now, all classic tales and essays on this site has JavaScript highlighting feature. For example, go to the Story of Cupid and Psyche, hoover annotated words to see its annotation highlighted.
some selection of other stories and essays with heavy annotation:
Arabian Nights. Spectacular tale. The First Kalandar's Tale
today's words: multiplex, hymn, chorale, stark, bunting. Arcade Fire — Abraham's Daughter (Hunger Games Ending Credits Song) 🎶
today's word: Elysium. Portishead — Elysium 🎶
starting to banish the article “the” in my writings. Mostly. Banish the f�ck out of it of the universe.
what accent is the girl? New England?
updated. Online English Dictionary Tools
when you type “weather” or “whether”, make sure you don't botch it into wether, because that could be devastating.
St. Patrick's Day, although not a legal holiday anywhere in the United States, is nonetheless widely recognised and celebrated throughout the country. It is primarily observed as a celebration of Irish and Irish American culture; celebrations include prominent displays of the colour green, feasting, copious consumption of alcohol, religious observances, and numerous parades. The holiday has been celebrated on the North American continent since the late eighteenth century.
from Saint Patrick's Day
☘. Shamrock
The shamrock refers to the young sprigs of clover or trefoil. It is known as a symbol of Ireland, with St. Patrick having used it as a metaphor for the Christian Trinity, according to legend. The name shamrock is derived from Irish seamróg, which is the diminutive version of the Irish word for clover (seamair) meaning simply “little clover” or “young clover”.
watch this. English Accent: British Accent 📺. What's the exact locality of the brother sister's accent?
heard of science news of turning excrement into artificial food? The idea is also in Gulliver's Travels 1726 Gulliver's Travels. PART III. A VOYAGE TO LAPUTA, BALNIBARBI, LUGGNAGG, GLUBBDUBDRIB, AND JAPAN.
some fantastic readings, on language and logic.
what is science? science is to split, rend, cleave!
science «c.1300, “knowledge (of something) acquired by study,” also “a particular branch of knowledge,” from Old French science, from Latin scientia “knowledge,” from sciens (genitive scientis), prp. of scire “to know,” probably originally “to separate one thing from another, to distinguish,” related to scindere “to cut, divide,” from PIE root *skei- (cf. Greek skhizein “to split, rend, cleave,” Gothic skaidan, Old English sceadan “to divide, separate;” see shed (v.)).»
A cant (or cryptolect) is the jargon or argot of a group, often implying its use to exclude or mislead people outside the group.
An argot is a secret language used by various groups — including, but not limited to, thieves and other criminals — to prevent outsiders from understanding their conversations. The term argot is also used to refer to the informal specialized vocabulary from a particular field of study, hobby, job, sport, etc.
The author Victor Hugo was one of the first to research argot extensively. He describes it in his 1862 novel Les Misérables as the language of the dark; at one point, he says, “What is argot; properly speaking? Argot is the language of misery.”
examples of unix tech geeker argots: YMMV, TIMTOWTDI, RFC, RTFM, I-ANAL, shebang, lisp1 lisp2.
Patter is a prepared and practiced speech, that is designed to produce a desired response from its audience. Examples of occupations with a patter might include the: auctioneer, salesperson, dance caller, or comedian.
The term was originally a colloquial shortening of “Pater Noster” and referred to the practice of mouthing or mumbling prayers quickly and mechanically, without any expression of meaning or sincerity.
longitude and latitude. Here's a easy way to remember them.
Longitude is “long”. It passes north pole and south pole. It's vertical.
latitude is horizontal lines. Think of it as “ladder”.
Meridian (geography) = a great circle passing north pole and south pole. It's also called “line of longitude”. Thus, there are many meridians. The one that passes Greenwich is called prime meridian. (Greenwich is inside London) Meridians are perpendicular to equator.
A “knot” means 1.852 km per hour. The essence is that it's equal to one minute of meridian. A ship traveling at 1 knot for 1 hour would move 1 minute on equator or meridian. If it travels at 60 knots for 1 hour, it would have moved one degree.
the term Knot came historically, when long ago ship speed is measured by dipping a line into the sea and as the ship moves, letting the line unroll from a reel, and measure how long it takes for the ship to pull the line till next knot tied on the line is reached.
