Language Overflow

Lawrence

01:33

@snailplane I think the interesting part of the question is the difference between the Present Perfect Continuous and the Simple Past, e.g. "What have you been doing?" vs "What did you do?" as a follow-up to "Your clothes are so dirty." Is there a sense in which these are different? I'm not sure if it's acceptable to edit the question dramatically this way, but if so, I'd like to give it a shot.

@snailplane Also, the most useful comment was the first, but it has a "You're/Your" typo that mars the effect. May I suggest a courtesy mod-edit?

Lawrence

01:52

@CowperKettle Getting 'thunked' by a hard metal-and-glass object from that suppine position can hurt more than getting 'swooshed' by a small stack of paper. If you're reading hard-back tomes, that's a different matter. (Words in italics in this message are onomatopoeia. Any resemblance to computing terms or sportsware logos is purely accidental. There is no hidden meaning in this message.)

Lawrence

02:09

@DamkerngT. After reading it slowly, that (StoneyB's statement) sounds right. "Preparing" is the gerund. It is subjectless (not "preparing someone for X", just "preparing for X"). And finally, I think "preparing for" is the (gerund-)participle clause.

@DamkerngT. I wonder why StoneyB's answer has only accumulated the same number of votes as the other answer (6 votes each). The other answer just lists some alternatives but doesn't explicitly answer anything.

Lawrence

02:24

@CowperKettle Possibly "skewing of the data".

@snailplane None of which have to do with ears or earls. :P

@Færd To me, the comma rewrites 'before', making it specifically 'today'. Like "do you like ~~vegetables~~, cauliflower?" It's more of a verbal hiccup, less of a properly grammatical construct.

Hi and bye, @Catija! :)

Færd

02:56

@Lawrence Yeah, I thought of that, but then I thought if the pause is really brief it could be that you meant them as a compound unit.

Hmm, maybe not.

Anonymous

03:08

@Cardinal Oh no, you can always feel free to interrupt with English-related stuff :-)

Anonymous

@Lawrence Sure :-)

Anonymous

Moderators can edit any comment, and we have to be very careful in how and when we do so because there's no public revision history. But for something like this, I think it'll be okay :-)

Anonymous

03:28

@Peter Different speakers have different analyses of that pattern, so in real data you'll find three different forms in the that-clause: ① past ("time she learned to drive"), ② plain ("time that he be tried for his crimes"), and ③ present ("time that human society as a whole learns to do the same"). Although all three are attested, not all forms are produced or accepted by all speakers. The past is the most commonly produced and accepted form, so I recommend learners stick to it, even if the other options aren't necessarily wrong. (It's time we go home sounds fine to me.) — snailplane ♦ 2 mins ago

Anonymous

This seems to come up repeatedly on ELL.

Anonymous

Well, hopefully that counts as my useful contribution for the day, because I'm going to go fall over :-)

Lawrence

05:00

@snailplane I hope that you're also fine with my offer to edit the question. I've submitted the edit - let me know what you think, when you've had a chance to regain your feet. :)

@snailplane Sounds like you've had a long day. Have a good rest!

Man_From_India

05:28

Neither else nor otherwise sounds correct unless you mean if the result is incorrect, contact me using that page. If the result is correct, contact me using IRC. If you mean you can contact either using that page or using IRC, you can use either either...or or just or. Another problem is that ... try contact ... expression is not correct. Either try to contact or try contacting will be fine. — Man_From_India 18 mins ago

In this particular sentence it is very unlikely if else or otherwise is used to mean you can either contact though the page, or through ORC.

Looking for the answer. Let's see how the answer deals with it.

1

Q: "Else" or "otherwise"?

first of all, my native language is Spanish. This is an example: If some result is incorrect, try contact with the page, else contact with IRC My question is if else is incorrect here? Is otherwise better?

word-request

Lawrence

06:18

@Man_From_India I agree, and have provided an answer along similar lines.

