Pronoun ambiguity

[Mikus]

If a sentence starts off something like:

"While depressed prpoerty values can hurt some large investors, they are potentially devastating for homeowners..."

How do we know for certain that "they" is referring to property values? (Intuitively, it makes sense, but from a grammatical point of view...?

Thanks!

[RonPurewal]

check out http://www.manhattangmat.com/forums/og- ... -t878.html

you can't post on those threads anymore, because the o.g. has since become a banned source, but you can still look at them.

this is one of those cases where we just shrug our shoulders and accept the fact that the gmat likes to shift the goalposts some of the time. if there is only one antecedent with clear grammatical parallelism to the pronoun, then it can be good, even if there are other nouns lying around that render the pronoun 'potentially ambiguous'. again, their rules, not ours.

[Guest]

I went through the link you posted and correlated it with one example in Manhattan SC guide:

Eva exercised daily with Jasmine so that SHE would stay in good shape.

It is explained here that this sentence is ambiguous as SHE could refer to either Jasmine or Eva. But from Jadran's comment, it first seemed to me that this sentence is correct as the subject in first clause is Eva and hence SHE is understood to refer to EVA and not Jasmine.

But on a closer look, it seems to me that there is a distinction between these two sentences. Grammatically, SHE refers to Eva as per the rule, but logically speaking, here SHE can really refer to both Eva and Jasmine. But in the sentence discussed by Jad, logically and also as per the rule Jadran quoted,"they" refers to "property values". So we need to look for a clear referent both logically and grammatically. Hope my understanding is right.

But I am confused by application of Jadran's rule. She say's:

"A pronoun in the following clause is presumed to refer to the subject of the first clause"

but I have seen cases where such a pronoun is linked to the CLOSEST noun in preceding clause. In the example I quoted above, the SC guide says:

"SHE seems to be referring to Jasmine(as Jasmine is the closest noun)"

Can somebody explain please?

[RonPurewal]

I went through the link you posted and correlated it with one example in Manhattan SC guide:

Eva exercised daily with Jasmine so that SHE would stay in good shape.

It is explained here that this sentence is ambiguous as SHE could refer to either Jasmine or Eva. But from Jadran's comment, it first seemed to me that this sentence is correct as the subject in first clause is Eva and hence SHE is understood to refer to EVA and not Jasmine.

But on a closer look, it seems to me that there is a distinction between these two sentences. Grammatically, SHE refers to Eva as per the rule, but logically speaking, here SHE can really refer to both Eva and Jasmine. But in the sentence discussed by Jad, logically and also as per the rule Jadran quoted,"they" refers to "property values". So we need to look for a clear referent both logically and grammatically. Hope my understanding is right.

But I am confused by application of Jadran's rule. She say's:

"A pronoun in the following clause is presumed to refer to the subject of the first clause"

but I have seen cases where such a pronoun is linked to the CLOSEST noun in preceding clause. In the example I quoted above, the SC guide says:

"SHE seems to be referring to Jasmine(as Jasmine is the closest noun)"

Can somebody explain please?

here's a good hierarchy to use:
STEP 1) look for possible pronoun ambiguity.
--> if you have NON-AMBIGUOUS PRONOUNS in ANY OF THE FIVE CHOICES, then pick one of those choices. DO NOT go to step 2.
--> if you have AMBIGUOUS PRONOUNS IN ALL FIVE CHOICES, go to step 2.
STEP 2) take the antecedent that is GRAMMATICALLY PARALLEL to the pronoun.

remember that this is a gmat forum, so we're only concerned with gmat-style problems (i.e., problems that have answer choices). we are NOT going to give you advice that will help you decide borderline pronoun issues WITHOUT answer choices; that is up to you.

presumably, the property-values example comes from a problem in which ALL FIVE of the answer choices exhibit pronouns with at least some degree of ambiguity. in that case, step 2 dictates that 'property values' is the antecedent, because it's the subject of its clause (and 'they' is the subject of its clause).

--

if the s.c. guide says that, then the s.c. guide is simply wrong on that point; our brains are wired to associate pronouns with grammatically parallel antecedents, and, in fact, associating such pronouns with any other antecedent requires conscious effort in the vast majority of cases. consider the following 2 examples:
(1) although the freshmen beat the varsity team in the opening exhibition games, it has not lost a game since.
(2) although the varsity team lost the opening exhibition games to the freshmen, it has not lost a game since.
in both of these examples, 'it' is completely unambiguous: it must refer to 'varsity team'. however, #1 is much, much harder to read, because 'they' is not grammatically parallel to its antecedent (the pronoun is the subject of the second clause, while the antecedent is the OBJECT of the first clause). #2 is natural, because both the pronoun and the antecedent are the subjects of their respective clauses.

[viksnme]

consider the following 2 examples:
(1) although the freshmen beat the varsity team in the opening exhibition games, it has not lost a game since.
(2) although the varsity team lost the opening exhibition games to the freshmen, it has not lost a game since.
in both of these examples, 'they' is completely unambiguous

Hi Ron, I guess there is a typo here. Did you mean 'it' is completely unambiguous?

Regards
Viksnme.

[rfernandez]

Viksnme, I believe you are correct. Thanks for pointing that out.

[RonPurewal]

consider the following 2 examples:
(1) although the freshmen beat the varsity team in the opening exhibition games, it has not lost a game since.
(2) although the varsity team lost the opening exhibition games to the freshmen, it has not lost a game since.
in both of these examples, 'they' is completely unambiguous

Hi Ron, I guess there is a typo here. Did you mean 'it' is completely unambiguous?

Regards
Viksnme.

heh, yes.
edited.
thank you.

[vineet3183]

hi Ron, could you explain why first sentence is correct --

(1) although the freshmen beat the varsity team in the opening exhibition games, it has not lost a game since.

structurally "it" refers to freshman ( as subject), but logically "it" refers to varsity team .

[RonPurewal]

hi Ron, could you explain why first sentence is correct --

(1) although the freshmen beat the varsity team in the opening exhibition games, it has not lost a game since.

structurally "it" refers to freshman ( as subject), but logically "it" refers to varsity team .

"freshmen" is plural. that doesn't say "freshman".