Until the mid-19th century vessel speed at sea was measured using a chip log. This consisted of a wooden panel, weighted on one edge to float perpendicular to the water surface, and thus present substantial resistance to moving with respect to the water around it, attached by line to a reel. The chip log was “cast” over the stern of the moving vessel and the line allowed to pay out. Knots placed at a distance of 47 feet 3 inches (14.4018 m) passed through a sailor's fingers, while another sailor used a 30 second sand-glass (28 second sand-glass is the current accepted timing) to time the operation. The knot count would be reported and used in the sailing master's dead reckoning and navigation. This method gives a value for the knot of 20.25 in/s, or 1.85166 km/h. The difference from the modern definition is less than 0.02%.
see also Google Earth Geography 101
today's homework: what's the difference between fornication and copulation?
and how to euphemistically describe the act in a way that's universally endorsed? the answer to that lies in the lyrics of The Power of Love.
transistor = transfer resistor
Most beautiful poem. And the word of the day is: pine.
我走遍漫漫的天涯路 我望断遥远的云和树 多少的往事堪重数 你呀你在何处 我难忘你哀怨的眼睛 我知道你那沉默的情意 你牵引我到一个梦中 我却在别个梦中忘记你 啊…我的梦和遗忘的人 啊…受我最初祝福的人 终日我灌溉着蔷薇 却让幽蘭枯萎 |
I have roamed all the roads I have seen past the clouds and trees How many memories are worth recounting You, O, you; where are you? I cannot forget your pining eyes I understand your quiet affections You lead me into a dream Yet I've forgotten you in another O… my dream and my forgotten one O… the one who had my first blessing Daily I tend to rambler roses In derelict is the quite orchid |
today's words: floozy, hussy, ingenue, canny, trollop, zeitgeist, dichotomy, flake, de rigueur, patsy.
they say poetry is like honey. This is like molasses.
moved to its own page. Humor: Sh%t Southern Women Say (slang; accent; video)
the transcription needs work. Anyone?
word by song. wanton, undulate, billow, demure.
an endless wave of affection, undulates like the waters of summer it arrived at your side, have you felt it? the image of you, flashed into my mind your moves, your thoughts, are my thirsts and cravings i always had this wish, wished there's a night where i whisper my grievances at your side, burden you with my worries sorrow is the billow of affection, and the bridge of affection the guide of affection if you need the nourishment of love; hesitate no more
A old song from Shanghai, China. A classic beauty. The lyrics is demure yet drips wantonness. 周璇 — 诉衷情 (Grievances of Love)
word by song. This song showcases a girl besotted in a flame. Rihanna — SOS
today's words, writter's words. emetic, logorrhea, notarize, treacly, travesty, vagary, usher, refractory, putrescence
make a sentence of it.
words by song. Slangs and idioms.
Last Friday night
We went streaking in the park
Skinny dipping in the dark
Then had a ménage à trois
Katy Perry — Last Friday Night
see also English Vocabulary: Foreign Words
word by song. After watching this music video, you'll know what lackadaisical means. Anya Marina — All the Same to Me
word by song: Undulation. You'll remember this word after watching Björk - Pagan Poetry
Undulation «1640s, from Medieval Latin *undulatio, from Late Latin undulatus “wavy, undulated,” from undula “wavelet,” diminutive of Latin unda “wave”»
Dave Pawson gave this usage.
At the inaugural meeting, his purported verve suffered from concealment. His niche, malicious gossip, facilitated the presentation. In a somewhat covert manner his gruesome side was shown, redemption being sought through words.
by Dave Pawson.
following yesterday's theme of “recursion”, here's a idiom about recursion used in computing . English Idiom in Unix: Directory Recursively
I'm a fountain of blood in the shape of a girl you're bird on the brim hypnotized by the whirl Drink me - make me feel real wet your beak in the stream the game we're playing is life love's a two way dream
word by song: recursion. “recursion” — a central theme in this song. Björk — Bachelorette
and what does spunk mean? and who is Cleopatra, Mata Hari?
This song: Madonna — Like It or Not.
today's word: forte. Example: “drinking coffee is my forte.” ☺
Today's words: hollow, cavern, jingle, jangle. Dusty Springfield — the Windmills of Your Mind
Lojban is a constructed language, design based on predicate logic. Some tutorial here, with voice recording: Xah's lojban Tutorial.
