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I was reading a mathematics text, and I came across a phrase which I thought was written incorrectly. There was a part of a sentence: ... it begs the question whether or not A=B. and I feel this is incorrect, but I'm not sure. I think it should be written like this: ... it begs the question of whether or not A=B. Or maybe there that's also incorrect, and there is a better form altogether? Maybe taking out the "or not" would make it even more correct, but I'm still not sure. My main problem is that I think there should be an "of" before the "whether" but I don't know why. So, what is the correct form of this expression? Answer Both uses of the phrase are correct. I would probably use the 'begs the question of whether or not A=B' as it flows better, but the 'or not' is superfluous really. Whether A+B only has two options, true or false, so the 'or not' doesn't really add anything to the phrase.

I have three examples where I am confused about comma usage with the subordinating conjunction 'where': a) The primal algorithms broadly correspond to implicit congestion control mechanisms where noisy feedback from the network is averaged at some sources using increase/decrease rules, which are commonly found in ..." b) For relatively explicit algorithms, they broadly correspond to congestion control approaches where sources can adjust their sending rates according to certain algorithms in response to the congestion information fed back by links." c) The fully explicit algorithms broadly correspond to the explicit congestion control protocols where the links directly allocate their capacities to the passing flows by feeding back the allowed sending rate back to sources. My question is this: Should I precede the subordinating conjunction 'where' with a comma in the above cases? In addition, is it always the case?

Is there a word to describe when a part becomes the name for the whole, particularly in a jargon sense? For example, a door to door salesman at the end of the day might talk about how many "doors" he visited, rather than houses, or a pathology nurse might talk about "doing veins" rather seeing patients? I read a definition along these lines years and years ago, but I've completely forgotten the word. If possible I'm trying to find this same word again. Answer I'd say that would be a synecdoche . A synecdoche (/sɪˈnɛkdəkiː/, si-nek-də-kee; from Greek συνεκδοχή, synekdoche, lit. "simultaneous understanding") 1 is a figure of speech in which a term for a part of something refers to the whole of something or vice versa Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synecdoche

Can someone tell me what phonetic alphabet is used here? Also, how is this word pronounced? Update: This is a scientific term from a 1976 National Bureau of Standards manual. The original word is written giga . Thanks. Answer Considering its date and source, the symbols appear to be a phonetic representation of the kind that has been abandoned in most of the world, but remains entrenched in the major American dictionaries and in American primary and secondary education. See for example the American Heritage Dictionary pronunciation key , Merriam-Webster Guide to Pronunciation , or the Wikipedia United States dictionary transcription key . The breve (˘) is not used by Random House, Merriam-Webster, or the New Oxford American Dictionary, but it is commonly used to mark a "short" vowel sound, and is used in the AHD system. The prime mark indicating stress but positioned at the end of the stressed syllable is also a mark of the AHD. Using the AHD key then, the SI prefix for gig...

Definitions justify Source: Wiktionary To provide an acceptable explanation for. rationalize Source: Wiktionary To justify an immoral act, or illogical behaviour. Questions Given the selected definitions of these verbs (I believe this is acceptable as Wiktionary, like AHD: rationalize 2a , lists them first among relevant senses/sub-senses), what is an example situation in which using one verb is more appropriate than using the other? I find myself needing a verb like these two, then finding it overly difficult to determine which one is best. Does "rationalize" have a more dramatic connotation?

Is there some rating for book regarding how hard they are to read for foreigners? Or the way to figure out how more difficult is book A than book B? I have begun reading "All The King's Men" and finding it a bit difficult to read, not something incredible but I have found about 30 new words from the very beginning during about 2-3 pages. How do I choose the level of a book that is not too easy and that will let me learn more new words and more advanced English?

Recently someone told me that racism means that it means both race and gender discrimination. However, I think that sexism is the word used for gender. Am I correct? Answer You definitely wouldn't use 'racist' for anything to do with sex-based discrimination. You could say that such a person was being sexist, or you could say that they were a chauvinist (though that generally refers to when someone believes that their sex is superior to the other). 'Racism' is somewhat like chauvinism, in that it is generally used to express the idea that "my race is better than your race (or all other races)". The slippery point here is the definition of 'race', which many often extend to include things like religion, which of course isn't a 'race'. 'Bigotry' is a better term to describe someone who is intolerant of other peoples' religions, or their belief systems in general. To sum up these intolerances: If it's gender-based, it'...

