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Vunder31 Posted 18 years ago
Grammar
Poll: Interpretation of a sentence
If someone writes "In this thread alone, several people have compared Obama to Bush", are you more likely to interpret it as:
A) Several people have made Obama-Bush comparison posts in this thread,
B) Several people participating is this thread have made Obama-Bush comparison posts elsewhere,
or
C) In this thread, several people have made Obama-Bush comparisons. People (but not necessarily the same people) have also made Obama-Bush comparisons in other threads.
Even if you believe the correct answer has already been posted, please post your opinion so that I can get a good feel for how many prefer the different options.
A) Several people have made Obama-Bush comparison posts in this thread,
B) Several people participating is this thread have made Obama-Bush comparison posts elsewhere,
or
C) In this thread, several people have made Obama-Bush comparisons. People (but not necessarily the same people) have also made Obama-Bush comparisons in other threads.
Even if you believe the correct answer has already been posted, please post your opinion so that I can get a good feel for how many prefer the different options.
Top answer
"In this thread alone" = talking about here only. There is a possibility that people have posted in other threads, of course, but the question really isn't addressed.
- "In this thread alone" = talking about here only.
- There is a possibility that people have posted in other threads, of course, but the question really isn't addressed.
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4 Answers
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"In this thread alone" = talking about here only.
There is a possibility that people have posted in other threads, of course, but the question really isn't addressed.
There is a possibility that people have posted in other threads, of course, but the question really isn't addressed.
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A, and only A.
C would be only wild conjecture. B would require something like "In this thread alone, there are people participated who have... elsewhere."
C would be only wild conjecture. B would require something like "In this thread alone, there are people participated who have... elsewhere."
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Vunder31C) In this thread, several people have made Obama-Bush comparisons. People (but not necessarily the same people) have also made Obama-Bush comparisons in other threads.This is the closest, but it should read something more like this:
Counting only the posts in this thread, several people have made Obama-Bush comparisons. (Implication:
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Hi,
since I am in a forum, writing a post, and thinking about forums, C is the one that is most similar to the context I am thinking of. However, if you want to be precise, only A is acceptable, because in the others you are actually speculating on some context you didn't provide. Your sentence says that there seems to be a lot of people who compare Bush with Obama, and several people made co
since I am in a forum, writing a post, and thinking about forums, C is the one that is most similar to the context I am thinking of. However, if you want to be precise, only A is acceptable, because in the others you are actually speculating on some context you didn't provide. Your sentence says that there seems to be a lot of people who compare Bush with Obama, and several people made co
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