“The more there is of mine, the less there is of yours.”
That's the concept of Zero–sum game. However, in real world, most things isn't zero-sum game. Both parties actually benefit. e.g. when you give something you no longer want to someone, a value is created “out of nothing”.
today's words: inaugural, verve, purported, concealment, niche, malicious, facilitate, covert, gruesome, redemption.
exemplary usage: SAT words ₁₉
make a sentence of it. Or else i whip you.
A song of polyamory. “you and me and her” — every man's dream. Snake River Conspiracy — You And Your Friend
What does waywardness mean? This song: Björk — Unison. Read into the ballad, the spirit, the innocence, and the waywardness!
Noun things: manor, armada, ungulates, varicose, insignias, mandible, frontispiece, hotcake, bric-a-brac, cowcatcher, cataract, palimpsest, causeway, reservoirs, duffel, lanyard, halberd, dirndl, chronograph, chronometer, stork, battlement, citadel, bastion, bile, backhoe, sinew, pachyderm, necropolis, spindle, foyer
English Vocabulary: Noun Things
blue, dusk, a wandering waif lazy songs, and the red caravan wutong trees shaded the dancing shoes the circus narrates the scene anyhow; a dime you have or a boat of gold anyhow; an ant you are or a god i long for a fleeing peep the contentment and wellness in a sip the old red bearded man a smile serene and plain my dancing shoes swirl i sing into a frenzy i would withdraw into a being the spinning carts cheer for me how would i ever tire
王菲 — 流浪的红舞鞋 (Wandering Red Dancing Shoes)
Much updated. 20 articles of video recordings. English Accents
English has a convention in capitalization of titles. For example, {for, of, a} are usually all lower case. e.g. 〈A Tale of Two Cities〉. Note that even the first word is “a”, but it should be capitalized. I thought this is pretty much the only exception. But I discovered a good example today:
The name of the song 〈For What You Dream Of〉. Bedrock — For What You Dream Of (Trainspotting)
There, the “of” in the end, should be capitalized. I'm not aware of any source that has detail of all the rules of this convention. (preferably, a algorithm) Normally it's like you know when you see it. Do you know a source that describes this title capitalized convention completely?
perm URL: English Convention of Capitalization in Titles
In the North there's a lady, stunning and singular. One look confounds a city; a touch dooms an empire. Rather not wishing to know, the ruination that may follow. Rare beauty is here and now.
House of Flying Daggers — The Beauty Song (十面埋伏 — 佳人歌)
“And there I saw the lady stripped to the skin, her limbs bound to four stakes and blood welling from her sides”
From Arabian Nights, The Second Kalandar's Tale
in typography, ligature is certain glyphs that are made up of combined letters. e.g.: fi=fi, ae=æ
See also: The Moronicities of Typography: Hyphen, Dash, Quotation Marks, Apostrophe
Dave Pawson gave this example: “The wizened pariah addressed the calumny of his interlocutor with vagary, not liking the accusation of a complicity in inerrancy; whilst the leitmotif played gently.”
usage examples: GRE Words ₁₅
Learn 3 words from Gangnam Style: neologism, exude, lavish. The first one is a bit hard, it's a terminology from linguistics. The other two are highschool level words. PSY — Gangnam Style
Today's words, arcane words: oniomania, precocial, neonate
Oniomania
Today's words, EASY: juvenile, genre, tangible, protagonist, coming-of-age, unobtrusive.
Young-adult fiction. Quote:
Young-adult fiction or young adult literature (often abbreviated as YA), also juvenile fiction, is fiction written, published, or marketed to adolescents and young adults. The Young Adult Library Services (YALSA) of the American Library Association (ALA) defines a young adult as someone between the ages of twelve and eighteen. Authors and readers of young adult (YA) novels often define the genre as literature as traditionally written for ages ranging from twelve years up to the age of eighteen, while some publishers may market young adult literature to as low as age ten or as high as age twenty-five. The terms young-adult novel, juvenile novel, young-adult book, etc. refer to the works in the YA category.
YA literature shares the following fundamental elements of the fiction genre: character, plot, setting, theme, and style. However, theme and style are often subordinated to the more tangible elements of plot, setting, and character, which appeal more readily to younger readers. The vast majority of YA stories portray an adolescent, rather than an adult or child, as the protagonist.