When writing (a blog post, script, etc..) what is the proper way to indicate two or more instances of a single letter? For instance, in Monty Python's Bookshop Sketch : C: I wonder if you might have a copy of "Rarnaby Budge"? P: No, as I say, we're right out of Edmund Wells! C: No, not Edmund Wells - Charles Dikkens. P: (pause - eagerly) Charles Dickens?? C: Yes. P: (excitedly) You mean "Barnaby Rudge"! C: No, "Rarnaby Budge" by Charles Dikkens. That's Dikkens with two Ks, the well-known Dutch author. P: (slight pause) No, well we don't have "Rarnaby Budge" by Charles Dikkens with two Ks, the well-known Dutch author, and perhaps to save time I should add that we don't have "Karnaby Fudge" by Darles Chickens, or "Farmer of Sludge" by Marles Pickens, or even "Stickwick Stapers" by Farles Wickens with four M's and a silent Q!!!!! Why don't you try W. H. Smith's? C: Ah did, They sent me h...

I was wondering whether there were any other alternatives to the phrase "highway robbery". I am trying to say the same thing in a light-hearted, but not too casual way. Answer If you want to be light-hearted, you could use dramatic understatement and say a bit pricey . You also could comment on whether you could afford to commit both an arm AND a leg to the purchase. You might suggest that you are comfortable with being taken for a ride , but not with being run over . You could indicate you like a neat appearance, but that doesn't mean you want to be taken to the cleaners or cleaned out . You also might indicate your mild reluctance to being ripped off .

Oh my goodness. I'm shipping Lupita and Trevor so much!!!! They are so beautiful together and irradiate such a good energy! Comment copied verbatim from YouTube. ‘Lupita’ is the Mexican-Kenyan actor, Lupita Nyong'o while ‘Trevor’ is the presenter of the satirical American programme The Daily Show , Trevor Noah . But how on earth did shipping come about? What are its roots? You can ship someone off and I've heard of when my ship comes in , but none of these idioms fit. The origins of “shipping” I found the answer at What's the source of "shipped" in a romantic sense? wherein the OP asked This is obviously slang and new slang at that but where does it come from? The same OP later posted an answer, citing TV Tropes, which claimed that ship was coined by fans of the 1990s TV series The X Files who, influenced by the sexual tension between the show's two leading characters, Mulder and Scully, wanted the investigators to initiate a sexual/romantic relation...

Is this any rule for this? I'm thinking aboutphrases like "filepath" vs. "file path", or "onground" vs "on ground". Are any of these better than the second? Or can I use both?

I want a word to use to describe a drug, vitamin, mineral, supplement, herb, food, or spice that you can take to treat a disease or that would affect the body. I want to put a label on these things. I want to be able to write something like: _____s that have been shown to be effective in treating heart disease: garlic, resveratrol, aspirin, and statins. The word "treatment" might be good above, but I'd like to be able to use the same word for things that are not treatments. It may not be a disease either. It may just be a mechanism. For example: _____s that may increase blood pressure: sodium, caffeine, and some antidepressants. It would be nice if the word could encompass activities, like exercises, or diets, like a paleo diet or Mediterranean diet. Those would be nice to have. I suppose I could use the word "drugs" or "supplements" even though it would not always be accurate. I'm considering using the word "agents". The word "biolo...

I would like to know what's the meaning and in which situations would one use the expression "Enter [somebody]", like "we were trying to find a solution. Enter John". Answer That's from stage directions for plays. "Enter [Name]" and "Exit [Name]" are commonly used to indicate when a player is entering or leaving the scene. Naturally, it's been incorporated into the language to achieve a dramatic effect, and has come to be used when the speaker or writer wants to achieve a bold announcement, especially in titles. Cf. Enter the Dragon , etc.

I just heard Love yourself by Justin Bieber. I thought I heard "My mama didn't like you but she likes everyone" from the song. Then later I found lyrics on some websites(listed bellow) but it's not what I heard, it was "My mama don't like you...". Any idea about this? Answer Usually, (assuming the song or poem is good at grammar), you can determine the tense of the verb by simple contextual clues, but after clicking on one of your links (and, thankfully, having never heard the song) I found that his verbs are all over the place ("you rained on my parade," "you think you broke my heart," "I'll be movin' on"), so I can't tell whether didn't or don't was used without listening to the song, which I am not doing. Technically, the sentence "My mama don't like you, but she likes everyone" is not grammatically correct; the use of don't instead of doesn't for the third person singular is, in...