Man_From_India

06:59

@Lawrence thanks I just found your answer :-)

Lawrence

@snailplane Hope you liked it. :)

@Man_From_India Oops, my previous message should have linked to you.

Man_From_India

Another clichéd question on ELL

0

Q: Stop+ Ving and Stop+ to+infinitive?

I have two questions here: To which action we can use Stop + gerund? And to which action we can use Stop + to + infinitive?

gerund infinitive

@Lawrence :-) no problem. I liked it and did a +1

Lawrence

@Man_From_India :)

Damkerng T.

Hmm... Blah blah blah, otherwise blah blah blah seems to be common enough nowadays. Even though, technically, it's not correct, I think.

Lawrence

@Man_From_India That one needs to be reworded, otherwise it's too broad.

@DamkerngT. I suppose so, but there's a lot of detail hidden in the blahs. :)

Damkerng T.

07:08

@Man_From_India A dupe! It's a dupe! (But of what question?)

@Lawrence To disprove it, feel free to use anything for blah blah blah. :D

Man_From_India

@DamkerngT. yes a dupe of lot of similar questions :-) I'm not on desktop :(

Damkerng T.

Anyway, I was thinking of the same error people usually make with however.

Lawrence

@DamkerngT. There's a bit of the jedi-mind-game about it for people fluent in English. :)

@DamkerngT. What error is that?

Damkerng T.

Sometimes people use it as if it were a conjunction.

Like a "but" or something.

Lawrence

@DamkerngT. How about "This is so, otherwise it is not."? I don't dispute that the form can be found commonly enough nowadays. I don't think it's technically 'incorrect' (ungrammatical), though.

Damkerng T.

07:24

@Lawrence That's exactly what I was thinking! (i.e., yes, it's common, but is it really grammatical?)

"Or else" is safer because it has "or" in it.

Lawrence

@DamkerngT. 'Otherwise' is grammatical and natural in that sentence. 'Else' there sounds forced to me.

(I'm heading off now. Bye!)

Damkerng T.

See you!

Krishn Shweta

Hello!!!

Damkerng T.

@Lawrence TRomano's examples are quite interesting, though. Some makes it more difficult to rephrase or insert a preposition. (I haven't cast my vote in that question.)

Man_From_India

@KrishnShweta hello. How are you doing?

Damkerng T.

07:35

Hello! @KrishnShweta

CowperKettle

@snailplane - I finally sent you the book. I'm such a snail when it comes to doing something. (0: And it took some time for the book store to deliver it to Yekaterinburg in the first place. (0:

Krishn Shweta

Heading off That's cool word. I want to some more ways to say Good bye similar to that...

CowperKettle

Sawasdee khrap, @DamkerngT. and all!

Krishn Shweta

@Man_From_India Good and you?

@DamkerngT. :)

Damkerng T.

> ... when they have problems preparing for the IELTS test
Do you have difficulty walking?
Do you have pain standing up?
Do you have trouble sleeping?
Do you have shortness-of-breath climbing stairs?
Do you have qualms doing that?
Did you have a good time visiting them

Sawasdee khrap!

In all cases, it's clear that the -ing part is about the subject.

So theoretically, this should work:

> ... when preparing for the IELTS test, they have problems.

But it doesn't work as well with questions:

> Walking, do you have difficulty?

> Do you, walking, have difficulty?

But the when/while insertion trick still works pretty well:

> Do you have difficulty when walking?

The preposition (likeliest in or with) insertion trick also works in most cases:

> Do you have trouble with sleeping?

Damkerng T.

08:30

2

A: Can the phrase “mutton chops” sometimes be used as “I’m doomed”?

Dawn Bellwether: [follows Mayor Lionheart, trying to keep the folders balanced and gathering the scattering papers] Oh, no, but sir, you do have a meeting with Herds and Grazing, sir, if I can just...! [Mayor Lionheart enters his office and lets the doors slam right in Bellwether's fac...

