prep01 Q23

酸辣年糕

The Environmental Protection Agency frequently puts mandatory controls on toxic substances that present as little risk as one in a million chances to cause cancer.

A. as little risk as one in a million chances to cause
B. as little risk as one chance in a million of causing
C. as little risk as one chance in a million that it will cause
D. a risk as little as one chance in a million for causing
E. a risk as little as one chance in a million for it to cause

one chance in a million of doing是固定用法，表示几率很小；
我知道这道题目可以从固定用法来选出B，就是有个疑问？as little risk as和 a risk as little as 这两个有区别么？

emmahiggins09

楼主这里的idiom 不是chance of doing 而是 risk of doing

RON 大神的原帖，楼主看看吧，大神解释的很清楚

https://www.manhattanprep.com/gmat/forums/the-environmental-protection-agency-frequently-puts-t2469.html

酸辣年糕

emmahiggins09 发表于 2016-12-28 02:20
楼主这里的idiom 不是chance of doing 而是 risk of doing

RON 大神的原帖，楼主看看吧，大神解释的很清 ...

whoa, you guys are missing the main point here: the word whose idiomatic usage is being tested is risk, not chance.

this is a bit hard to see in this particular sentence, so here's an analogy (which i'm making up on the spot - not part of an official question):
as small a collection as three pirated albums has occasionally drawn the attention of the recording industry.
in this case, 'collection', not 'albums', is the subject of 'has drawn' (which can be inferred from the fact that 'has' is singular).
this is the case because this sentence is equivalent to the following rearranged version:
a collection as small as three pirated albums has occasionally drawn the attention of the recording industry.

--

the same reasoning applies here; you're looking for idiomatic usage that agrees with 'risk', not 'chance'.

--

the last poster is correct in one sense, which is that there are correct idiomatic usages of 'chance to'.
HOWEVER,
the last poster is incorrect in this particular scenario, because 'chance to' is NOT used when 'chance' refers to a mathematical probability (as it does in this context). in the case of mathematical probabilities, you can only use 'chance of'.
for instance, you can't say this treatment has a 70% chance to cure the disease; you have to say chance of curing.

hth!

酸辣年糕

emmahiggins09 发表于 2016-12-28 02:20
楼主这里的idiom 不是chance of doing 而是 risk of doing

RON 大神的原帖，楼主看看吧，大神解释的很清 ...

☆⌒(*＾-゜)v THX!!

Grace828

感谢分享！