What is the person called who always thinks negative? E.g. Mr. X always thinks negative. Mr. X has negative attitude. What we can use either? Is there any particular word for this? Answer The word is pessimist , a person who expects the worst. Mr X is a pessimist. Contrast with optimist . It is often said that while optimists are happier, pessimists are more often correct. and Optimists are said to live longer than pessimists, though a pessimist might say those extra few years are bound to be miserable.

I came across this question on Academia.SE and I noticed its first comment. The question points to an article in the New Yorker magazine written by Sylvia Nasar and David Gruber, both of whom seem to be native English speakers. The comment says: I really dislike how the authors of that article keep writing "the Poincaré" for "the Poincaré conjecture". The comment has gained some upvotes, but I really don't get it. What exactly is wrong with that phrase? Is it the inappropriate use of "the" ? I am not a native English speaker, but from what I have read/heard so far, I think we should use "the" in such cases and it wouldn't sound so annoying. I hope this question is on topic for this site, because I thought it was about English language usage , and I appreciate any feedback. Answer Using the surname of a mathematician as a metonym for his famous conjecture seems as counterintuitive as saying Christian fundamentalists don't believe ...

I'm quite sure that I can say the Onegin's score meaning the opera “Eugene Onegin”. However, i feel that it's wrong to say the Onegin's leg meaning the character Eugene Onegin and that the correct form is Onegin's leg . Do I understand correct? Does that mean, that we can use the + possessive only if we talk about inanimated concepts? Answer A phrase like "The somebody's thing" means that the 'thing' is owned by "The Somebody". The definite article is applying to 'somebody' not 'thing'. So you can say "The President's leg", meaning a leg of "the President" (it's implied that there is only one president by the context). "The Onegin's Score" would have to be the score of "The Onegin", and since "The Onegin" shouldn't be used, the rest shouldn't either. The same applies to legs. Correct English would be "The score of Onegin". or "The ...

Consider the following: He will be able to do it. He can do it. They mean the same thing, right? Can "can" replace "will be able to" in any sentence? What is the difference, if anything? Why not just use the shorter version? Answer No, they're not the same thing. Will be able to obviously talks about a future event, while can talks about the present. I can swim, so we should go to the pool. Means I can swim already, I learned it before and I'm capable of doing it now. I will be able to swim sometime in the future, as long as I take swimming lessons. Means I cannot swim right now, but I'm hoping to learn in the future. Probably you meant to ask the difference between can and am able to . If so, there is a difference, yes. Let me explain: I am able to swim, but I can't, because my skin is damaged. This means that I am capable of swimming, but I am prohibited to do so, because of an infection. So to put it to an explanation: To be able to talks abo...

I haven't ever read "Here is the potatoes." but I have read/heard sentences like "Here's the potatoes." and "Here are the potatoes." Look at the following sentences: Here's the details. Here’s all the ways you can look at this problem. Here’s some things you should know. I found the following, but it's difficult to find more than plain opinions. Actually, though, there’s no prohibition against using “here’s” before a plural. As with “there’s,” you could make the case that putting “here’s” before a plural is standard in common speech -- idiomatic. So I’m not critical of people who make that choice unless they happen to be members of the media writing for publication. News organizations strive to avoid sloppy, informal, ungrammatical forms. They hold themselves to a higher standard, which seems like a good idea to me. ( Citation: 'Here's' or 'There's' Before a Plural – Grammar Underground with June Casagrande ) I ackno...

We saw him enter the room. He was seen to enter the room. When the sentence that has the pattern of “S+V+O+OC” is changed into passive form, do we call ‘to enter the room’ as a subjective complement or an object ? Answer The two sentences under question are We saw him enter the room. He was seen to enter the room. The second is clearly the passive transform of the first. The problem is what to do with the infinitive complement , complicated by where the to came from (or went to, if one uses a different model). As usual, a great deal has been deleted and modified already in that first sentence. Where did it come from? As I mentioned in the comment, that first sentence is the result of B-Raising , followed by Passive. If you don't understand right away what I mean by Raising (never mind A- or B- ), you can take a look at the link. It's some explanation, with examples, and a couple of solved problems. This is real English syntax, and it's likely to be strange; sorry ab...