Oh, pickles!

Never heard it before, but it sounds kinda cute!

It's not easy to write grammar rules.

It's established that we would normally use SAI with a negative or restrictive sentence.

But, in, for example, Lost, we have this line: Only, the thing is, we're going to have to take the boy.

Interestingly, I thought it was just Only the thing is, we have to take the boy.

(No pause between Only and the, either, IIRC.)

Damkerng T.

09:03

Wondering of the day: what would be the more effective ways to learn vocabulary?

(Inspired by this question: ell.stackexchange.com/questions/103429/…)

Damkerng T.

09:17

0

Q: "for its own value" how did you understand this expression in the following sentence?

"Some individuals believe that the primary goal of universities should be to provide information and skills needed for future work.Others however feel that the main objective of universities is to give students access to knowledge for its own values regardless if the information is useful for a j...

meaning-in-context

Something in the text is interesting ...

regardless if? I wouldn't expect regardless if in this kind of writing.

Ahh... it's from here:

essayforum.com/writing/…

> Some individuals believe that the primary goal universities should be to provide information and skill needed for future work. others however feel that the main objective of universities is to give students access to knowledge for its own values regardless if the information is useful for a job or not.
what, in your opinion, should be the primary objective if university education? give reason for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience
(IELTS TASK 2)

Another difference in an ExE dialect!

(Also values for value as JavaLatte pointed out.)

the primary objective if university education?! -- Now that makes me wonder what the real original would look like!

CowperKettle

Knowledge can have multiple "values"

Damkerng T.

It sounds less good to me with values.

CowperKettle

"on its own merits"

dictionary.cambridge.org/ru/…

> Judge the product on its own merits, and not on what the ads say.

Damkerng T.

It's not like cultural values or values of a religion, IMO.

CowperKettle

merits chimes in with values

Damkerng T.

09:26

Like jobs/tasks and work, perhaps.

merits is fine with me.

This values, not much.

This kind of thing always makes me think English is hard! :-)

CowperKettle

(0:

Now I will track the parcel using Russian Post's tracker system. My previous parcel reached New York in 1 month sharp

Damkerng T.

Yay!

CowperKettle

But the t-shirt has not arrived, and it's 1.5 months

Damkerng T.

I see that you sent a book or something to California. ;-)

CowperKettle

Yes, a book to Snails. (0:

Damkerng T.

09:32

@CowperKettle It's not here yet either.

CowperKettle

In Russian

Damkerng T.

nods

CowperKettle

You can send her a book in Thai (0:

Damkerng T.

LOL

CowperKettle

Are books expensive there?

I bought the book for about 500 rubles

Damkerng T.

09:34

Quite a bit, lately.

But so is everything.

CowperKettle

R500 is $8

We also are having an inflation

I'll go and translate some bleak Russian industry news

BBL

Damkerng T.

See you later!

BTW, @snailplane, I just heard the news about a (translated) manga publisher over here is going to stop printing manga soon. Their ebook manga line is still relatively new (about 1 year, plus or minus a few months). I sense that the future of the company is now uncertain. ...

I wonder how well the situation is in Japan. I guess you would know more about the current situation of Japanese manga than me.

CowperKettle

10:35

makroflex.com/en/products/pu-foams/makroflex-special-foams/…

How do we call this thing? A canister, maybe..

Good afternoon, Snails! (0:

> According to the company's plan, the plant should have the highest production capacity in Russia, reaching 50 canister per minute or 7000 tonnes of finished product per year.

I used "canister" thus far.

Ah. Maybe just "can"

Anonymous

10:47

Good morning :-)

Anonymous

Shouldn't that be plural?

Deo

11:02

@CowperKettle I've found usages of "can" and "tube" for similar form-factors. Also, depending on dispender system similar containers (btw, "container" is an OK option too) can be called aerosoles and cartriges.

