Displays of the aurora borealis, or “northern lights,” can heat the atmosphere over the arctic enough to affect the trajectories of ballistic missiles, induce electric currents that can cause blackouts in some areas and corrosion in north-south pipelines.
- to affect the trajectories of ballistic missiles, induce
- that the trajectories of ballistic missiles are affected, induce
- that it affects the trajectories of ballistic missiles, induces
- that the trajectories of ballistic missiles are affected and induces
- to affect the trajectories of ballistic missiles and induce
What does this question test?
This question tests your understanding of parallelism.
What does the sentence mean?
The sentence is not absolutely clear in the meaning that it is trying to communicate. The meaning that is absolutely clear is as shown:This sentence shows the effects of northern lights. It states that these lights can heat the atmosphere over the arctic enough to affect the trajectories of the missiles.
The sentence then states the verb – induce. It is not clear if this verb is part of effects of heating of atmosphere and hence part of the following list:Lights can heat the atmosphere enough
- to affect the trajectories of the missiles AND
- to induce electric currents that can cause blackouts and corrosion
In this list, for element 2, we do not need to repeat the word “to” since it is understood that this “to” applies to the second element as well.
Alternatively, this verb can be part of the list of verbs of Northern lights as follows: Northern lights
- can heat the atmosphere enough to affect the trajectories AND
- can induce electric current that can cause blackouts and corrosion.
But for this list to be correct we would need to repeat the helping verb – “can” before induce to establish that this verb is part of the list of verbs as shown above. This is because if “can” is not repeated, then it will not be clear if element 2 is part of this list or part of the list above.
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What are the errors in the original sentence?
1: Meaning Error: This sentence has meaning error as explained in the meaning analysis above.
2: Parallelism Error: The element 2 in the list is not connected using “and”.
Answer Choice Analysis
Choice B – The verb “induce” is not connected appropriately in the list. This leads to fragment error since it is not clear what is the subject of the verb “induce”.
Choice C – Same error as in choice B. In addition, the antecedent “it” appears to refer to the action that northern lights can heat the atmosphere. This is not allowed since “it” can only refer to other nouns but not to an action.
Choice D – Same error as in Choice A in that “induces” is not part of either of the two possible lists. It cannot be part of the list that shows the effects of the heating of atmosphere since it is written in active voice. Similarly it cannot be part of the list of actions of the northern lists since it is not written as “can induce”.
Choice E – No errors.
Thus, choice E is the correct answer.
What are the key take-away messages?
1. All the elements in a list must be connected appropriately.
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