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First notebook entry: Introducing myself
I am currently not learning a language, I just want to improve my English, to raise my job chances (this is not gramatically incorrect and is often used informally in speech, but for writing or anything more formal, 'job prospects' would be more appropriate), and (conjunctions are a must in english) 'for communicating/to be able to communicate' ('for' is used to denote that the action is done with a specific purpose in mind, the purpose being that which 'for' modifies. Because the purpose is to communicate and not to be in a state where you are able to communicate, it sounds odd to say "for being able". 'for' always modifies a noun, the noun in this case being the act of communicating. 'to' however, in this context, is used to modify verbs. You could not say 'to being' but rather, as the other poster noted 'to be'. Because of semantic intricacies with this word, it is more accepted to say 'to be able' because it connotes that the purpose is to reach a state in which you are able to communicate.) with people from all over the world. Also, in my opinion (it is not necessary to the main meaning of the sentence and therefore is separated by commas), English is simply a fun language (unlike in german, if a clause is not directly related to another clause, they are written as two sentences). I come from Germany and learned English in school for 8 years. I really like crafting; my newest hobby is sewing (both of these sentences are independent clauses and can stand alone, and therefore need a conjunction to connect them if using a comma. Generally they would just be written as two sentences, but if you want, you can use a semi-colon (;) to connect independent clauses). I like to watch movies and to meet friends, like most people do. For a couple years I have been watching (an alternative would be to say 'I have watched', but this enphasizes the indefinate past (as opposed to I watched, the definate past) while 'I have been watching' emphasizes the indefinate past and the present (watched being changed to watching causes this). In this case, you have watched english shows in the past and still watch english shows in the present, so to say 'I have been watching' is best) most movies and TV-Shows in english, (independant clauses are seperated with a comma. dependant clauses are often not) and it 'has really helped(indefinate past)/really helps(present)' me (I did not recognize that the verb help really doesn't directly act on the person who is being helped, but the thing that they are being helped with, untill I started studying german. In english the distinction is fuzzy, so you always want to include the indirect object (mir/me)) to understand common speech and several english accents. I hope that I meet tons of great people and have the opportunity to practise talking spontaneously in this community!
0 votedSeptember 22, 20132- like Spencer said, yes the apostrophe is needed in this case because it is not referencing the units of time themselves (day, month, year) but literally the amount of time that these units consist of. To say 'in one day's time' is using a possessive, literally saying the time is owned by or of the day. It is more commonly said as simply 'in one day', here using the unit directly.0 votedSeptember 22, 20130
- you can say both, but it is silly to say the second. To say 'you have done something' is to connote the indefinite past. In this case both you and your teacher know exactly what it is you should have read and when you should have read it, so you use the definite past. ex: I have skydived (perhaps several years ago, or perhaps just yesterday). I skydived yesterday (very certain).0 votedSeptember 22, 20131
- to answer specifically your third question, the usage of 'have + past-tense_verb' connotes the indefinite recent past(while 'had +past-tense_verb' connotes the definite past) (roughly). Using the verb 'to be', in this case the particular word "been", denotes being in a certain state. So, you could not say 'been discussed' because you are/were not in a state of being discussed, but rather a state of discussing. Because the act of you discussing would be fresh in the minds of the listeners at the point of saying this sentence and could easily be placed by them in the recent past, you would most commonly hear 'I have discussed' (emphasizing recent past) or 'I have been discussing' (emphasizing your state of discussing in the recent past and the present. ie: you are essentially continuing to discuss what you were discussing ie: remaining in a state of discussing)0 votedSeptember 22, 20131
- The first is a fantasy, and the second is a condoling reality. To more directly answer your question, you are right to want to treat the words together. When this phrase is used, the precise meaning given it by the words which compose it are not so important as the meaning given it by its common usage. It is generally used to express idealized unity and love towards one another, and brings to mind a kind of utopia. Perhaps it is merely the influence of my generation, but it tends to bring to mind hippies. If used as directly relating to a person and not as some abstract idea, it simply means what it denotes.0 votedSeptember 22, 20130
- I tried to think of some semantic difference, but honestly couldn't think of much of anything. If I had to draw the line, I would say that the connotations are slightly different, in that 'lately' causes me to consider the time more in reference to the whole time-span of the object while 'recently' causes me to consider the time more in reference to the present. I half believe that that just happens to be an intricacy understood by myself from my exposure to the word, but you can see some evidence of such a distinction in the etymology of the words ('late' vs 'recent')0 votedSeptember 22, 20130
- First of all, I believe it should say "[...]the Asiatic love [...] is clearly present in that polonaise." I am curious to know where you found this text. I want to say that the two main clauses in the sentence (linked with 'but) are not directly related and the sentence structure is not intuitive, but I do not know the context of the sentence and half expect it to be some writer much more qualified to judge the sentence than I (...am qualified). To your question: I would assume from the statement alone, without context, that it means that he genius did not come through deliberation and much thought, but rather comes to her naturally through her intuition. Its kind of like in philosophy where some ideas are deemed great because of how much thought is put into them and how well they match our logic and observation, while other ideas are deemed great just because of how genius the thoughts themselves are and how no one else would have thought something so grand (ex: the world doesn't need a tree, or water, or anything to support it, but simply is still and indifferent towards movement), regardless of how well they match reason or reality. The idea expressed by your quoted statement would be the later.0 votedSeptember 22, 20131
- Like Peachey said, it is merely an inverted sentence structure. .'you' is the subject and follows the verb 'are', of course a derivative of 'to be'. Because of the absence other grammatical elements that could be confused as the subject of the clause, the meaning is clear ("you are seldom believed"). Generally the verb is placed second with the subject after. Because the English language is often vague with pronoun cases, you won't often find sentences such as "seldom believe they you" where 'you' might initially be confused for the subject. Sentence inversions rarely stand alone, and are considered somewhat archaic, but when used with dependent clauses it is a good way to shift emphasis (in this case emphasizing 'seldom' while de-emphasizing the subject 'you' ) and just sound classy. It's almost never used in casual speech.0 votedSeptember 22, 20130
