In order to be grammatically correct,
sentences that make comparisons must compare like terms. The words "like,"
"unlike," "similar to," "as…so", and "in contrast to" are the most common
indicators of comparisons. For example:
As domesticated animals, indoor cats typically lose their ability
to hunt for their own food, so too do domesticated dogs come to rely
exclusively on their owners for sustenance.
Here, domesticated cats are compared to domesticated
dogs, and the comparison works because they are both domesticated animals
— they are like terms. Whenever you see a comparison being set up in a
sentence, check to see that the terms of the comparison are compatible.
This compatibility requirement is more stringent than that which is required by the rules of parallelism (covered in the Basics Workshop). In parallelism, compatibility is determined by part of speech; nouns must be paired with nouns, verbs with verbs, and so on. But in comparisons, compatibility is determined by subject matter. One domesticated pet must be compared to another; one coat must be compared to another; one piece of furniture must be compared to another. The terms of the comparison will offer two variations on the same basic subject.
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