there's also the idiom "studied WITH as much depth", which is substandard -- it should be "IN as much depth".


that's a bit overly simplistic, actually -- in fact, note that this sentence itself is written in the passive voice! (we used to propound this rule in our older materials, but we're in the process of removing it because ... well, it isn't true.)
it's not really true that active is preferred to passive; in fact, in OG12, of the 33 splits between active and passive, 17 (= over half) are resolved in favor of the passive. this observation appears to defeat any hope of using active/passive as an easy criterion for elimination.

in this particular example, the active voice makes more sense because of the parallelism with the earlier clause, but it's a mistake to think that the active voice is preferred in general.

_________________
Being well-dressed gives a feeling of inward tranquillity [that] religion is powerless to bestow.
C.F. Forbes

This is great information! I have learned a lot from this. Just goes to show why Ron is the king here. :-)

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Jamie Nelson
ManhattanGMAT Instructor

Thank you Ron, Thank you Nelson.

Thanks again Ron!

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Jamie Nelson
ManhattanGMAT Instructor

I have a question with the use of whether. The first three choices were eliminated because of lack of parallelism of whether or whether but I thought whether.. or... is a valid split and am sure there are several examples to prove. Am I missing something here.

Pls clarify.

you aren't understanding the meaning of the sentence correctly.

you are parsing the sentence as though it were
whether (x) or (y)
--> this construction can be correct, but only if just one issue (x vs. y) is unclear.

the problem is that the meaning of this sentence is actually
it is unclear (whether x) or (whether y)
i.e., there are two different issues that are unclear, not just one x-versus-y type of issue.

_________________
Being well-dressed gives a feeling of inward tranquillity [that] religion is powerless to bestow.
C.F. Forbes

Hi Ron,

I thought that Chimpanzee is unique vs other animals may have the same ability is just one issue here.
If there is two different issues (as you pointed out), I think it should be:
it is unclear (whether x) and (whether y)

I know I shouldnt question the OA but it is just really confusing :(

Ron sorry for bumping in the thread.
Can you indicate what other errors does option C contain (besides parallelism).
Can we say that the if ...then clause pattern is violated, beacuse would be found is not exactly would + bare infintive.

well, the whole structure of that first part ("would similar patterns be found...") is the structure of a question, not a statement.

this is something people here should pay attention to, because (a) it's come up in a few official problems now, and (b) lots of people here don't distinguish properly between the structure of a question and the structure of a statement.

e.g.
Why is choice A wrong? (question)
I don't know why choice A is wrong. (statement)
^^^ this is the primary offender. lots and lots and lots of people here write "why A is wrong?" -- and that's wrong.

in this example:
Would similar patterns be found in other animals? (question)
I don't know if/whether similar patterns would be found in other animals. (statement)

_________________
Being well-dressed gives a feeling of inward tranquillity [that] religion is powerless to bestow.
C.F. Forbes