@CowperKettle caveat: I searched related terms for silicone containers mostly, because it came to mind first. This may have affected results.

CowperKettle

11:32

@snailplane Ooops

Thank you!

And thank you, @Deo!

I'll check now whether that singular slipped into my actual translation

No, it's "cans" there. (0:

> DRUG is a recombinant trispecific antibody, having specificity against IL17A, IL17F and human TNFα, as well as several orthologic targets.

Is this present participle phrase okay?

I thought it was not okay, and edited it, and now the agency objects, saying it was okay.

The agency whose work I was reviewing

If we take away the comma before "having", would it be okay? It would still look odd to me, but passable maybe.

Man_From_India

T-shirt has arrived in India as well :(

Damkerng T.

I think it would look better if you removed both the commas before "having" and "as well as".

CowperKettle

@DamkerngT. It was mainly the comma seemed wrong to me, but I changed it more.

Damkerng T.

@Man_From_India Hopefully, the shirts will reach their destinations soon!

CowperKettle

> DRUG is a recombinant trispecific antibody with specificity against IL17A, IL17F and human TNFα as well as several orthologic targets.

I used "with"

@Man_From_India Then it's okay. It's still not here either

Damkerng T.

11:39

Nice option!

Man_From_India

One of my uncles bought a china tea pot online. It had to come from abroad. But our custom policies are pretty nasty. They hassled him a lot.

He didn't give me the details of why they did it.

Damkerng T.

Maybe the pot is big and very expensive.

CowperKettle

That's odd, for a teapot

Damkerng T.

Or very old.

CowperKettle

I put some commemorative coins when I sent a book to a friend in New York. Then I suddenly learned that it is prohibited to send coins from Russia to other countries.

I ran back to the station and took my parcel, put it apart and took out the coins.

Damkerng T.

11:41

Oh!

CowperKettle

That was a pity.

Damkerng T.

Some rules are mind-boggling!

Man_From_India

Not big. But here you know laws are nasty n people in power are nastier. Maybe he bought some sort of antiques. He is fond of such things. That's what I suspect

CowperKettle

nods

Man_From_India

@CowperKettle very strange.

CowperKettle

11:42

But usually it's prohibited to send antiques out, not bring them in

@Man_From_India I fully agree, it's outlandish. Those were just ordinary Russian coins, but stamped with some nice pictures. And some Ukranian commemorative medals. I was not sure about those, so I had to take them out too..

Man_From_India

Hmmm then it shouldn't have been a problem. I am still not sure if it's antique. I just suspect.

Laws are strange. They are made to stop criminals, but we common people suffer :(

CowperKettle

And it costs an arm and a leg to send money to India from Russia via Western Union. And India has some weird law prohibiting my sister to make a Visa credit card, since she is not a citizen

At least that's what she says

Man_From_India

Not unlikely. The way India lets the authorities shit!

CowperKettle

"lets the authorities shit"?

Man_From_India

Most of them are corrupted :-) that's what I meant :P

CowperKettle

11:48

(0:

Same here.

An anti-corruption police colonel was arrested a week ago. He had 8 000 000 000 rubles in his apartment

Man_From_India

Still far better I think. I'm planning to move out :-) but you know how parents are.

CowperKettle

.. and some thousands of Euros in the car, as small cash money

@Man_From_India (0:

Man_From_India

What the hell! A corrupted officer with anti-corruption designation :D

CowperKettle

Yes, his job was to fight corruption (0:

He thought it well, it seems

But it got the better of him (0:

Man_From_India

:(

CowperKettle

11:53

They arrested him for a 7 million ruble bribe, and found 8 billion rubles in his flat, LOL

Man_From_India

Haha

CowperKettle

That's a thousand such bribes

$123 million

themoscowtimes.com/news/…

Man_From_India

Bribes! They are so common to police and govt officials here that maybe they have started to think it's their honest right :D

CowperKettle

(0:

A jolly little song about bribes

Man_From_India

Ufff my book is due to arrive on 20th :( phewwww so long does it take!

