Timeline for You have to consider all the probabilities (A comparison between possibility and probability / likelihood)
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
17 events
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| Mar 15, 2017 at 10:31 | comment | added | J.R.♦ | @TeacherKSHuang - But as others have been telling you, it's not fine. When someone on ELL assures a learner that a wording is "fine," that doesn't just mean it's grammatical; it means it's idiomatic speech that wouldn't make the speaker sound non-fluent. Fact is, likelihood is seldom used in the plural, and others have rightfully called you out for dispensing faulty guidance in this case. "Used interchangeably" my foot. | |
| Mar 15, 2017 at 8:13 | comment | added | Teacher KSHuang | @J.R.. as I had said in my initial comment, I had only offered it as an alternative to using the phrase "consider all the possibilities" repetitively. I agree, "consider all the possibilities" is the most common and probably what I would say myself. As the OP himself had mentioned, he had already known which one was the most idiomatic as well. He had just wanted to know if the other two were likely and probable possibilities (:D) to which I had responded with the sentiment of, "Yes, they're fine, if you want to avoid repetition." | |
| Mar 14, 2017 at 21:52 | comment | added | fixer1234 | It isn't technically wrong because it could refer to the situation you describe. However the only time someone would refer to considering the probabilities would be in a discussion of analytical methods for a statistics-related problem. In considering the possibilities, you would weigh the probabilities, so it is sort of implied. | |
| Mar 14, 2017 at 17:01 | comment | added | J.R.♦ | @TeacherKSHuang - Sorry, but you're dishing out bad guidance here. Check out this Ngram. We can "consider the likelihood," we can "consider all the possibilities," but, generally speaking, we don't "consider all the likelihoods." | |
| Mar 14, 2017 at 16:56 | history | edited | J.R.♦ | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
do not use "sth" as an abbreviation for "something" in a question
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| Mar 13, 2017 at 22:54 | vote | accept | A-friend | ||
| Mar 13, 2017 at 20:41 | answer | added | user3169 | timeline score: 2 | |
| S Mar 13, 2017 at 11:32 | history | mod moved comments to chat | |||
| S Mar 13, 2017 at 11:32 | comment | added | ColleenV | Some of the discussion here has been moved to chat. I think that while it's a good discussion, it's starting to distract from the question a little bit. | |
| Mar 13, 2017 at 10:48 | comment | added | Dan Bron | @TeacherKSHuang I am native speaker, and I do say no native speaker would put it that way, and that it is unidiomatic. If you don't believe me, maybe you'll believe Google nGrams: this phrase hasn't even appeared once in all the books it indexes, going back centuries. The phrase "consider all likelihoods" is grammatically possible, as is "invisible green ideas sleep furiously", but they should both be avoided. | |
| Mar 13, 2017 at 9:32 | comment | added | Dan Bron | @TeacherKSHuang "You must consider all the likelihoods" may not be ungrammatical, but it's unidiomatic. No native speaker would phrase it that way. Most people would say "consider all the possibilities", and if we were talking about something more technical and mathematical, something like betting on a horse race, "you have to consider all the probabilities", because there the probabilities are specific, concrete things to be considered. But that's a much less common situation. Safest and most idiomatic is "consider all the possibilities". | |
| Mar 13, 2017 at 9:17 | comment | added | Yuri | Since you want to emphasize to consider all things that might happen possibilities is a better choice I think. As a rule of thumb "probability is bigger than possibilty" the movie in pursuit of happiness :-) | |
| Mar 13, 2017 at 9:08 | comment | added | Teacher KSHuang | Just FYI, "You should consider all the likelihoods" is not wrong. In fact, all three are fine and in a piece of text, they might all be used interchangeably to avoid repetitiveness. | |
| Mar 13, 2017 at 8:57 | history | edited | A-friend | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
added 640 characters in body; edited title
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| Mar 13, 2017 at 8:28 | history | edited | A-friend | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
added 215 characters in body
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| Mar 13, 2017 at 8:28 | comment | added | Yuri | Possibilities is your word. | |
| Mar 13, 2017 at 8:25 | history | asked | A-friend | CC BY-SA 3.0 |