I know a person who keeps saying that he likes to be sad and just live his life without any enthusiasm or motivation. He prefers to be alone and he doesn't want to engage in activities that are fun-filled. Is there a word which can capture this description? Answer I don't think there is a single word for this. Melancholic is close, but doesn't really imply a desire to remain so. Calling him a loner is also close but doesn't fully denote a lack of enthusiasm or motivation for anything he keeps to himself. However, it does sound a lot like self-defeating personality disorder : The person may often avoid or undermine pleasurable experiences [...] [and] rejects opportunities for pleasure, or is reluctant to acknowledge enjoying themself There's more to it than that, but since this is not an appropriate place to practise amateur psychology I will leave it there.

Could academics or acads be used to describe the university faculty as well as researchers? What is a better hypernym of academia, researchers and topic enthusiasts?

A haven is a place that is safe. So, "safe haven" is redundant. Shockingly, several state legislatures have even passed laws for dropping off babies with no penalty; these laws are usually referred to as "safe haven" laws.

Let's say we have a poem that has a first-person point of view and then goes like: I have eaten the cookies Now, when I write about this poem and want to describe the action in the poem, would it be okay to write the following? The narrator has eaten some cookies If not, what is the proper way to write about the narrated action? Answer You can refer to the "narrator" or "the speaker" or (sometimes) "the poet" as having said the quoted material.

When reading some work of a friend, I noticed the sentence "When in doubt ask me". Instead of simply pointing out that it could use a comma after doubt, I read the sentence aloud with no gaps or punctuation, as it is written. When I was corrected that there should be a pause, I smiled and remarked that there was no punctuation to indicate this and my friend realised their own mistake. When asked why I didn't just say that, I remarked that I was just being __ for the sake of amusement. I used "spurious", but having re-read its definition, that is not the correct word to describe the way I acted, because it means: Not being what it purports to be; false or fake: "spurious claims". I don't think "sarcastic" covers what I did either and I'm at a loss for the word to use. Answer I would use "facetious" in this context. I define being facetious as "just messing with (something or someone)." It's not quite sarcasm,...

Is there a single word to describe an object or idea that is so desirable that everyone wants to attain it but once they have it they are immediately cursed? The idea is often used in literature—some examples: In Lord of the Rings , the 'one ring' is a perfect example of this. In Guy de Maupassant's story The Necklace , the necklace might be considered to be this. There are many stories of people making deals with the devil (see question: What does "Faustian bargain" mean? ), or being granted three wishes by a Djinn or fairy, which inevitably turn out bad. In the Twilight Zone episode Time Enough at Last , Bemis's desire to be left alone with his books would be an example of this word. 'Bane' covers the cursed part, but no one desires it. Is there a single word to describe a most highly desired treasure that (knowingly or unknowingly) comes with a curse? Answer I can find plenty of other examples for such objects but most of them revolve around a cha...

Suppose I have the following sentence: I lived in a communist country during the fall of communism in 1989. Should "communist" and "communism" be capitalized? Answer The correct capitalization for that sentence is: I lived in a communist country during the Fall of Communism in 1989. (You may want to keep "fall" in lower case.) A proper noun should be capitalized, as it is a unique entity. A common noun represents a class of entities or non-unique instances of that class, according to the English SE tag for proper nouns. Applying that definition, "a communist country" is an example of a common noun. It should not be capitalized. The other occurrence of communism in the sentence is a specific instance. (I presume that it refers to the former Soviet Union? Or another nation, doesn't really matter which one). It is unique by virtue of the fact that it was "of 1989". That is why the second occurrence of communism in your sentence shou...

A person that professes discrimination based on race is a racist. What is the word for defining a person that discriminates based on culture (pretty sure it is not culturist ) or social habits? E.g., Eric Cartman doesn't like hippies, he discriminates against them. But a hippie is not a race, an ethnic, a religion or a nationality. It is a life style not related to any of these.

