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Question
Some anthropologists believe that the genetic homogeneity evident in the world's people is the result of a "population bottleneck" - at some time in the past our ancestors suffered an event, greatly reducing their numbers and thus our genetic variation.
Some anthropologists believe that the genetic homogeneity evident in the world's people is the result of a "population bottleneck" - at some time in the past our ancestors suffered an event, greatly reducing their numbers and thus our genetic variation.
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Solution
The correct option is B that at sometime in the past our ancestors suffered an event that greatly reduced their numbers
The part of the sentence before the em dash seems to be correct in grammar even though its a bit convoluted - it is talking about the belief that some anthropologists have regarding the genetic homogeneity seen in humans world wide. The information provided after the em dash is in the form of an independent clause. It states that at some point in the past our ancestors suffered an event - nothing else about this event is mentioned. Given this lack of information about the event', it seems illogical to talk about the result (this result being implied by the use of the verb-ing modifier, 'reducing'). 'Reducing' also seems inappropriate when used after the subject of the clause ('our ancestors'). These are the reasons why option A is incorrect. Options C, D and E are missing a preposition (at) which should precede 'some time' for it to modify the clause 'our ancestors suffered'. Also, 'and thus our genetic variation' doesn't make sense within the context of this option (C). Only option B corrects both the errors in the sentence by replacing the verb-ing modifier- 'reducing'- with the relative clause 'that greatly reduced'. This clause also modifies 'event' and provides some information about it- our ancestors suffered an event THAT greatly reduced their numbers. Thus, B is the correct choice.
The part of the sentence before the em dash seems to be correct in grammar even though its a bit convoluted - it is talking about the belief that some anthropologists have regarding the genetic homogeneity seen in humans world wide. The information provided after the em dash is in the form of an independent clause. It states that at some point in the past our ancestors suffered an event - nothing else about this event is mentioned. Given this lack of information about the event', it seems illogical to talk about the result (this result being implied by the use of the verb-ing modifier, 'reducing'). 'Reducing' also seems inappropriate when used after the subject of the clause ('our ancestors'). These are the reasons why option A is incorrect. Options C, D and E are missing a preposition (at) which should precede 'some time' for it to modify the clause 'our ancestors suffered'. Also, 'and thus our genetic variation' doesn't make sense within the context of this option (C). Only option B corrects both the errors in the sentence by replacing the verb-ing modifier- 'reducing'- with the relative clause 'that greatly reduced'. This clause also modifies 'event' and provides some information about it- our ancestors suffered an event THAT greatly reduced their numbers. Thus, B is the correct choice.
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