Overcoming some of the most common grammar mistakes
In the business world, there are plenty of numbers, and those numbers are always in flux, going up or down. Not surprisingly, many of the sentences you will correct on the GMAT have topics that discuss quantities of various things and how those change. Much of the language to discuss quantities is quite familiar and intuitive, where mere familiarity with spoken English is more than enough preparation. Unfortunately, the spoken English all around us contains a couple screaming errors, errors that will sound correct to us because we hear them said all the time.
The Big Diagram for the Language of Comparing Quantities
The first thing we need to clarify: of the many things in the world that increase and decrease, some come in countable units, while with others, you can have more or less, but there’s nothing to count.
Quantities that come in countable units include anything you can count; for example, cars, trips to Hawaii, dollars, tasks, orders, units of time, units of length, elected officials, and countries. Anything you can count.
Quantities that are inherently uncountable include: for example, sickness/health, patience, knowledge, travel, work, time, length, democracy, and justice. Anything which you can’t count, but of which you can have more or less.
Below is a big chart summarizing thing, with examples. Pay attention to what sounds unfamiliar.
Now, I’m going to make a prediction: the boxes that sounded awkward, not quite right, are all in the right-most column, especially rows #4, #6, #8, and possibly #9. That’s where the vast majority of the public makes their mistakes. These mistakes are pervasive: have you ever seen, at the checker in the grocery store, the embarrassingly ungrammatical sign that says, “Ten items or less”?!? These mistakes are everywhere.
To get it right on the GMAT Sentence Correction, you don’t even need to remember ideas about countable vs. uncountable. Simply ask yourself: “how many’ or “how much’?” If you can distinguish between “how many” vs. “how much” for a particular situation, then you know which column you’re in, and everything else in that column follows.
If you’re clear about this distinction, you will experience less uncertainty on the Sentence Correction questions, and you will make fewer mistakes.
| 1. Asking about quantity | how much: How much does she travel? How much time did you work on that?
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how many: How many trips does she take? How many hours did you work on that? |
| 2. Comparing equal quantities | as much (….) as: Does your professor have as much knowledge as mine?
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as many (….) as: Has you professor written as many books as mine? |
| 3. Increase, comparative | more: Is Albert Pujols more talented than Ichiro Suzuki?
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more: Does Albert Pujols have more RBIs than Ichiro Suzuki? |
| 4. Decrease, comparative | less: Is grandpa less argumentative now? In a week, you should eat less ice cream.
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fewer: Does grandpa have fewer arguments now? In a week, you should eat fewer servings of ice cream. |
| 5. Intensification, for an increase | how much more: How much more distance will we have to travel?
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how many more: How many more miles will we have to travel? |
| 6. Intensification, for a decrease | how much less: Consider how much less money would you have left if you bought the expensive kind.
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how many fewer: Consider how many fewer of these you would have been able to but if you bought the expensive kind. |
| 7. The extreme of an increase | too much: He reads too much. She has too much pride to apply for that job.
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too many: He has too many books. She has too many degrees to apply for that job. |
| 8. The extreme of a decrease | too little: Unfortunately, we did too little advertising for this event.
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too few: Unfortunately, too few people attended this event. |
| 9. Word referring to the quantity | amount: No amount of hand-wringing will solve this problem. This amount of mashed potatoes should be enough for dinner. |
number: No number of calls to your mother will solve this problem. This number of baked potatoes should be enough for dinner. |
Can you please add the differences in the usage of ‘more’ and ‘greater’.
I remember some questions in which this distinction was important.
Thanks!
In general, if you are just referring to the material itself, you use “more” —- “more work”, “more money”, “more dogs”, “more houses”, etc.
The word “greater” refer specifically to anything that is numerical —
“The taxation rate is greater than the interest rate.”
Both of those are numbers, so we use “greater”.
If you are just talking about the objects, you use “more” — “more baseballs” — but if you add in the word “quantity” or “number”, that changes it — “a greater quantity of baseballs”, “a greater number of baseballs” — now, you are comparing, not objects, but numbers, so you used “greater”.
Does that make sense?
Mike
Thanks a ton Mike
So, kind of you for writing such good articles and following-up.
If I got this correct:
My height is greater than Ram’s – correct
My height is more than Ram’s – wrong
One more small doubt foe less vs fewer
You have fewer than 10 seconds.
vs
You have less than 10 seconds.
I have more dollars than you.
vs
I have fewer dollars than you.
Another, is lesser incorrect on GMAT?
Yes, I agree with the sentences about Ram & height.
The sentence about 10 seconds — tricky, because time itself takes “less”, so often you will see “less” in that context, although technically, “fewer” is correct. Similarly, money itself takes “less”, so you will often hear “less than 10 dollars”, although again, “fewer” is correct.
I cannot think of a context on the GMAT for which “lesser” would be correct.
Mike