Heavy commitment by an executive to a course of action

[CrystalSpringston]

the most important thing about that is ... not to think about that.
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/foru ... ml#p115704

So is it better to forget this rule? And how do we deal with the possessive antecedent in the exam?

Thank you

[RonPurewal]

So is it better to forget this rule?

i have already linked you to a thread with "DO NOT THINK ABOUT THIS" written in big, red, boldfaced capital letters... so, i guess i don't understand what you are asking here.

if your question is "Ron, do you really, really, really mean what you wrote in big, red, boldfaced capital letters?", then ... the answer is yes.
(:

if your question is something else, please clarify.

[RonPurewal]

And how do we deal with the possessive antecedent in the exam?

Thank you

ignore it, and look for something else.

[CrystalSpringston]

So is it better to forget this rule?

i have already linked you to a thread with "DO NOT THINK ABOUT THIS" written in big, red, boldfaced capital letters... so, i guess i don't understand what you are asking here.

if your question is "Ron, do you really, really, really mean what you wrote in big, red, boldfaced capital letters?", then ... the answer is yes.
(:

if your question is something else, please clarify.

YES, that's what I mean. I will forget this rule. Thank you.

[tim]

Glad to hear it. For what it's worth, this is at least the third time in the last week I've seen you ask Ron for confirmation of something he already said. Please understand that when we write answers here we mean them, and there is no need to ask us if we're sure.

[CrystalSpringston]

Glad to hear it. For what it's worth, this is at least the third time in the last week I've seen you ask Ron for confirmation of something he already said. Please understand that when we write answers here we mean them, and there is no need to ask us if we're sure.

Sometimes there is understanding differences due to culture backgroud. I didn't do it intentionally .
So "honored" to be remembered by you.

[RonPurewal]

YES, that's what I mean. I will forget this rule. Thank you.

ok.

...but now i'm quite curious about the cultural differences you mentioned above. perhaps you could explain that comment a bit more?

[eveH982]

Hi Ron ~~

in choice D. Executives’ being heavily committed to a course of action, especially if it has worked well in the past, makes them likely to miss signs of incipient trouble or misinterpreting them when they do appear.

as you said, possessives are adjectives, not nouns, so executives' is not an appropriate antecedent for a pronoun.

BUT I just read a correct sentence in manhattan SC 6th :

MARY’S job is in jeopardy because of HER mistake.


is that sentence really correct? since "MARY'S" here is also an adjective, "her" has no proper antecedent.

[eveH982]

Besides, I have another question about the ambiguity of pronoun.

in one of your posts, you said

our understanding of the gmat's pronoun rules has evolved by leaps and bounds recently.
in particular, we have discovered that the gmat actually has much, much more tolerance for ambiguous pronouns than we had previously thought.
so, a takeaway for you:
the rules on ambiguous pronouns are NOT absolute.
here are only two ABSOLUTE RULES for pronouns:
(1) the pronoun must stand for a noun that is actually PRESENT in the sentence;
(2) the pronoun and the noun must MATCH IN TERMS OF SINGULAR/PLURAL.
the other "rules", such as those that govern ambiguity of pronouns, are more like "guidelines" or "suggestions".

those two rules are the ONLY two ABSOLUTE RULES.


However, in another one of your posts, you said,

generally, the only time you can be 100% confident in eliminating an ambiguous pronoun is when that pronoun is parallel to the wrong noun, and NOT parallel to the correct noun.

does that mean except for the two absolute rules you mentioned above, there're some extra rules for pronouns? for example, the pronouns must be parallel to the right noun?

e.g.: For centuries, people on sea voyages washed their clothes by placing the dirty laundry in a strong cloth bag, tossing them overboard, and let...



is this sentence wrong because structurally "them" is supposed to be parallel to "the dirty laundry", but logically it refers to "clothes"? so that means your only two ABSOLUTE RULES don't apply here and a third rule needs to be included?


thank you > <

[eveH982]

Ouch ! and another question...

as you said, the construction "make something likely" is correct. but it means

that a particular orientation or choice of behavior (= excessive commitment) is what makes xxxxx thing likely.

The construction itself is just fine, provided that it actually conveys a reasonable meaning. E.g., The presence of police officers makes street crime much less likely.

That's nonsense; it's the executive's excessive commitment that makes certain undesirable things likely.

you mean "someone makes something likely" has the connotation that someone do something with a purpose that his desirable things may happen?



looking forward to your reply.. thanks! ! !

[RonPurewal]

just don't think about "ambiguous pronouns".
you won't need them to solve the problems -- and, as you see here, they will do nothing but make your life unnecessarily difficult.

you should erase all thoughts of "ambiguous pronouns" from your brain, completely, when you take this exam.

[RonPurewal]

you mean "someone makes something likely" has the connotation that someone do something with a purpose that his desirable things may happen?

this ^^ is the wrong approach.

right now you are thinking in terms of individual sentences. in other words, you are forgetting that this exam is multiple-choice.

you will NEVER have to make this sort of judgment about an individual sentence -- so, don't train yourself to think this way. this is thousands of times too difficult.

here, you face an OPTION between the following TWO VERSIONS of this construction:
• The executive makes something likely.
• The executive's heavy commitment makes something likely.
if you have any sense of the context, then it's 100% clear that the second one is the one you want, and the first one isn't.
this is how you make these kinds of decisions -- RELATIVE JUDGMENTS.

[RonPurewal]

a forum user asked whether choice A could be interpreted as the second type listed here:
https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/foru ... tml#p49622

the answer is no, that interpretation still doesn't work, because the sentence specifically has to say that the executive will be "likely to miss signs of trouble".
the sentence is not meant to say that missing signs of trouble is something that's generally likely -- it's only talking about executives.

[LIK WONGL738]

Hi Instructor,

In answer E, "likely to make an executive miss sign of "
May I know why it isnt "misses" to match singular noun object? is that because of number agreement only applied to subject-verb, not object-verb?

[Sage Pearce-Higgins]

The reason why the verb isn't 'misses' is the verb 'make'. The idiom at use here is 'to make X do Y'. Take a look at these (correct) examples:
Silvia made Amit help her.
Thomas made his children walk to the park.

We don't have a subject-verb relationship between 'Amit' and 'help' (the subject-verb in the sentence is 'Silvia made'). The word 'help' is simply part of the idiom that follows the verb 'made'. In English, there are lots of examples of this kind of construction, in which we use extra verbs not in a simple subject-verb relationship, sometimes with the word 'to' before the verb, depending on the idiom. Here are a couple more (correct) examples:
I'd like you to buy me some fruit.
John let the water flow down the garden.

I assume that your first language isn't English, but I'm pretty sure that you have similar constructions in your first language. Try to think up some simple examples to get an understanding of how words are put together in idioms. Also, you may find the idioms chapter in the SC section of All the Verbal useful.