why

Because it's a meaningless cliche.

That's poker.

Better we say the much snapier, "The situation we have arrived at is not alterable; therefore we much forge ahead with the understanding that prior events cannot be changed in this particular circumstance."

But It means this,

So therefore it's not meaningless.

"So therefore" is redundant.

Good analysis.

To me, it's redolent of a lack of attention to word-selection/rhythm/significance-of-details. There's so much that's of no consequence.
", which is a withering drug." Well, duh. Tell me something that isn't howlingly* obvious.

"...slightly curved face..." Just can't picture that. Weak description.

"...seemed framed by hair..." A certain breed of cliched facial descriptions tends to devote a disproportionate amount of attention to the hair. Another uses the word "framed" to describe the hair in relation to the face. This one does both! (Less of the former, but still...) And there's the awful hedging verb "seemed." As in his face seemed framed with hair but there was a chance that it wasn't? For $6.99 come see The Man With Magical Hair That Can Trick You Into Believing That It Borders The Perimeter Of His Face.

"...look in mirrors..." A minor trifle that I would have forgiven if there weren't so many mistakes before it. Both "look at the mirror" at "look in the mirror" sound better, aurally.

Okay, I'm bored. There are more.

* I this adjective.

lol I just wrote "...sound better, aurally." Oh wow. I should start rereading my posts.

Haters gonna hate.

An SAT-type question that I am in the process of creating. I would appreciate your input.

Being of a lesser position than the supervisor’s, the lowly employee deemed it wise not to question the order.

(A) Being of a lesser position than the supervisor’s
(B) Being of a less position than the supervisor
(C) A person of lesser position than that of the supervisor
(D) As someone of lesser position than the supervisor
(E) Because his position was less than the supervisor’s

The intended answer is hopefully pretty clear.

I would not use "less" or "lesser" to modify "position."

Not clear imo.

And lower rank > lesser position. ("Being of lower rank than the supervisor...").

Also, the entire clause, in all its incarnations, seems redundant/purposeless. "The lowly employee deemed it wise not to question the order of his supervisor,"¹ for instance, carries two tacit messages: one, he's not questioning the order of his supervisor because of his status as a subordinate; two, he's of lower rank than his supervisor (obv).

Your question would work if you change the position of our big shot from "supervisor" to one that doesn't automatically imply that she's superior to our lowly employee. That way you can signal her superiority without being redundant. Also, get rid of "lowly" for the same reason.

Example: Being of lower rank than the VPC², the employee deemed it wise not to question the order.

¹ Which is the most elegant/concise way that I can think to phrase it, without thinking too hard about it.
² Totally made-up acronym! Just an example.

I agree with taking out the "lowly." Thanks for the suggestion. But I cannot change the "lesser" in the original sentence because a major part of what the question is designed to test is a student's ability to distinguish between "less" and "lesser." Replacing it with "lower" defeats this purpose.

The other major concept the question is designed to test deals with comparison errors. The general rule, of course, is that similar things should be compared: person <-> person, concept <-> concept, and so on.

If the correct response is not clear, why not? Which answer would you tentatively pick assuming the question and answer choices stay intact?

Edit: Finally, on the actual SAT there are plenty of situations in which the correct answer isn't the most concise or efficient. That's part of the game. I would thus prefer to start by focusing on what is grammatically wrong / redundant before focusing on how the sentence could be rewritten for optimal efficiency.

Ok, and I respect that. But the most relevant consideration here should be whether or not either expression is grammatically wrong.

C.

Nah it's alright, given the goals of the question. It's just that I would totally reconstruct the sentence, and all of the available options seem wrong w/r/t style/usage (even though one is "technically" correct).

The sentence is too wordy and kind of redundant anyway. I would just say "The lowly employee deemed it wise not to question the order of his supervisor."

That says it all, for it describes the two positions: an employee (adjective: lowly, denoting rank) and a supervisor (implying a higher rank). The clause you want to jam in there is superfluous.

As mentioned before, I will get rid of "lowly," thus cutting down on the most obvious redundancy. Otherwise, your post misses the point of the exercise.

Does anyone have an answer other than C, btw?

I understand that the point of the exercise is to find the clearest way to state the dependent clause, but I'm saying it's a ****ty sentence in the first place and you can come up with a better example.

I would say D if forced to pick between several crappy sentences.

I would have gone with D, but I suck at grammar.

This reminds me of "hence why". a;lsdflasdfkl;adls;fkl;

I also would have selected D

Out of the choices, I think D is pretty clearly the best one.

OK, quite a few of you are saying D. But isn't that a wrong comparison? The employee's "position" is being compared with the "supervisor."

Another similar yet simpler example might be the following:

"He is a person with more character than his wife."

vs

"He is a person with more character than that of his wife."

A slight nitpick: it's a participial modifier, not a dependent clause.