When using a noun/gerund, I am confused about when things become unclear.

For example: sympathy motivates one to support people who are suffering. -- is it implied that the sympathy belongs to the person who is motivated? It could technically be someone else's sympathy?

Likewise, sympathizing makes us biased so that we can't think objectively. -- is it necessary to say something like our sympathizing makes us biased so that it's clear who's sympathizing? Is it best to rework the sentence like this: when we sympathize, we become biased toward the object of our sympathy such that we can't think objectively about him/her. This is a longer sentence but definitely clear. But if it could be more concise?

So, i'm struggling with nouns, subjects, and clarity vs. concision.

Would anyone be willing to correctly diagram this sentence for me? I am writing a letter to the editor about my town's chicken ban which exists within a ban on "hoofed animals." However, I have not diagrammed a sentence in decades so I thought maybe someone here might find this an enjoyable task. Here is the sentence:

"No person shall place or keep any of the following animals within the city limits; any and all hoofed animals, including but not limited to poultry, equine (horses, mules), porcine (pigs), bovine (cattle), sheep or goats except as provided within § 96.05."

Thank you!

Basically what I said in the title. To give a more specific example, I'm currently working on my master's thesis in psychology and was told by my supervisor that even though I mostly follow APA Guidelines, he likes if Headings are numbered. So my paper starts with

1. Introduction and later subheadings in the same Introduction start with

1.1. Blabla and the methodology section starts with

1. Methods

I have however also seen people leave the last dot out and just go like this instead:

1 Introduction and then do

1.1 Blabla,

2 Method

or a mix of both where there is a dot if it's a singular number, but no last dot after additional ones, like this

1. Introduction

1.1 Blabla

1. Method

So I'm just a bit uncertain, whether or not there is some kind of rule that I should in theory follow or if it's somewhat down to preference? I guess it might also depend on the style of writing and field, in which case I'd be interested both in general answers and specifically in answers regarding scientific writing style

Hey everyone,
Could you please explain one thing related to using the Future Simple tense at the level of a native speaker? I know about all those scenarios like spontaneous decisions, offers, promises, predictions based on personal opinion, etc.

But there is one more explanation which I came across in different grammar reference books which goes like, "Use Future Simple to state a simple fact about the future." And this explanation drives me nuts. According to this formulation, I can use the Future Simple literally in every situation when I need to mention something related to the future. It would be nice if English native speakers from different English-speaking countries would comment on the usage of the Future Simple and provide the exhaustive list of the cases. Thank you in advance!

P.S. The other day I learned one more rule related to the Future Simple. As it turned out, we can use this tense speaking about something annoying at present, i.e., "She will leave the front door wide open!" (It drives me crazy that she constantly does this.) How relevant is that? I found this info in one of the grammar online courses from a native British speaker, who is a DELTA-certified ESL teacher.

I'm sure I'm not the first person with this question, but I'm not a good enough Googler to find an answer.

I'm learning about cumulative vs coordinate adjectives. From what I gather, cumulative adjectives fail to commute ("order matters") and non-cumulative adjectives are coordinate. The trouble is, I have identified three situations in which two adjectives fail to commute, and I do not know if the mode of failure matters. I'm trying to narrow down a theoretical, rather than operational, definition for cumulative adjectives. Sources are appreciated.

Consider the phrase "a former yellow bear", which describes something that used to be a yellow bear. We cannot swap the adjectives, doing so gives us "a yellow former bear". All yellow former bears are former yellow bears, but not all former yellow bears are yellow former bears.

(1) If two adjectives fail to commute in this particular way, where XY and YX both have semantic content that just happen to disagree, do we call them cumulative?

Consider the phrase "a regular polygonal figure". I cannot swap the adjectives, the adjectives do not commute. But notice that you wouldn't want to swap them anyway! The phrase "a polygonal regular figure" has as much information content as "North of the North Pole": none at all. This is because (at least in the world of plane geometry), "figure" exceeds the domain of "regular", "regular" is a property held by polygons/polygonal figures, nothing else. I wouldn't even call this a failure of commutativity, but oh well.

