Timeline for At the cost of about or At a cost of about
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
6 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oct 12, 2014 at 9:28 | comment | added | Matthew Haugen | @J.R. I like it. DAMS. All you need is a synonym for "syndrome" that starts with an 'n' and it will even carry the emotion of trying to overcome the syndrome, too. | |
| Oct 12, 2014 at 9:23 | comment | added | J.R.♦ | If you click on the articles tag, you'll find no small number of why is this a something instead of the something questions (or vice versa), so I think your intuition is probably correct. I even gave this a "syndrome" a humorous name one time. | |
| Oct 12, 2014 at 9:16 | comment | added | Matthew Haugen | @J.R. Definitely. I feel sometimes like some of the greatest lessons one can learn about English come in its exceptions, and a lot of teachers seem to underestimate the value of them. Comfortable sentences often don't conform to every single rule of grammar, and yet we're generally left on our own to figure that out. It's like we're taught every rule, then gradually they just start being silently unenforced the further up in education you get. Of course, I've never taken an ESL class, but I imagine the same applies there. | |
| Oct 12, 2014 at 9:16 | vote | accept | CowperKettle | ||
| Oct 12, 2014 at 9:07 | comment | added | J.R.♦ | I concur. This notion that we shouldn't use "the" unless we've previously referenced the object is an overused rule of thumb that trips up many non-natives. Anyone using that "rule" should realize exceptions abound; this is one of them. | |
| Oct 12, 2014 at 6:37 | history | answered | Matthew Haugen | CC BY-SA 3.0 |