<p>[We had never seen] anything like this style of architecture before, we thought we were looking at giant sculptures, not buildings.
a) We had never seen
b) We never saw
c) Never had we seen
d) Never having seen
e) Never seeing
Please explain why one of the choices out of D and E is clearly better.</p>
<p>The intricate [pattern on] a butterfly's wing [is composed of] thousands of microscopic scales, each [of which] [is] the product of a single cell.
I thought the error is at D because the phrase "each of which is the product of a single cell" in an independent clause while the introductory clause is also an independent. There is not a connection between the two clauses so I thought that by deleting "is," the second clause would become a dependent clause... However, the answer is not D... Am I misinterpreting something?</p>
D is correct. The participial phrase “never having seen” modifies “we,” first of all. The sentence structure tells us that the act described in the participial phrase (“never having seen”) and the act described in the independent clause (“we thought we were looking at . . .”) occur roughly at the same time. For example, in the sentence Walking down the alleyway, the man was robbed by a bum, we know that the walking and the being robbed occur at roughly the same time, or–to be more precise–the man was robbed while he was walking down the alleyway. Now, if the narrator were to continue the story, he might say, Having been robbed by a bum, the man decided to never walk down alleys at night again. The same concept and structure is employed here, except the verb is changed from walk to have. Have in this context denotes the present perfect tense, which talks not about the action (it doesn’t refer simply to the act of walking), but about the present effect of a past action. For example, I have studied implies that you studied in the past and are still affected by the studying in the present–i.e., you still know the material that you studied. It makes no sense to say Walking down the alley, the man learned to never walk down alleys again because the man didn’t learn the lesson until after walking down the alley; he did not learn it while walking down the alley. “Having walked down the alley” is still present tense, just not in the time frame of the actual walking–but in the time frame of being changed, or affected, after the walking.</p>
<p>Looking back at the grammatically correct sentence (D)
. . . and the incorrect sentence (E)
. . . we see that the first one is talking about the subject’s evaluation of what the buildings look like BASED ON THE FACT that they have never seen anything like them, which means that it’s not referring to the action of not seeing (in an instant of time), but referring to the result of never having seen it (over time). The second sentence implies that, while they were never seeing a style of architecture, they thought they were looking at giant sculptures and not buildings. This makes no sense because the sentence isn’t talking about not seeing X (that particular style of architecture) while thinking about Y (the buildings); it’s talking about experiencing the effect of not seeing X–ever–in thinking about Y.</p>
“each of which is the product of a single cell” is a dependent clause, more precisely a relative clause. “which” refers back to “microscopic scales,” so any clause with the relative pronoun which is dependent on a noun phrase from the preceding independent clause and therefore logically has to be a dependent clause: you can’t write Which is the product of a single cell as an independent sentence since the meaning and antecedent of which lies in another element, a noun from a different clause. That being said, the relative pronoun *which<a href=“related%20to%20%5Bi%5Dwho%5B/i%5D,%20%5Bi%5Dwhom%5B/i%5D,%20and%20%5Bi%5Dthat%5B/i%5D”>/i</a> allows you to use a verb: “I like turtles, which have green shells.” “Which” represents “turtles.” If you want to further modify the pronoun which, you can add a prepositional phrase to it: “I like turtles, each of which have green shells.”</p>
<p>Here are a bunch of examples of sentences that use relative (dependent) clauses:
I sold the jacket, which I’ve worn for many years.
I moved to a new house, and I miss my bathtub, in which I’ve taken countless baths.
There are several suits on the rack, all of which are too expensive for me to buy.
There are three girls, the first of whom is very attractive, the second of whom is mildly attractive, and the third of whom is average, to say the least.
I’m talking to a dude who swears he’s going insane.</p>
<p>Well, that guy really knows his grammar. But I came to the same answer choice just going by ear. </p>
<p>[We had never seen] anything like this style of architecture before, we thought we were looking at giant sculptures, not buildings.
a) We had never seen Sounds awkward.
b) We never saw Sounds wrong.
c) Never had we seen Sounds wrong.
d) Never having seen Sounds fitting.
e) Never seeing Sounds wrong.</p>
<p>Sometimes it’s good to sound it out. When in doubt, sound it out.</p>
<p>I completely agree. While there are some things that are grammatically correct and weird-sounding, sounding out the answer choices will help you get the right answer a surprising number of times.</p>
<p>Sure, but are you really learning anything by sounding something out? If you know exactly why something is wrong or right, then you can apply that reasoning to every sentence that tests the same topic with greater accuracy than if you just went by ear. The relative impracticality of “sounding it out” is further compounded by the fact that the person who made this thread likely can’t come to the conclusion without formal explanation–otherwise he perhaps wouldn’t have been stuck and had to make this thread.</p>
<p>^Of course; I agree with you. However, “sounding it out” is sound advice (pun not intended) for the actual writing MC section on the SAT; most people aren’t as well-phrased in grammar as silverturtle and crazybandit are.</p>