[Vocabulary] Between and it

[notletrest]

" Most of us have roughly the same number of offspring. Again, differences between people and the opportunity for natural selection to take advantage of it have diminished. India shows what is happening." (ret240)
1.What is between?
2.What does "it" refer to?
Please help me!
Thanks!

 

[JMurray]

" Most of us have roughly the same number of offspring. Again, differences between people and the opportunity for natural selection to take advantage of it have diminished. India shows what is happening."

1.What is between?
2.What does "it" refer to?

1) Here, "between" is a simple preposition indicating a relationship involving two or more people or things, in this case their differences.
... the differences between people ..."

2) I believe "it" is incorrect.
The text intends to say:
"Again, differences between people, and the opportunity for natural selection to take advantage of them (the differences), have diminished."

That is, "it" refers to "differences" (plural) and requires "them".
I would be inclined to include the comma after "people".

not a teacher

 

[notletrest]

" Most of us have roughly the same number of offspring. Again, differences between people and the opportunity for natural selection to take advantage of it have diminished. India shows what is happening."

1.What is between?
2.What does "it" refer to?

1) Here, "between" is a simple preposition indicating a relationship involving two or more people or things, in this case their differences.
... the differences between people ..."

2) I believe "it" is incorrect.
The text intends to say:
"Again, differences between people, and the opportunity for natural selection to take advantage of them (the differences), have diminished."

That is, "it" refers to "differences" (plural) and requires "them".
I would be inclined to include the comma after "people".

not a teacher

I am sorry to say that it is from the Chinese university graduate entrance test of 2000 year, put by the country, and I quoted it without mistake.
Thanks!

 

[emsr2d2]

If I'm not very much mistaken, an alarming number of the posts containing mistakes which appear on this forum seem to be taken from the Chinese university graduate entrance test (not sure if it's always the same year). I would be interested to see the entire test because it appears to contain a worrying number of errors.

 

[notletrest]

If I'm not very much mistaken, an alarming number of the posts containing mistakes which appear on this forum seem to be taken from the Chinese university graduate entrance test (not sure if it's always the same year). I would be interested to see the entire test because it appears to contain a worrying number of errors.

It is not necessary for me to copy the whole passage, because it is no use and too long to copy. Even if I copied it, perhaps you would not believe.
Thanks!

 

[5jj]

I would be interested to see the entire test because it appears to contain a worrying number of errors.

Here it is.

 

[bhaisahab]

Here it is.

That is appalling.

 

[Barb_D]

Wow. So many errors.
For the record, I don't know what answer was intended for the question about using India as an example. None of them sounded right to me.

 

[tzfujimino]

Hmm...
I mean no offense, but it looks like a poor translation from another language into English.

 

[charliedeut]

Here it is.

:shock::?::-?:shocked!::crazyeye:

No more (and no less!)

 

[Tdol]

A few years ago, a teacher living in China quoted a text used in a school test that stated that When he was a little boy, Julie used to watch the radio. For some reason, it stuck in my memory. I have managed to work out a context to make it correct - a transgender person living in a high crime area - but haven't felt the need to use it on my students.