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Difference Between Whereas and While
There are differences between these two words, but I never realized before. Actually, I rarely use 'whereas' in English. But my best foreign friend R pointed out my mistakes. He also gave me a link which I think is very helpful http://www.differencebetween.com/difference-between-whereas-and-vs-while/. So in order to enhance the impression, I type it here word by word.
Whereas and while are used to compare two items or facts. The word ‘whereas’ is used in the sense of ‘on the other hand’ as in the sentences: ('is used in the sense of' 可以代替means, 好表达)
Whereas is"而" in Chinese.
(1) It is a small book whereas the other one is a big one.
(2) Your house is a big one whereas my house is a small one.
'While' can be used in the same sentences in the sense of 'at the same time.'
The conjunction 'while' is also used in the sense of 'although' or 'in spite of'.
The word 'while' is used in the sense of 'in spite of' in the sentences:
While is "尽管" in Chinese.
(1) We continued to play cricket while it rained. (in spite of)
(2) I scored poor marks while I attended special classes.
The word ‘while’ is used in the sense of ‘during the time’ in the sentence:
While I was entering the station the train left.
While is "一会儿" in Chinese.
'While' is also used as a noun in the sense of ‘period of time’ as in the sentences: "I didn’t see her for a while," " I didn’t hear from you for quite a while."
' Whereas' is commonly used in the beginning of a sentence in legal documents as a conditional statement.
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Using which and that correctly
reference:http://www.betterwritingskills.com/tip-w022.html Writing resources from Scribe Consulting
Consider the following sentences. Both are acceptable, but their meaning are subtly different:
(1) The books, which have red covers, are new.
(2) The books that have red covers are new.
The words "which have red covers" are adding information about the books, all books are new;
The words "that have red covers" are limiting which books we're talking about. Only the red books are new.
Now, here's our rule of thumb (经验法则, good phrase!): Use {which} (surrounded by commas) if a group of words adds information. Use {that} if it limits the set of things you're talking about.
Here are two more examples just to make that clear (good sentence which I should remember!):
(1) Classes that are held on Wednesdays are in building 206. (limiting)
(2) Leap years, which have 366 days, contain an extra day in February. (adding information)
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I do research in artificial intelligence and machine learning in the field of NLP
I write this because a teacher asked me this question: how do you do research? I'm not satisfied with my answer. So I write this to prepare for the next time :) A heads up, I'm not the best example.
I'm doing research as a Ph.D. candidate in a university in Beijing, China. In the first year, I used to take a lot of classes every day to collect enough credits. It's one of our graduation requirements.
And this year is my second year. What I do every day now, to put it briefly, is reading for new ideas, then coding to prove them. When troubles come, I read more, then thinking day and night. When I solve it, I continue to code. Finally, I will write the conclusion down to a paper using LaTex when I get a good result. I can't finish that without reading more papers. I will cite and list all of them in the reference.
So now you can see, reading is the most important part of my research life.
And also, meeting with my colleagues and my mentor is important, because they have many insights I don't have. I often let them evaluate my idea before I start to work on it, and let them point out drawbacks of methods proposed by me. We do that to each other very often. We are not only colleagues but also best friends.
P.S. I' m familiar with artificial intelligence, machine learning, and neural network in the field of natural language processing (NLP). If anyone is also interested, we can communicate later.
Thank you (^.^)
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I got a new idea for automatic summary generation task, but I was stuck in the middle.
I'm fighting for my new idea this week. It is about abstractive summary generation. You know, I'm a computational linguist.
Gigaword is the most commonly used dataset for the evaluation on this task. BUT, the annotated version needs 6000 US dollars. Yes, it is 6000 dollars!!! Can you believe that?
So what I decided to do, is to annotate it by myself. I spent a week processing the data, but I finally failed. The Stanford parser (a very famous natural language parser) always gave errors! (gave errors, is this expression correct?) "Your memory is not enough", "Sorry, the sentence is toooo long", "IO error",..., etc.
So, with no other choices, I give up this dataset. I won't touch it, at least, this month because I believe I will not get any result on it in a very short time. I must prove my thought quickly so and I'm trying to find another dataset.
Doing research is full of fun, but preprocess data is a boring job. XD
Wish me good luck in the next week! haha
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My paper is accepted by an international conference
I got this news yesterday afternoon. I'm so excited and proud of myself!!! I couldn't stop laughing all yesterday night.
Because the graduation requirement of my institute is to be accepted by at least two top conferences and I just get one now.
I will introduce my paper to researcher from all over the world this summer in Canada! Is there anyone in Canada this summer? around 7.30-8.3
But I still cannot talk well in English. I've never been so eager to practice English speaking!
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What is the common sentence for "I can't understand what you mean, please talk slow"?
Is it "I can't catch you up"? or something like that...I knew it before, but I forget it now. Could you please help me?
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Is there any other expression for "I see" in English?
I only know" I see", "I got it", and "I know".
But when somebody is telling me a long story, I can't always say "I see". You know, that would be boring. So is there any other expression for I see? Thank you:)
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I'm sorry and I want to reschedule. Can I say like this?
I planned to talk with my language exchange partner this Monday, but something has come up. So I have to reschedule. This is what I said to him:
Good morning, Jim. The reason I wanted to message you is that I'm sorry but I can't make it to our appointment this Monday. I was really looking forward to seeing you but something has come up. Can we reschedule it for another day? I would be free all day Friday.
Is there anything wrong, or rude, or not commonly used?
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Is Quora a good place to learn English
I found a question on Quora: What is the most effective way for a Russian to learn Chinese? An answer said: Download Zhihu (a Chinese version of Quora). I agree with this answer very much. Because I know some people succeeded.
So my question is: Is quora a good place for a Chinese to learn English?
Why and how?
Thank you:)
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If I were not a programmer, I would probably be an artist or architect. But I don't regret!
I love drawing from childhood. Once upon a time, I even dream to be an architect. When my parents know my thought, they didn't say anything, but found a real architect who took me to her office and introduced her job for me.
Then I started to know about their everyday life in an architectural design institute. They drew hundreds and thousands of drawings using various computer software. But they all like the same. She told me that if they design for a residential building(in China), Party A is their god. Party A likes ordinary buildings, and almost all creative and interesting thinking would be hated. From then on, architect is no more my dream job.
Because my math and physics are always good, I was admitted by a university and major in computer science. That's far more interesting than drawing same design diagram everyday!
Now my dream is to be a great programmer. But I still love drawing and painting. And language exchange as well. That's my story. How about you?
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