This morning I was pondering the things in the English language which have not been given a name, such as 'the Sun' or 'the Moon'. These do not seem to fall into the same category as 'the ground' or 'the sky' which seem a lot more spatially vague. In cases where an implicit place is referred to, for example: 'we went to the ocean', the thing also has a specific name. Is there a reason why English has not given a name to the Sun or Moon? Other languages seem to have gone to the effort to name the big fiery thing in the sky, for example: Sol, Helios, Güneş. Answer Posted as answer, as requested: I think that 'the sun' counts as a name. There's only one; we refer to other giant, bright balls of hydrogen as 'stars'. In fact, you capitalize Sun if you're referring to it in an astronomical context

Why do we use cucumber to describe the attitude of a person who is able to control his/her temper in front of a difficult event? Answer This entry in the Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins (p133) has the answer: It took scientists with thermometers until 1970 to find out what has been folk knowledge for centuries - that cucumbers are indeed cool, so much so that the inside of a field cucumber on a warm day registers about 20 degrees cooler than the outside air. The belief is ancient, but was first put on record by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher in their play Cupid's Revenge (1610), when they referred to certain women as " as cold as cucumber ".

I came across these two examples, given to illustrate 'a case' where the inclusion of the preposition for is considered optional in the paper " Acquisition of Preposition Deletion by Non-native Speakers of English " by the authors Jae-Min Kim and Gil-Soon Ahn (in §2, on p.3): a. We have lived here (for) 12 years. b. I've studied English (for) ten years. Though I have no problems with either version of the ( a ) sentence, omitting the preposition in ( b ) sounds unacceptable to me. Is this regional? Is acceptability influenced by the size of the DO (/locative / PP / ...) between the verb and the time phrase the actual verb used ? Please note: The referenced paper is very useful, but contains a few expressions that need minor corrections – possibly translation errors.

I just read the following in Dan Ariely's book Predictably Irrational , [...] Zoe, and the other kids to whom I offered the same deal, was completely blinded by [...] p. 57 To me it would have seemed more natural to have written ' were completely blinded' . On the other hand, commas are often used in place of parentheses, in which case the following would, presumably, be incorrect, Zoe (and the other kids to whom I offered the same deal) were completely blinded by [...] Should 'was' or 'were' be used in the sentence separated with commas? Answer To me it would have seemed more natural to have written ‘were completely blinded’. You are right. Dan Ariely’s sentence does not seem natural regardless of the punctuation. The answer to your question has to do with what reading is – well, what readers do . And it turns out that neuroscientists now know one very interesting thing about reading which explains exactly how Dan’s sentence is problematic : reading u...

What do lengths of time with the "bi" prefix mean"? I have understood bicentennial as once every two hundred years, but biannual as meaning twice a year. Do biweekly and bimonthly mean twice a week or month , or once every two weeks or months ? If this prefix is not used consistently, is there any rationale as to why it isn't? Answer Bi- usually means "every two" (as in "every two [weeks/months/years, etc.]." But it can also mean "twice every [week/month/year, etc.]." To avoid confusion, I save bi- for "every two" and use semi- to mean "twice every." I wish everyone did.

Is there any preposition before "next week"? Is it "I would send you the proposal next Monday", or "...on next Monday"?

Should I use 'who' or 'that' in the following sentence? Any information you have, or any leads to staff who may have this information would be very much appreciated. Any information you have, or any leads to staff that may have this information would be very much appreciated.

I'm looking for something people from rural area would use, especially when they refer to that person's inability to adapt to the country life.

I've grown up on a farm, and my dad and his dad, apparently, always used "cattle" to refer to both the singular and plural forms of the domestic bovine. I've always assumed it's how the word "deer" is. However, I've heard people say that this is incorrect and the singular is just "cow", but this has always offended us as a cow is a mother cattle, and is incorrect if you're referring to a steer, a bull, or a heifer. So, is cattle singular as well as plural? If not, is there some general, non-gender-specific word that should be used instead? Answer Historically, cow refers to a female, and steer or bull refers to a male. The plurals of these are cows , steers and bulls . The 1896 edition of Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (found on Google books) defines cow as: The mature female of bovine animals. The female of certain large mammals, as whales, seals, etc. If you want to refer to more than one of this kind of animal, and don...

Do you say “All but one person forgets something” or “All but one person forget something”? I'm assuming that if all means five people, for example, then the example can be rewritten as Four people forget something , so the latter sentence would be correct, but I'm not sure. Answer Plural. Don't get confused by the word "one" popping up in there. "One" is not the subject of the sentence. The entire phrase "all but one" is the subject, and it is treated as plural because it IS plural. It's a group.

