write the unnecessary "it".

[georgepaul0071987]

Is there anything wrong with the usage of 'living' in option (E) ?

This modifier doesn't really describe the effect of the entire preceding clause right ?

As per the original sentence we just need a modifier that just describes 'social wasps' right ?

If we consider this sentence :

Emily Dickinson’s letters to Susan Huntington Dickinson were written over a period beginning a few years before Susan’s marriage to Emily’s brother and ending shortly before Emily’s death in 1886, outnumbering her letters to anyone else.

In this case 'outnumbering' doesn't really describe the previous clause , so the usage of 'ing' modifier is incorrect here .

Can we apply this reasoning to the "wasps" question ?

[RonPurewal]

Is there anything wrong with the usage of 'living' in option (E) ?

This modifier doesn't really describe the effect of the entire preceding clause right ?

As per the original sentence we just need a modifier that just describes 'social wasps' right ?

If we consider this sentence :

Emily Dickinson’s letters to Susan Huntington Dickinson were written over a period beginning a few years before Susan’s marriage to Emily’s brother and ending shortly before Emily’s death in 1886, outnumbering her letters to anyone else.

In this case 'outnumbering' doesn't really describe the previous clause , so the usage of 'ing' modifier is incorrect here .

Can we apply this reasoning to the "wasps" question ?

not really, because "living in a society..." really does describe the fact that these wasps "number among the ... social wasps". the original version is somewhat better, because people can't be expected to know the term "social wasps", but this modifier isn't actually incorrect.

the main problem with that answer choice is, of course, its rather blatant lack of parallelism.

[vijay19839]

Ron
I think 'which' in options C & D refer to Social wasps. Why is the usage of which wrong in these options?

thanks
Vijay

hi,


(C which means they live in a highly cooperative and organized society, almost all
(D) which means that their society is highly cooperative, organized, and it is almost entirely

can anyone throw some light on the "which" in choice C and D? Thanks.

make sure that you know those are wrong answers!

in fact, these instances of "which" are one of the reasons why those choices are wrong -- "which" should refer to the noun or noun phrase preceding the comma, but the nouns preceding the commas in those two choices don't make any sense in context.

[RonPurewal]

Ron
I think 'which' in options C & D refer to Social wasps. Why is the usage of which wrong in these options?

look at the construction -- "which means..."
this construction would only make sense if it followed the name of a term or word. Here, social wasps is the name of a type of animal, not the name of a word.

e.g.
The word "dummy", which means a replica of a human object when spoken by Americans, is used by Britons to mean "pacifier".
--> correct, since "dummy" (in quotes) refers to the actual word "dummy", rather than to an actual dummy.
but...
Automobile crash tests use a dummy, which means a fake model human rather than a real human.
--> incorrect, since a dummy is a physical entity, not a word.

[bish]

I don't understand why is C wrong -

"which means they live in a highly cooperative and organized society, almost all"

The "which means they" should clearly refer to the wasps (noun immediately preceding the comma?

I think the almost all females describes the organized society, and is wrong without a verb like consists.

[RonPurewal]

I don't understand why is C wrong -

"which means they live in a highly cooperative and organized society, almost all"

"which means" has nothing to modify, because the noun before it does not refer to a word.
if you're going to say that xxxxx means something, then xxxx must literally be a word, gesture, phrase, message, etc. it can't be a physical object.

e.g.
According to most of Harold's classmates, he is a dork, which means he is socially awkward.
--> wrong, because "a dork" is not a word; it's a person.

Most of Harold's classmates refer to him with the word "dork", which means a socially awkward person.
--> correct.

as you can see, it's rather hard to use "which means..." correctly in written english; the second sentence here is rather contrived, but that's really the only kind of context in which "which means..." could be correct.
if you see that construction on an SC problem, it is thus very likely -- almost certain -- to be incorrect.

[Jov]

Hi Team,

In option C and D, I understand that "which means" is wrong from meaning poiint of view.

Wasp- Singular
Wasps- Plural
My doubt is that which refers to Social wasps which are plural. Therefore plural verb "mean" should be used.

Please advise whether the singular verb "means" is right here or it is wrong.

Thanks in advance.