The subject matter and story lines of YA literature are typically consistent with the age and experience of the main character, but, beyond that, YA stories span the spectrum of fiction genres. Themes in YA stories often focus on the challenges of youth, sometimes referred to as problem novels or coming-of-age novels. Writing styles of YA stories range widely, from the richness of literary style to the clarity and speed of the unobtrusive and free verse.
Example of Young Adult Fiction that's hugely popular in recent years:
Major update. Two hundred songs, of humanity, literature, poetry, annotated for your reading pleasure. Xah Music
Today's words: débutante, ingénue.
If you want to remember what débutante means, this song makes it a permanent impression. Blondie - Dreaming.
A similar word is ingénue. And this song makes it: Mono - Slimcea Girl, Ingénue
See also: English Vocabulary: Foreign Words
Faye Wong has a song, called〈彼岸花〉 (Flower of Paradise). It is a beautiful song. Somber and tranquil, and the lyrics touches ancient Buddhism mythology — a couple who can never meet each other. 王菲 - 彼岸花 (Flower of Paradise)
Today's word: epiphany.
See: Epiphany in a Dream: Seat as Inverted Ass.
See also this UCLA Racisim incident: Racism Humor: Asians in UCLA, where the girl used the word “epiphany” as “… when i'm about to reach an epiphany…”.
Some words, are particularly attached to a thing, or a story, or a personal event, such that the word describes it “To a T”, that you'll think of the word whenever you think of the thing/song/event.
Can you remembers one thing, person, song, photo, event, phrase, that particularly remind you of a word?
PS “To a T” is a idiom. If you are not familiar, look it up.
Today's words: leitmotif, vagary, contingency, complicity, cull, wizened, inerrancy, pariah, calumny, interlocutor
usage examples: GRE Words ₁₅
Today's words: pyre, napalm, schizoid. See: 21st Century Schizoid Man
Today's words: burly, indefatigable, malaise, redux, anodyne, remonstrate, culpability, peripatetic, redoubtable, prognostication.
Usage examples: GRE Words ₁₄.
Make a sentence of it. If you just know one word or two, make a sentence of using the word you know. For advanced readers, concoct a single sentence using all words you know.
If there's a song for the word “sultry”, this is it Sharon Apple - the Borderline (Macross Plus)
Today's words: sectarian, respite, cognate, minutiae, avuncular, epiphany, titular, defeatist, estimable, capitulate.
Usage examples: GRE Words ₁₃
What to do if someone is bugging you?
Growl.
Growl «1660s, from M.E. grollen “to rumble, growl” (early 15c.), from O.Fr. grouler “to rumble,” said to be from Frankish; probably ultimately of imitative origin. Related: Growled; growling. The noun is 1727, from the verb.»
What to do if you disapprove?
hiss.
hiss «late 14c. (v.); 1510s (n.); of imitative origin. Johnson wrote, “it is remarkable, that this word cannot be pronounced without making the noise which it signifies.” Related: Hissed; hissing.»
These are called Onomatopoeia. English Vocabulary: Animalistic Cries (Onomatopoeia).
10 Difficult words: salubrious, capricious, putative, grist, euthanize, nettlesome, edict, jeremiad, cognate, maladroit.
These are GRE words. Usage example. GRE Words ₁₂.
How many do you know off the bat?
for I, for my own part, cannot think that these latter days of weak experiment, fragmentary theory, and mutual discord are indeed man's culminating time! I say, for my own part. He, I know—for the question had been discussed among us long before the Time Machine was made—thought but cheerlessly of the Advancement of Mankind, and saw in the growing pile of civilization only a foolish heaping that must inevitably fall back upon and destroy its makers in the end. If that is so, it remains for us to live as though it were not so. But to me the future is still black and blank—is a vast ignorance, lit at a few casual places by the memory of his story. And I have by me, for my comfort, two strange white flowers— shrivelled now, and brown and flat and brittle—to witness that even when mind and strength had gone, gratitude and a mutual tenderness still lived on in the heart of man.