The antonyms for acquisition is loss and the such like found on here . However 'loss' and the such like do not catcher the full scope that need to be reflected in this context. It need to be able to encapsulate loss, sold, broken... The idea of an object/item go out of my ownership, rather than object/item coming into my ownership, which acquisition does a quite good job at. Answer In a business context the opposite to an acquisition would be a disposal , which can be used to describe items that are sold or otherwise got rid of. I would expect a "disposal form" to be used to document items leaving a person or business's ownership, with a field to categorise whether it was donated, sold, lost, stolen, etc.

I'm not a native English speaker. I am having difficulty with some words. Could anyone please tell me if there's any difference between the above mentioned short sentences, as I'm a little confused. Answer The short answer is 'not much'. The two expressions are more or less interchangeable. It can depend on distance. 'Come over here' would be used if the person you were calling was some distance away, at the other end of a hall, let's say, and there were other people in between. 'Come over here' is also perhaps a little more polite. Either expression would be enhanced by adding 'please', but 'Come here please' can sound slightly imperious in certain situations, depending on the relationship of the individuals. A parent or teacher might say it to a child, but it is not the sort of thing one would perhaps say to a colleague, without adding something like 'Would you mind coming here a moment'. 'Come over here please'...

I am translating a British story and I came across this expression "you look like you lost a shilling and found a penny". I am not sure I understand what it means.

How flexible is the measurement "a dozen"? If there are nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand people at a rally it is acceptable to say one million people attended, but if eleven people are arrested is it acceptable to round up to a dozen? Answer Dozen is quite flexible when it is pluralized. While hundreds sounds natural, you don't often hear about there being tens of something. Saying there were dozens of something fills this void without implying an exact multiple of 12.

What is happening to the phrase "Thank you"? Related questions: Is thank you considered formal nowadays? Is thanks used more often? Is there a decline in the usage of the phrase thank you observable among different generations, classes, regions or countries? Is there a difference in how people express gratitude today compared to the past (by using different phrases)? Preamble: I'm not seeking a discussion or criticism. I included my research on the topic below but it doesn't prove anything. I'd like to hear about your experiences. It would be nice if you could include additional information and any research as well. Of course, there are other ways to show gratitude but my question focuses on this phrase and its usage. It is not about people becoming more impolite or less grateful. Note: Great subjective questions invite sharing experiences over opinions. Certainly experiences inform opinions, but the best subjective questions unabashedly and unashamedly prio...

Most of us have had the experience of stumbling over a new fact or bit of knowledge and then finding several more references to it in the near future. For example, you see a strange word which you're forced to look-up and then the next day the same word appears in the headline of your local paper. There's a term for this phenomenon but I've been unable to track it down. Can anyone help?

In Britain and most of Europe, some form of U-speak exists: old-money language has certain features that distinguish it from other language. In Dutch, it doesn't really have a name, but it is still very much alive. I believe the same applies to England. The phenomenon is just very hard to research; that is why not much information about it is available on the internet, except about England, partly because of several famous studies on the subject (see Wikipedia). But even there the few reliable sources are several decades old, while U-speak changes continuously. Do Americans have their version of U-English? How does it differ from British U—or is it very much alike? What are some examples? It might be that the term is just not applicable to American society for some reason (though I doubt that). It would be best to have some references, like scientific articles or interviews or corpus finds, if such are available. Edited: Emily Post wrote extensively about what resembles European ...

I wonder how the following words for describing someone who knows many different things compare, and when to use which word. Some are adjectives, others are nouns: renaissance polymath versatile aficionado ... (possibly others if you don't hesitate to mention) Some background: I encountered "aficionado" and "versatile" from a personal description here "It's getting harder and harder for me to believe that you're just a hobbyist. Aficionado would be a better term. And a damn versatile one at that!" When I told some American I hoped to be polymath, he said they would use "Renaissance" instead. Answer Renaissance is usually talked about in relation with the Renaissance Period . Though it may be used in this sense, I guess, but I am not sure if it is advisable. Polymath is adequate. But please note that it usually implies that a person is an expert in several different subjects, you cannot become a polymath if you only know many subj...

