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Re: I Need Help From All You Native Speakers Once Again

Started by OldGit, December 14, 2014, 10:30:54 AM

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Recusant

#345
Quote from: xSilverPhinx on August 19, 2020, 07:42:09 PM
Hello again :grin:

I have a question regarding "sooner" and "earlier".

Would you say something like:

"Loss of memory precision occurs earlier in adolescent males compared to females" or "loss of memory precision occurs sooner in adolescent males compared to females" :notsure:

The idea is that males lose memory precision at around 14 days while females at around 28 days. Half the time.

Quote from: Tank on August 19, 2020, 09:40:41 PM
Either works but I prefer 'earlier' in this context.

I agree with Tank. In this context sooner and earlier are synonymous. That isn't always the case. Here they're adverbs, but earlier can also be used as an adjective, while sooner cannot: "I wrote this post earlier" works, but "I wrote this post sooner" does not.

I also agree with Tank's stylistic choice--to me earlier sounds better in the sentence.
"Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration — courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and above all, love of the truth."
— H. L. Mencken


Bluenose

+++ Divide by cucumber error: please reinstall universe and reboot.  +++

GNU Terry Pratchett


xSilverPhinx

I am what survives if it's slain - Zack Hemsey


xSilverPhinx

Positive symptomatic patients and Symptomatic positive patients, which is correct for a patient that tested positive and is symptomatic :notsure: 

I'm going to risk a guess and say it's the first option. But I'm not sure.
I am what survives if it's slain - Zack Hemsey


Davin

Neither of those work for me for clarity. I'd say something like "Symptomatic patients that have tested positive."
Always question all authorities because the authority you don't question is the most dangerous... except me, never question me.

xSilverPhinx

Quote from: Davin on August 31, 2020, 11:19:34 PM
Neither of those work for me for clarity. I'd say something like "Symptomatic patients that have tested positive."

:thumbsup:
I am what survives if it's slain - Zack Hemsey


Recusant

I agree with Davin--clarity requires explicit wording. Further musings by me below may be regarded as superfluous.  :blue smiley:

Regarding order, there may be a convention in medical writing, and I'll look for examples, but off the top of my head, I'd look at it as follows: Symptoms generally precede testing, chronologically. Of course that's not always the case, but in a clinical setting I'd think it usually is.

Later: Looking through Google Scholar, I found examples in which symptomatic precedes positive when they're used together. See for instance the following title of a paper in Acta Neuropathologica:

"Investigation on the expression of major histocompatibility complex class II and cytokines and detection of HIV-1 DNA within brains of asymptomatic and symptomatic HIV-1-positive patients"

One from JAMA Surgery:

"Meta-analysis of Cholecystectomy in Symptomatic Patients With Positive Hepatobiliary Iminodiacetic Acid Scan Results Without Gallstones"

Admittedly I didn't do an extensive search, but I didn't find any examples of positive preceding symptomatic.

"Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration — courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and above all, love of the truth."
— H. L. Mencken


hermes2015

"Eventually everything connects - people, ideas, objects. The quality of the connections is the key to quality per se."
― Charles Eames

Recusant

A hyphen makes it a single concept.* Therefore "symptomatically-positive" means essentially that the patient has symptoms; "positive" is redundant. In the context we're dealing with I believe that "positive" refers to test results.

* "When you connect words with the hyphen, you make it clear to readers that the words work together as a unit of meaning."  (source)
"Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration — courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and above all, love of the truth."
— H. L. Mencken


hermes2015

Quote from: Recusant on September 01, 2020, 05:57:24 AM
A hyphen makes it a single concept.* Therefore "symptomatically-positive" means essentially that the patient has symptoms; "positive" is redundant. In the context we're dealing with I believe that "positive" refers to test results.

* "When you connect words with the hyphen, you make it clear to readers that the words work together as a unit of meaning."  (source)

Thanks, Recusant.
"Eventually everything connects - people, ideas, objects. The quality of the connections is the key to quality per se."
― Charles Eames

Bluenose

Of the two options I would go with the second.  A positive patient may be symptomatic or asymptomatic.  I would prefer a comma in there Symptomatic, positive patients. However I agree that a more explicit wording would be a good idea.
+++ Divide by cucumber error: please reinstall universe and reboot.  +++

GNU Terry Pratchett


xSilverPhinx

Thanks guys! :grin:


Quote from: Bluenose on September 01, 2020, 12:58:53 PM
... A positive patient may be symptomatic or asymptomatic...

Adjective order in English really jumbles my head (too much interference with Portuguese) but that makes sense. :thumbsup:
I am what survives if it's slain - Zack Hemsey


Bluenose

Quote from: xSilverPhinx on September 01, 2020, 01:24:23 PM
Thanks guys! :grin:


Quote from: Bluenose on September 01, 2020, 12:58:53 PM
... A positive patient may be symptomatic or asymptomatic...

Adjective order in English really jumbles my head (too much interference with Portuguese) but that makes sense. :thumbsup:

The thing is native English speakers use an unwritten rule for the order of adjectives, using them out of order sounds odd.  Most people do this, but could not explain how they arrived at the order.

This link may help (or make it even more confusing.)
+++ Divide by cucumber error: please reinstall universe and reboot.  +++

GNU Terry Pratchett


Recusant

Quote from: hermes2015 on September 01, 2020, 08:41:42 AM
Quote from: Recusant on September 01, 2020, 05:57:24 AM
A hyphen makes it a single concept.* Therefore "symptomatically-positive" means essentially that the patient has symptoms; "positive" is redundant. In the context we're dealing with I believe that "positive" refers to test results.

* "When you connect words with the hyphen, you make it clear to readers that the words work together as a unit of meaning."  (source)

Thanks, Recusant.

Apologies. I'm an inveterate reader of style manuals and usage references. I don't think that's made my writing any more readable, but it does show up in less optimal ways on occasion.  :-\

Most recently I treated myself to the British edition of Dreyer's English, which I thought was a genuine delight.  :excuse:
"Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration — courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and above all, love of the truth."
— H. L. Mencken


Tank

I'm with Recusant in that I used to read dictionaries for fun when I was a kid.
If religions were TV channels atheism is turning the TV off.
"Religion is a culture of faith; science is a culture of doubt." ― Richard P. Feynman
'It is said that your life flashes before your eyes just before you die. That is true, it's called Life.' - Terry Pratchett
Remember, your inability to grasp science is not a valid argument against it.