CowperKettle

11:58

nods

CowperKettle

12:13

@Man_From_India From one Indian town to another?

I'm lurking cause I'm editing and stuff. O_o

When I order a book, it also takes more than a week for it to arrive from Moscow

Deo

Anybody here fond of board games?

Heard big news about Fantasy Flyght Games breaking up with Games Workshop?

CowperKettle

I play them with friends, but very rarely, alas..

*heard

*Have you heard

(0:

Avicenna

Yay, last session of last semester in summer! Bubbly class is all silent again. :-)) (My turn to take revange again 😈😈😈😈)

Deo

@CowperKettle thanks

CowperKettle

@Deo No problem!

@Avicenna What?

They studied all the summer?

0

Q: Would this present participle phrase always imply causation? "X is an antibody, having specificity against.."

DRUG is a recombinant trispecific antibody, having specificity against TARGET1, TARGET2 and TARGET3, as well as several orthologic targets. I was reviewing a translation and changed this sentence to DRUG is a recombinant trispecific antibody with specificity against TARGET1, TARGET2 and...

present-participle participle-phrase

@Avicenna They are silent because an exam is approaching?

Avicenna

12:23

@CowperKettle Oh, you don't know about them!

@CowperKettle No, poor them! They are taking their final exam!

Jun 14 at 13:13, by Sina

My students r taking final exam. They r all silent. Oh, what a peace. This is the unique opportunity seeing them all quiet:-) the only one who is enjoying is me😈😈😈😈

Man_From_India

@CowperKettle yes. It shouldn't be like this. My experience with Amazon is getting worse. Comparatively it takes max 2-3 days for any goods from Flipkart to arrive.

Flipkart is an Indian online store.

CowperKettle

@Avicenna (0:

Man_From_India

I could order this book from Flipkart, but it's a bit cheaper in Amazon. So I ordered from Amazon.

Avicenna

@CowperKettle :)) 😈😈😈😈😈

Oh, look at my revenge! Who typed it as revange? It seems fishy! I need a detective to find them out!

CowperKettle

(0:

Avicenna

12:34

And a that one too!

30=see, 100=sad. Learn some Persian if you like!

CowperKettle

(0:

Avicenna

300=see sad

CowperKettle

I hope to never 30 you 100, Avi!

Let not even paeez make you 100.

Avicenna

Wow! Thank you! You learn really fast! I hope the same for you! :-)

CowperKettle

(0:

@Avicenna No, it's that Cardinal told me about paeez

Avicenna

12:42

@CowperKettle You're Persian, aren't you?

CowperKettle

paeez

►

Avicenna

@CowperKettle You should have known that Persian is contagious! Paeez is my favorite season! :-)

@CowperKettle nice!

CowperKettle

Paeez, autumn, go away.. (0:

Because you're too rainy.

specificity is jargon here. Not sure what "having specifity" means. I'll have to look it up. I assume it means that it targets the target(s) and only the target(s)? But "with" and "having" are synonymous in this use. — TRomano 3 mins ago

@Avicenna Poets love the autumn, bicyclists hate it. (0:

> The antibody communicates with the cytokines and neutralizes their biological functions.

I edited it to binds, and now the translator objects.

Here at least I'm certain.

"Binds" is the natural verb

@Avicenna But I guess it is beautiful in Iran, and not too much rain

In the autumn, I mean

On the rare dry days it is beautiful here too in the autumn. I like May in the Urals better though.

Avicenna

@CowperKettle and full of dried leaves I can step on them and enjoy! So don't listen to CowperKettle and make yourself at home!!!

CowperKettle

@Avicenna (0:

Avicenna

12:56

@CowperKettle So send all of your fall over here!

CowperKettle

@Avicenna No, come and pick it up! (0:

It's too expensive to send such a large thing as Russian autumn to Iran.

