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Sentence:

"The senate adopted new rules to prevent representatives from serving on a committee while at the same time maintaining an interest in any company that conducts business that is affected by that committee's decisions."

Can "while" be replaced with and?

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  • May I ask you to un-accept my answer? It is now meaningless; but an Accepted answer cannot be deleted. – StoneyB Aug 21 '14 at 22:36
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    You may use one star * for italics, two stars ** for bold, or three stars *** for both. Seven stars is probably pushing it :-) – snailboat♦ Aug 21 '14 at 22:42
  • @StoneyB Sure, but you answered my question. the ill-formated question probably isn't helpful for others. – user8959 Aug 21 '14 at 22:48
  • You can. IMO. Because you have at the same time phrase in the sentence. – Maulik V♦ Aug 22 '14 at 5:53
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    After answering, I see that StoneyB had already answered this question correctly and sufficiently, and then deleted it. – CocoPop Aug 22 '14 at 12:59
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The original sentence:

"The senate adopted new rules to prevent representatives from serving on a committee while at the same time maintaining an interest in any company that conducts business that is affected by that committee's decisions."

The sentence as your change is implied:

"The senate adopted new rules to prevent representatives from serving on a committee and at the same time maintaining an interest in any company that conducts business that is affected by that committee's decisions."

I don't see any substantial change in the meaning of that sentence. That's probably because after and, the phrase at the same time takes care of keeping the meaning intact [This was also mentioned by StoneyB in his deleted answer].

However, it's worth to note that using the phrase while at the same time itself is redundant as mentioned here, here and here.

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