Today's words: spindle, racket
spindle
See also: English Vocabulary: Noun Things
Can you make 5 sentences involving the word “coalesce”? If you can, all power to you. else …
Here's a great vocabulary learning tool, at http://dict.bing.com.cn/#coalesce
It gives many usage examples of a word, gathered from current news.
This is fantastic. Because, traditional dictionaries only give one or two example, usually a exemplary usage, often from old writings that's a hundred years old. But the bing dictionary site, you can see many live examples.
The site is designed for Chinese people who are learning English, but that shouldn't bother you. For polyglots, the advantage is that it not only give you English usage examples, but also provide translation in Chinese. However, the translation to Chinese is done by machine. Often, it's incorrect.
Here's some other nice {Chinese-to-English, English-to-Chinese} dictionary sites, some also show English-to-English. But i haven't tried them in detail:
For English dictionary tools, see: Online English Dictionary Tools
thanks to 假日笛声 for “dict.bing.com.cn”. Thanks to Aphantee for “http://dict.youdao.com/”.
armada
Now will I hence to seek my lovely Moor, And let my spleenful sons this trull deflower.
From Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus: Act 2.
What's the relationship between the words “troll” and “prostitute”? Their etymology gives us a clue.
today's words: pliable, pander, lest.
pliable
Make a sentence of it. Use it. Because if you don't, you won't remember it.
affected
“women's pleasure without man is short of measure”
—Arabian Nights, The Porter And The Three Ladies Of Baghdad
Ten difficult words, GRE words: prognosis, surreptitiously, clandestinely, fetid, inarticulate, peonage, nebulous, compunction, snub, amity.
Usage examples: GRE Words ₁₁
These are university graduate level. Good for GRE takers. Make a sentence out of them.
The state doctor, mumbling inarticulately while staring surreptitiously at the nebulous, yet fetid growth dangling off the patient's nose, had no compunction about faking a prognosis while clandestinely filing a secret report with his superiors, thus condeming this poor fool to eternal peonage for the act of ignoring the amity of his superior and snubbing his attempts at comraderie.
Beverley Eyre gave this usage example for yesterday's words:
My putative antagonist, an estranged classmate, is an erudite jokester with an affinity for facetious yet poignant persiflage, and who will rejoice if his pervasive stench manages to innundate my senses to the point where I am unable to concentrate on my play.
Score: 100!
Today's words: facetious, antagonist, poignant, pervasive, erudite, putative, estranged, affinity, inundate, rejoice
Usage examples: SAT words ¹⁸
Make a sentence out of them!
Ten difficult words, GRE words: prognosis, surreptitiously, clandestinely, fetid, inarticulate, peonage, nebulous, compunction, snub, amity.
Usage examples: GRE Words ₁₁
These are university graduate level. Good for GRE takers. Make a sentence out of them.
Today's words: depraved, immune, subsistence, imbue, deft, subjugate, honorific, secession, precipitation, expedient.
Usage examples: SAT words ¹⁷
Make a sentence out of them!
Today's words: blasphemy, tumultuous, postulate, lopsidedness, debauched, nuanced, autonomous, reticence, malevolent, candor.
Usage examples: SAT words ¹⁶
These are highschool-level. Good for SAT takers. Make a sentence out of them.
Today's words: animosity, clandestine, trove, reprimand, repercussions, lucrative, affable, tenuous, coveted, scourge.
Usage examples: SAT words ¹⁵
These are highschool-level. Good for SAT takers. Make a sentence out of them.
Ten highschool-level words: cartel, minions, portending, monumental, loin, gaunt, debauchery, eminent, decorum, insurrection.
Usage examples: SAT words ¹⁴
Make a sentence out of them.
Vocabulary review: abjectly, hermetic, relinquish, apprehend, precipitously, anecdotal, elucidated, harrowing, contentious, repercussions.
Usage examples: SAT words ¹³
These are high-school level. If you are studying SAT for college, you better know them all. Make a sentence out of them.
Vocabulary review: disdain, jocular, trespass, bolster, insufferable, confidante, parsimonious, mayhem, sally, proclivity
Make a sentence out of them.
Usage examples: SAT words ¹²
Answer to last review: I gleaned the etiquette from the contemporaneous period relentlessly and found inexorable reprise of vitriol that repeal the restive revisionists. SAT words ¹¹
My frontpage got a facelift. Let me know what you think, ya all! http://wordyenglish.com/
Today's words: restive, contemporaneous, relentlessly, vitriol, inexorably, glean, repeal, reprise, revisionist, etiquette.