Avicenna

@CowperKettle It was raining more in the past, but not now, you're right!

@CowperKettle :D

I am heading to Russia!

CowperKettle

Yay!

Avicenna

Yay!

Do you like the song paeez? It's mellow, and lovely!

CowperKettle

Yes, I listened many times to it, and made a primitive translation into Russian.

Avicenna

13:02

O.o You know Persian!? You're Iranian!!!

CowperKettle

No, there was a simple translation into English on the YouTube page.

Sorry for not being Iranian.

We have many Tajik people in the city, their language is basically a Farsi dialect

Avicenna

@CowperKettle Yes, they were Iranian!

@CowperKettle Be proud! You're Russian!

CowperKettle

(0:

Avicenna

@CowperKettle :-)

CowperKettle

13:18

Be proud, you're a teacher!

> TNFa is a natural cytokine, which is involved in the regulation of normal inflammatory and immune response.

Do we need this comma?

I wrote this off as an error, but again the translator objects.

They say: "If the phrase beginning with "which" is describing a noun, then it needs a comma before it".

O_O

Not so, I think

I feel that there should be no comma there.

ColleenV

Good morning. I would not put a comma after cytokine.

CowperKettle

Good morning, @ColleenV!

ColleenV

I would take which is out entirely

CowperKettle

Same here, my edited version contained no relativizer (or whatever it is called)

ColleenV

Cytokine involved in the regulation

Commas are the punctuation of controversy lol.

CowperKettle

13:28

(0:

ColleenV

Everyone seems to have their own style

And they can change the meaning drastically in some cases

CowperKettle

I wrote: "Disagree: restrictive relative clauses are not offset with commas"

ColleenV

Let's eat, Grandma! Let's eat Grandma!

Avicenna

@CowperKettle :-) Thank you! I am busy with my classes! See you!

CowperKettle

@Avicenna Thank you for the talk, Avi! See you later!

> TNFa is expressed in the form of active transmembrane predecessor with weight of 26kDa.

I changed it to "precursor" instantly, but again they disagree.

Why disagree? It's not bad to make a mistake, a translator will make them every day. Not a crime.

ColleenV

13:33

They are consistently wrong at least

Some folks are insecure

CowperKettle

I found one instance when they are almost right. Hope that will improve my proofreading skill.

ColleenV

Any mistakes makes them feel like everyone sees that they are incompetent instead of just learning and moving on

CowperKettle

May be so..

ColleenV

If someone believes in their heart they aren't good enough, they may spend a lot of time trying to hide it instead of getting better

CowperKettle

13:49

> IL17A is mainly produced by activated Th17 cells, constituting a separate subtype of T-helper cells (CD4 +).

Here "constituting" clearly refers to IL17A.

Thus the whole sentence is a grave mistranslation

Damkerng T.

14:07

@CowperKettle nods -- It doesn't sound that bad to me, though. Then again, we could avoid it by using some other alternatives.

Hi, @AlanWhited! Welcome to the room!

(And hello, everyone who is in the room quietly. :-)

CowperKettle

14:20

(0:

> Fig. 2 represents microphotographs of cells used in the experiment. (I changed it to shows)

Maybe we can say represents?

Damkerng T.

represents sounds odd to me, unless the cells are representative examples.

CowperKettle

Same here.

They object, providing an example: "The picture that graphically represents the items you use in windows is called GUI"

But that is a quite different thing

Damkerng T.

Hmm... (I got curious so I look it up.)

> 4 [transitive] to be a picture or image of something
The statue represents Jefferson as a young man.

macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/american/…

CowperKettle

Yes, but "figure" (an image in a scientific publication) can hardly "represent" microphotographs, IMHO

Damkerng T.

nods -- The GUI and statue examples sound better than our figure example.

user233358

14:27

Howdy @CowperKettle @DamkerngT.!

