OG 53. There is no consensus on what role, if any, is played by acid rain in slowing the growth or damaging forests in the eastern United States.
(A) slowing the growth or damaging
(B) the damage or the slowing of the growth of
(C) the damage to or the slowness of the growth of
(D) damaged or slowed growth of（E）
(E) damaging or slowing the growth of
The corrected sentence must make clear that both damaging and slowing the growth of refer to forests. E is the only choice that does so without introducing errors. In choice A, of is required after growth. In choices B and C, the use of the damage instead of damaging produces awkward and wordy constructions, and without to after damage, B is grammatically incomplete. In C, the slowness of does not convey the original sense that the rate of growth has been slowed by acid rain. Choice D also changes the meaning of the sentence by making both damaged and slowed refer to growth.
两个并列的介词短语可以省略相同的介词吗？比如：the A of and B of = the A and B of，对吗？
如语法上对,对E的理解只有根据其逻辑意思了,对不?
damaging the growth of forest or slowing the growth of
or: damaging forest or slowing the growth of forest
谢谢! | 