Try to make a sentence using all of them.
Here's my take: I gleaned the etiquette from the contemporaneous period relentlessly and found inexorable reprise of vitriol that repeal the restive revisionists.
Real Time Speech Translation from English to Chinese by Machine
The video is 9 minutes. You can start at 6:00 if you just want to see the result.
Chief Research Officer Rick Rashid demonstrates a speech recognition breakthrough via machine translation that converts his spoken English words into computer-generated Chinese language. The breakthrough is patterned after deep neural networks and significantly reduces errors in spoken as well as written translation.
Schadenfreude, Roman holiday, morose delectation, gloat, lulz
Schadenfreude /ˈʃɑːdənfrɔɪdə/ (German: [ˈʃaːdənˌfʁɔʏdə]) is pleasure derived from the misfortunes of others. This German word is used as a loanword in English and some other languages, and has been calqued in Danish and Norwegian as skadefryd and in Swedish as skadeglädje and Finnish as vahingonilo.
An English expression with a similar meaning is “Roman holiday”, a metaphor taken from the poem Childe Harold's Pilgrimage by George Gordon, Lord Byron, where a gladiator in Ancient Rome expects to be “butcher'd to make a Roman holiday” while the audience would take pleasure from watching his suffering. The term suggests debauchery and disorder in addition to sadistic enjoyment.
Another phrase with a meaning similar to Schadenfreude is “morose delectation” (“delectatio morosa” in Latin), meaning “the habit of dwelling with enjoyment on evil thoughts”. The medieval church taught that morose delectation was a sin. French writer Pierre Klossowski maintained that the appeal of sadism is morose delectation.
An English word of similar meaning is “gloating”, where “gloat” is defined as “to observe or think about something with triumphant and often malicious satisfaction, gratification, or delight” (gloat over an enemy's misfortune). Gloating is differentiated from Schadenfreude in that it does not necessarily require malice (one may gloat to a friend about having defeated him in a game without ill intent) and that it describes an action rather than a state of mind (one typically gloats to the subject of the misfortune or to a third party).
In Internet culture, “lulz” has a very similar meaning of getting laughter out of people's misfortune.
In linguistics, a calque (/ˈkælk/) or loan translation is a word or phrase borrowed from another language by literal, word-for-word (Latin: “verbum pro verbo”) or root-for-root translation.
cockamamie
sanity, etiquette
etiquette
“women's rights” or “woman's rights”?
Technically, i think it's more correct to say “woman's”. But there comes a logical conundrum. “woman's” seems to imply a single female, while “women's” implies all female. So, if you write “women's”, the meaning for all female is embedded, clear to all, including the massive number of people whose native language is not English, yet also clearly understandable and non-intrusive to native speakers (most won't even notice, except the handful and loud “grammar nazis”)
what do you think?
See also: The Meddling Of The English Plurality On Meaning.
Started a Chinese only blog, at 李杀中文博客. All future posts that require fluency in Chinese language, will be posted there.
bitingly
A heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs. In certain historical Christian, Jewish, and some modern cultures, espousing ideas deemed heretical was punishable by law.
The term heresy is from Greek αἵρεσις originally meant “choice”, but also referred to that process whereby a young person would examine various philosophies to determine how to live one's life. The word “heresy” is usually used within a Christian, Jewish, or Islamic context, and implies slightly different meanings in each.
Heresy was redefined by the Catholic Church as a belief that conflicted with established Catholic dogma. Eventually it took on the meaning of an accusation levied against members of another group which has beliefs that conflict with those of the accusers. It is usually used to discuss violations of religious or traditional laws or codes, although it is used by some political extremists to refer to their opponents. It carries the connotation of behaviors or beliefs likely to undermine accepted morality and cause tangible evils, damnation, or other punishment. In some religions, it also implies that the heretic is in alliance with the religion's symbol of evil, such as Satan or chaos.
fornication, covetousness
But fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, let it not be once named among you, as becometh saints
—1611, King James Version of the Bible (Authorized Version), Ephesians 5:3
“becometh” is a old form of “become”.