CowperKettle

Translators are trying to understand the meaning of sail in a description of a toilet bowl

Damkerng T.

If they really want something not plain, I think presents is a better choice than represents.

Hi!

user233358

How are we all today? :p

CowperKettle

@DamkerngT. same here

@Arrowfar - good evening! I'm proofreading a reply to my proofreading made a month ago.

So a bit busy.

(0:

Hope you're well!

user233358

oh good luck with the proofreading man.

user233358

14:29

I'm fine, yeah.

Damkerng T.

I'm just taking a short time slot to chat here. :-)

user233358

Why short? Are you busy?

Damkerng T.

I'm going to write a long piece of C code tonight, so I'm just kicking the can around now. :P

user233358

It is evening here. I thought I'd just pop in for a while.

user233358

@DamkerngT. Oh cool :)

Damkerng T.

14:32

:D

user233358

So you still write code? I thought you quit coding. (sorry if I misremember)

user233358

It has been a long time.

Damkerng T.

@Arrowfar Well, I guess I have to do it again, for now.

user233358

ah nice.

CowperKettle

-1

Q: Would this present participle phrase always imply causation? "X is an antibody, having specificity against.."

DRUG is a recombinant trispecific antibody, having specificity against TARGET1, TARGET2 and TARGET3, as well as several orthologic targets. I was reviewing a translation and changed this sentence to DRUG is a recombinant trispecific antibody with specificity against TARGET1, TARGET2 and...

commas present-participle participle-phrase

Is this a bad quality question? I see it was downvoted.

It's not a proofreading request but rather a request to explain whether my proofreading was wrong.

The comments seemed very interesting to me.

I did not pay attention to that aspect of English.

Damkerng T.

14:41

I'm not sure. It's only one downvote anyway.

CowperKettle

nods

I hope TRomano knocks together an answer.

Damkerng T.

An old question of mine almost got closed once because the example I used to demonstrate a grammar point was in the lyrics of a song!

@CowperKettle nods

CowperKettle

@DamkerngT. Really?

Where is it?

user233358

My questions would get closed in the past on ELU, so I stopped asking on the main site and started picking people's brains in chat there. It is fine, mostly I asked backshifting stuff anyway.

user233358

Two years ago.

Damkerng T.

14:47

@CowperKettle Oh, it was fine. I posted a comment, insisting that I wasn't interested in the meaning of the song, just the grammar. :-)

user233358

Hello @ColleenV Congrats on becoming the mod here on ELL :P

ColleenV

@Arrowfar Thanks you!

@Arrowfar Thank you!

Damkerng T.

Just in case you got curious, @CowperKettle, here it is: english.stackexchange.com/questions/74072/… :D

ColleenV

:) I typo a lot when I'm at work

user233358

heh :)

user233358

14:50

Me too!

CowperKettle

@DamkerngT. Interesting question

Damkerng T.

Thanks!

user233358

@CowperKettle The downvote is gone now, I noticed. Yay.

CowperKettle

@Arrowfar Nice!

6

A: "When all you hear is fear and lies"

The words that precede the verb determine its form, not the words that follow it, so we can disregard the fact that fear and lies is plural. The relevant question is whether all is singular or plural. If it’s singular, the verb is is. If it’s plural, the verb is are. In other contexts there would...

ColleenV

It's not gone, just offset by someone who thought it didn't deserve a down-vote

CowperKettle

14:55

ah, yes

Nice answer there ^^

ColleenV

OK, someone teach me how to get an answer/question in a nice block like that

Damkerng T.

Just paste the link to the question and make sure that it's the only thing in your message. :-)

CowperKettle

It's an ancient practice, it takes years to master it fully.

Damkerng T.

LOL

CowperKettle

(0:

ColleenV

14:57

Lol

So, what you're saying is that I am too verbose and it will take years of practice for me to be able to paste a link and hit return. I think you're right :P

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