🦩 Simple or complex? 🦩

If sometimes you think it might be cool to be Irina Lutsenko, consider the dilemmas that keep me awake at night. Like this one.

Is this sentence simple or complex?❓

"North America, in the meantime, ranked third, albeit with a considerably lower quantity of 24.7 million tons."

My colleagues, whose level is C3 or higher, disagree. ChatGPT first gave one answer, but then took it back after a clarifying question and said the opposite thing.

Here is the deal.

The answer hinges on whether "albeit with a considerably lower quantity of 24.7 million tons" is a clause. I don't think it is because it doesn't have a subject and a verb.

Those who say it is a clause argue that it is a reduced one because the subject and the verb are implied, e.g. "it ranked / it did so." But I don't think this holds up as "albeit" doesn't take a subject and a verb in that "albeit it did so with a considerably lower quantity" is impossible. Therefore, it cannot be a reduced clause or a clause at all.

This makes the sentence above a simple one. A beautiful, sophisticated, high-level one, but still a simple one.

Of course, none of this has any practical applications (probably). It's just my idea of fun.

So, where do you stand on this - is the sentence simple or complex? Why?