chinese literature; history. 李敖在微博; Li Ao Tweet Collection
Vocabulary Review: arduous, shenanigan, tantamount, belligerent, onus, multifarious, glisten, relish, tepid, nominate
Last time, i posted a vocabulary review (SAT words ⁹) of these words:
Mathematician John C. Baez gave this usage example:
As my colloquial vocabulary shrivels, I exacerbate my hubris with an upsurge in titillating terminology: my listeners grow haggard at my holistic deployment of onerous language. —John C. Baez
That's very funny, and a excellent construction. So, can you make a sentence of the following words?
vocabulary review: arduous, shenanigan, tantamount, belligerent, onus, multifarious, glisten, relish, tepid, nominate: SAT words ¹⁰.
The more artistic, creative, meaningful, coherent, would be better. Must use at least 7 of the words.
PS: John Baez is also very popular on the web. Check out his home page at http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/, and his very popular blog at http://johncarlosbaez.wordpress.com/2012/09/28/azimuth-news-part-2/.
新发现,如果中文打字不熟,可以先到 Google Translate 用声音输入.
New discovery. If you are not familiar with Chinese input, you can go to Google Translate first, use voice input. (other language work too)
Also, you can paste any sentence in any language, then Google translate to another language, and hear Google read out the sentence in the new language. (this can work for other languages, e.g. Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Arabic, Russian, …) For example, try to paste the Chinese above.
For example, try to paste the Chinese above.
See also:
Chinese slang: 卧槽
卧槽 (wò cáo) is a euphemism for 我肏 (wǒ cào). Literally: “Me Fuck”, as interjection “Fuck!” or “what the fuck”.
vocabulary review: loom, upsurge, onerous, haggard, titillate, hubris, holistic, colloquial, exacerbate, shrivel. SAT words ⁹.
Your job today is to construct a sentence using all of them. I'll post good ones.
gonna throw some eggs if anyone tells me again about english grammar an. English Writing: to An or Not to An
The open source dictionary dict.org and used by Linux haven't improved a bit. See: Problems of Open Source Dictionaries
i've been checking on Wikipedia article on Nihilism, about every year since about 2005. In the past, the article is misleading, describing nihilism as some destructive Russian movement, or some anti-moralist thesis. Today, the intro section is correct.
Nihilism (play /ˈnaɪ.ɨlɪzəm/ or /ˈniː.ɨlɪzəm/; from the Latin nihil, nothing) is the philosophical doctrine suggesting the negation of one or more putatively meaningful aspects of life. Most commonly, nihilism is presented in the form of existential nihilism, which argues that life is without objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value. Moral nihilists assert that morality does not inherently exist, and that any established moral values are abstractly contrived. Nihilism can also take epistemological or metaphysical/ontological forms, meaning respectively that, in some aspect, knowledge is not possible, or that reality does not actually exist.
in short, nihilism means that life couldn't possibly mean anything, if you want to follow logic, and all the supposed meaninful interpretations, are basically bullshit.
syndicate, reclusive
syndicated
syndicate «1620s, “council or body of representatives,” from Fr. syndicat, from syndic “representative of a corporation” (see syndic). Meaning “combination of persons or companies to carry out some commercial undertaking” first occurs 1865. Publishing sense of “association of publishers for purchasing articles, etc., for simultaneous publication in a number of newspapers” is from 1889. (Syndication “publication, broadcast, or ownership by a syndicate” is attested from 1925.) As a synonym for “organized crime, the Mob” it is recorded from 1929.»
If you missed it, here's the correct link for yesterday's article: Lost in Translation: Madame White Snake; 小青姨……你妈是白娘子吗…
mammoth
The etymology of mammoth is interesting. Quote:
1706, from Rus. mammot, probably from Ostyak, a Finno-Ugric language of northern Russia (cf. Finnish maa “earth”). Because the remains were dug from the earth, the animal was believed to root like a mole.
As an adjective, “gigantic,” from 1802; in this sense “the word appears to be originally American” [Thornton, “American Glossary”], and its first uses are in derogatory accounts to the cheese wheel, more than 4 feet in diameter, sent to President Jefferson by the ladies of the Baptist congregation in Cheshire, Mass., as a present, engraved with the motto “Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God.” Federalist editors mocked the affair, and called up the word mammoth (known from Peale's exhibition) to characterize it.
