The Environmental Protection Agency frequently puts

[Hei]

The Environmental Protection Agency frequently puts mandatory controls on toxic substances that present as little risk as one in a million chances to cause cancer.

(A) as little risk as one in a million chances to cause

(B) as little risk as one chance in a million of causing

(C) as little risk as one chance in a million that it will cause

(D) a risk as little as one chance in a million for causing

(E) a risk as little as one chance in a million for it to cause

"a risk" vs "little risk"
Is "a risk" wrong because it kind of changes the meaning by saying that there is only one risk posed by the toxic substances? Or is it wrong because "risk...for [noun/verb-ing]" is unidiomatic?

"risk of" vs. "risk to"
I looked up Longman Dictionary, and they are both fine. Or am I missing something?

"one chance in a million" vs. "one in a million chances"
Is there any difference between these two?

Thanks in advance.

[Hei]

bump..

[enginpasa1]

STUMPED.

[jana]

I guess I got it....
CHANCE OF..is corerct idion not the CHANCE TO..
I checked in Dictionary...there are no examples of CHANCE TO...

[Hei]

It depends on which dictionary you used.
Also dictionaries usually don't include all usages unfortunately =( sigh..
I use Longman, and there is an example of "chance to":
Ralph was waiting for a chance to introduce himself.

[RonPurewal]

whoa, you guys are missing the main point here: the word whose idiomatic usage is being tested is risk, not chance.

this is a bit hard to see in this particular sentence, so here's an analogy (which i'm making up on the spot - not part of an official question):
as small a collection as three pirated albums has occasionally drawn the attention of the recording industry.
in this case, 'collection', not 'albums', is the subject of 'has drawn' (which can be inferred from the fact that 'has' is singular).
this is the case because this sentence is equivalent to the following rearranged version:
a collection as small as three pirated albums has occasionally drawn the attention of the recording industry.

--

the same reasoning applies here; you're looking for idiomatic usage that agrees with 'risk', not 'chance'.

--

the last poster is correct in one sense, which is that there are correct idiomatic usages of 'chance to'.
HOWEVER,
the last poster is incorrect in this particular scenario, because 'chance to' is NOT used when 'chance' refers to a mathematical probability (as it does in this context). in the case of mathematical probabilities, you can only use 'chance of'.
for instance, you can't say this treatment has a 70% chance to cure the disease; you have to say chance of curing.

hth!

[Hei]

Thanks Ron.
Referring back to one of my original question, what's the difference between "risk of doing something" and "risk to do something"?
I found that Longman dictionary includes both usages.
Thanks in advance.

[Vasu]

For people who are still wondering as to what the answer is, its B

[RonPurewal]

Thanks Ron.
Referring back to one of my original question, what's the difference between "risk of doing something" and "risk to do something"?
I found that Longman dictionary includes both usages.
Thanks in advance.

i'm not aware of 'risk to do something'. you could probably cobble together a sentence that looked something like this:
james thought that it was an unacceptable risk to ride his bike in traffic.
...but that sentence is bulky and awkward, and would be better rephrased as something like
james thought that riding his bike in traffic was unacceptably risky.

the only widely seen legitimate use of 'risk of' of which i'm aware is the following:
riding in traffic poses considerable risk to bicyclists.
...but this usage doesn't square with what you've posted, because, here, 'to' is used as a preposition (to PERSON or ENTITY), not to introduce an infinitive.

you say that 'risk to do something' is in your dictionary. is there a sample sentence showing that usage? if so, could you post the sample sentence?

[Hei]

hi Ron,

here is the example from Longman Dictionary:
It was a calculated risk to appoint a man without management experience to such a senior post.

[RonPurewal]

hi Ron,

here is the example from Longman Dictionary:
It was a calculated risk to appoint a man without management experience to such a senior post.

ah yeah, that's a different structure entirely.

those sorts of things, beginning with 'it is/was/would be/etc.', are actually inverted constructions: in other words,
'it would be X for Y to do Z' is the same as 'for Y to do Z would be X'
'it would be X to do Z' is the same as 'to do Z would be X'

...so the longman example is really a convoluted way of saying
to appoint a man without management experience to such a senior post was a calculated risk.
it's uncommon, although not truly rare, to see infinitives used in this sort of way. (note that the sentence i just wrote - completely unintentionally - can be rearranged in exactly the same sort of way. see if you can do it)

--

as an analogy, you can perfectly well say:
it would be a mistake to marry her
...which is really an inverted-construction way of saying 'to marry her would be a mistake'. but a sentence can't refer to 'the mistake to marry her'; the proper idiom in that case would be 'the mistake of marrying her'.

[Hei]

Thanks Ron!

[rfernandez]

[steph]

whoa, you guys are missing the main point here: the word whose idiomatic usage is being tested is risk, not chance.

this is a bit hard to see in this particular sentence, so here's an analogy (which i'm making up on the spot - not part of an official question):
as small a collection as three pirated albums has occasionally drawn the attention of the recording industry.
in this case, 'collection', not 'albums', is the subject of 'has drawn' (which can be inferred from the fact that 'has' is singular).
this is the case because this sentence is equivalent to the following rearranged version:
a collection as small as three pirated albums has occasionally drawn the attention of the recording industry.

--

the same reasoning applies here; you're looking for idiomatic usage that agrees with 'risk', not 'chance'.

--!

sorry ron :-( i am little slow and don't understand how your example is applicable to "risk". could you please try to explain again? i got the right answer only by knowing the idiomatic usage of "chance of"..

thank you very much in advance!

[nanu.nantaki]

Ron or Stacey,

Could you please explain why D is wrong ?

Thanks, Nanu