I often have to present a complex result and explain why it is true. Doing so in a single sentence usually makes it too long and difficult to understand. But how do you succinctly do this in two sentences. For example consider the sentence When stocks increase in price, people want to buy them, increasing … Read more
I have seen questions like "He went through all that just to go to Columbia?" or "That’s the Ferrari?" and I would like to know if they are grammatically correct. Can you use questions like that in regular speech? Can you even start a question with "you" or "that"? Answer These questions are grammatically correct. … Read more
Is it grammatical to start a sentence with two subordinating conjunctions? For example: Because if it rains tomorrow, I will get wet, I hoped for a sunny day. It seems wrong to start a sentence with “Because if…” and the last two clauses feel like a comma splice, but I can’t figure out what’s actually … Read more
I was asking someone “whom were you horrible to?” And thought, is it who or whom? I believe it’s whom but when I typed the phrase into Google search It felt differently. Answer In the example given, ‘whom’ is correct, it is the object of the preposition to. Having said that, in North American English, … Read more
"X might not have been made had money been a priority" We are discussing with friend about this sentence, which I had trouble understanding at first. To me, it’d have been more idiomatic adding "if" or a comma in the middle like : "X might not have been made if money had been a priority" … Read more
Is it correct to use “But” at the start of a sentence like this? You can afford it. But think twice before buying it. Won’t using “But” instead of “However” mark me as a non-native speaker? Answer If anything it would mark you as a native speaker, because native and non-native speakers alike are taught … Read more
I am having a discussion with my friend. I said, “Many times I have seen him washing his car.” He says it should be, “Many times have I seen him washing his car. Much like “Often do I see him”, and not “Often I see him.” While I agree with him on ‘often,’ I am … Read more
I try my best to use proper sentence construction and punctuation, and for my amusement, I’ve taken the quest to find meaningful situations where one might use the various conjunctions at the beginning of sentences. I was told that “because” was the only one that’s worthy of being placed at the start of a complete … Read more
I saw one topic on the wordreference forum discussing whether a sentence could begin with “Different from” (see the post). The example sentences in that post are A: Different from Drug A, Drug B can also be administered orally. B: Unlike Drug A, Drug B can also be administered orally. It is said that in … Read more
I know it’s OK to start sentences with While, but is it OK to start a text with it? For example: While electron-electron correlations and interactions are crucial in the descriptions of atoms and molecules, studies of ionization in the strong-field régime have in general ignored their effects. I’ve had a look in the corpora … Read more