How it is called (in the US) when you go to the bank or an ATM to add cash to your VISA/MasterCard debit card? That is, when you add cash to the bank account which is tied to that card. Is it either of these two, or is it something else? to refill my debit card to add funds to my debit card Answer Your question reveals a mindset about debit cards that simply doesn't exist in the US. Here, bank accounts came first, many many decades before anyone dreamed of electronic transactions. Thus, people have debit cards because they have bank accounts, not the other way around. You don't go out and get a debit card; you go out and open an account at a bank. This also means that you simply don't talk about refilling a debit card, because it was never filled in the first place. You can say something like "I need to put money in my account" or "I need to go to the bank to make a deposit", but at no point would you mention your debit card, any more than you would me...

Ok, we got a lot of words with suffix "- tion " in English like reflection or congestion . But the way to pronounce "- tion " is different sometimes. congestion /kənˈdʒes.tʃən/ reflection /rɪˈflek.ʃən/ SO, What are the rules to pronounce the suffix " -tion " in English, when to say " /-tʃən/ " and when to say " /ʃən/ "?

Epizeuxis is a rhetorical device which is defined as involving immediate or close repetition of a word or phrase - 'Break, break, break, On thy cold grey stones, O sea!' (Tennyson) or 'There's a fox, a fox in the garden' (quoted in Pilkington , p 125). If we restricted examples to a strict, single-word, immediate repetition pattern based on English language texts, would it be valid to state that: A: One-syllable patterns are more common than two-or-more-syllable ones; and, if so, then B: Examples involving the immediate repetition of two-or-more-syllable words have more impact? OR Does the impact depend solely/chiefly on the emotional weight of (a) the term and (b) the term in context? I am checking various works including Fisher's Repetition and have not found references to any comparative studies of this type to date. I wondered whether anyone on here might be aware of any specific studies that could provide some answers ... I would be very grateful for any c...

I would tend to treat a company name as singular and would therefore write the possessive form with 's. Now, my company refers to its international operations by placing the country name behind the company name; think: "Coca Cola USA" or "Coca Cola Germany". In these examples I would write, in similar fashion, "Coca Cola Germany's workers are happy". Unfortunately, we also operate in a number of countries that have plural names; think: Netherlands and Cayman Islands. What is the possessive form in these cases? Is it "Coca Cola Netherlands' workers are happy" or "Coca Cola Netherlands's workers are happy"? I nudge towards the latter being grammatically correct, however reckon the former to be more generally accepted — or easier on the eye. I'm not a native English speaker, so I am not always entirely capable of assessing what is "accepted" or "sounds right".

As I am a foreigner, I have great difficulty differentiating the sounds /æ/ and /e/ . When spoken softly, it becomes almost impossible for me to discern the sounds. Such as this one from movie Inception at 2:06 (...Saito knows. He's playing with us. Dicaprio: It doesn't "MATTER".) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D659PzLQDKk Matter here almost sounds like "MEtter". As such, I am frustrated by such hardship. Are /æ/ and /e/ always distinguished when spoken? I always make sure that I emphasize the vowel sound when I speak so as to achieve the best clarity I possibly can. However, it seems that when native speakers speak, the difference becomes extremely subtle or just indistinguishable. Is it only me? And if so, what should I do to attain the ability to hear such difference? Answer Phonology works together with word sense and context. In your example, there is no need to mark /æ/ from /Ɛ/ much: "m æ tter" or "m Ɛ tter", the word sense rema...

I always thought it was a todo list, and quite a few places online refer to it as todo , but various spell checkers are telling me it should be to-do . The only meaning I could find was a reference by dictionary.com which is different from the use I need for the word. Which is correct? Answer Wiktionary defines both to-do and todo : Noun to-do ( plural to-dos) ... 2. A task that has been noted as one that must be completed, especially on a list. My to-do list has been growing longer every day. And: Noun todo ( plural todos) ( US ) A task yet to be done; an item on a to-do list. You can use whichever you want, but be consistent. To-do is a little clearer, but hyphens are naturally lost as languages evolve (to-day, wire-less), so todo should be fine too. Edit: Waggers makes a very good point that todo isn't yet as widely adopted as to-do. So you may be better off sticking to to-do. Ngram of "todo list" vs "to do list" (+ "list" because to avo...

Someone said "Your team kicking serious butt" to me in an email. Does that mean that he thinks my team is awesome? I feel it may have a similar meaning to "kick ass" but I'm not sure and can't find this in dictionaries. Hope someone can help to clarify. Thanks.