Internet English Resources / EnglishIsFun -lessons

Hi everyone,

From now, given:

- the big number of postings in Internet English Resources on EnglishIsFun (Facebook)
- the interesting/important summary tables published by EnglishIF
- our aim to learn English or improve our level
- etc.

I intend to post the lessons in this thread so that they are isolated here and we can stop longer on them and write comments to better learn.

Agree?
At least I'm in agreement with myself LOL

Please, feel free to comment and ask.

Hi everyone,

I'd like to go back to the last board I posted:

Let's stop a bit on it and work.

Muriel's comment:

MurielB a écrit: I Gérard, everyone
Those tables (I am not sure to use the right word ) are very interesting. I must read them over and over again !

My comment:

gerardM a écrit:Muriel,

Very interesting indeed.

However, as I often say: there are no true synonyms, in any language.
English has got many sources for its words; usage builds/changes the meanings of words - many ware taken to French but mind the false cognates.

Something interesting when we want to study a language is to find out details and differences, and build a kind or scale ordering them to know which one to use.

Hi everyone,

There are 15 lists of "synonyms".
On which one do you want to stop?
As you can see, the board suggests 12 close words: would you say English is very rich? could you find 12 such close words in French?
Did they cheat do you think, so as to get the magical number of 12?

Thanks for your comments!

Hi Gérard, everyone
At first sight I thought that the English language was richer than the French one and then I looked up in google and was amazed
http://www.synonymo.fr/synonyme/aimer : Aimer
http://www.synonymo.fr/synonyme/courir : courir
12 is not a magical number, just the 12 more important words;

Hi Muriel,

I called 12 the magical number just because the writers decided to reach this number for the lists.

However...

12 was often referred to in the good olde times
How many hours in half a day?
How much is 60 divided by 5?
How many phalanges in the fingers except thumb?
Decades back, how many pence in a shilling?
I'm not old enough to have known this but in the Middle Ages, in France, we also had many units that were 12 times other ones.
12 was an important number, if not magical.

In fact, religions appear to prefer 7.

like Oriental and Judaic, it corresponds to the plenitude, the completion and the integrality of a thing. R. Allendy tells that it expresses the idea that the Universe forms a whole, associated with the idea of differentiation - 10 + 2.

gerardM a écrit:Hi Muriel,

I called 12 the magical number just because the writers decided to reach this number for the lists.

However...

12 was often referred to in the good olde times
How many hours in half a day?
How much is 60 divided by 5?
How many phalanges in the fingers except thumb?
Decades back, how many pence in a shilling?
I'm not old enough to have known this but in the Middle Ages, in France, we also had many units that were 12 times other ones.
12 was an important number, if not magical.

In fact, religions appear to prefer 7.

Ok 12 symbolizes "plenitude"

Hi Muriel,

Yes but 12 was mainly used because it was a very convenient number.

It was used in arithmetics because 12 has got lots of divisors: 12 - prime numbers 1 x 2 x 2 x 3; divisors 1, 2, 3, 4, 6
If 12 was convenient, its multiples were as well, especially 60 as it added another important prime number which is 5. Does 60 rings a bell? Is it used (seconds, minutes, etc.)?

Many divisors means many submultiples ie many spiltting possibilities (think of sale and commerce).

NB:
American English consider a few verbs of this list as regular:
- to burn I burned burned
- to learn I learned learned
(there's another one that I didn't find it yet)
A tendency in any language is to transform irregular into regular verbs
(there were more En irregular verbs in the past)

Easy peasy !  

Hi Gérard !
Spelling differences between American English and British English are really  very small and difficult to remember !

Hi Muriel,

MurielB a écrit:Hi Gérard !
Spelling differences between American English and British English are really  very small and difficult to remember !

Really? No.

To these spelling differences, must be added true differences b/w Am and Br languages: crops, energy, clothes, parts of a car, etc.

Good lesson!
I add one verb: stated

Would you add others?

When you've been learning English for years and that things couldn't be printed in your brain,
Learn it differently, transversally.

E.G. Learn synonyms (and degrees in the meanings)
Remember: no true synonyms, always a difference.

Hi Gérard
You can also poke your nose into somebody else's business like mister Nosey...