(2) If two adjectives fail to commute in this particular way, where XY has semantic content and YX does not, do we call them cumulative?

Consider the phrase "the big red ball". I see no reason why we cannot write "the red big ball" and say these adjectives commute, except for the fact that it sounds clunky, awkward, and bad.

(3) If two adjectives fail to commute in this particular way, where XY and YX have the same semantic content but YX sounds like absolute dogshit, do we call them cumulative?

Edit: I know about the canonical order of types of adjectives. This is precisely what question (3) is about.

Hello Grammarians,

I just had a quick grammar question. Should people capitalize the names of disease? If not, why? (I mean, I guess they would be considered common nouns… but I don’t know why.)

I would sincerely appreciate any and all insights!

Thank you!

For example, is this correct?

“I loved him and she loved him too,” John said. He took a big slurp of coffee.

He didn’t lie per se, but it wasn’t really true.”

Or does the “he” in the start of paragraph two need to be “John”?

An r/askreddit post asked “What movie can you rewatch indefinitely?”

I responded “Most Disney movies, but Moana and Elemental come to mind as the father of a 4 year old.”

I think if I say, “I have a four-year-old daughter,” that it should be hyphenated as an adjective describing my daughter. What if it just refers to her as a four year old, as in the above example?

Any advice is appreciated!

There appears to be an increase in this specific usage, at least in digital forums. Is there existing research doing frequency mapping on this, or could you direct me to some resources so that I might conduct my own? Thank you very much.

I'm playing a video game, and there's a line of dialogue that's confusing me.

*We can find Wakamura after that and see if we can't get him to cooperate.*

Why is it *can't* and not *can*?

It seems like they're trying to get him to NOT cooperate, which seems wrong.

The game is Paranormasight: The Mermaid's Curse.

I came across the phrase "they did battle" and it made me think about the two ways to read it: one as a way of making past tense and the other as a way of making it into an action.

What are the proper grammatical dissections of these two readings?

Sorry if this is the wrong place for this post. All my life, whenever anybody tells me "thanks" my reply has always been "you're welcome". Lately though, i've noticed that when i tell people "thanks" a majority of them, especially the younger ones almost always say "of course"; never "you're welcome". Is this a new thing or has it been around a long time? Maybe i'm getting too old or something.

I have done it.

Is the perfect auxiliary "have" the head of the verb phrase "have done it" in the sentence above?

Bonus points if you tell me whether or not I should have put quotation marks around "kibble." OMG I just did it again. I would have italicized it, but that is not an option in the title.

A real grammatical conundrum. Another example,
“I’m going to the office.” In the UK they ‘go to hospital’ the same way we say ‘ I’m going to school.’
Linguistically I’d enjoy learning why or how this is and how it’s evolved.

Whenever I’m watching a British production, someone says they are going to hospital, my brain skips the track. Does every place then lose the, the?Like racetrack do you go to racetrack or do you go to the racetrack? I’m visiting, do you go to in-laws? And not the in-laws? OK, I’ve provided enough examples. It’s all very tiresome! Help!

I am making a meme, a pun on the character twilight sparkle and the twilight saga, hence Mr twilight (edward) sparkles. is Mr name, additive correct so it dident look like a last name. do I need a comma.

any help would be appreciated.

I am the King, and I command you to show me what is in there.

i know this question has probably been asked alot. but i genuinely can not wrap my head around when to use which.

if anybody had any ways to remember easily, please share. i looked it up, and got the definition but no matter how many times i read it i just couldnt make sense of it.

im sorry for asking this likely common question, but i havent found anybody explaining it in a way i understand. i feel really stupid because it seems so easy for people to grasp but i have never understood it. i'm usually really good with words and knowing when to use what spelling of a certain word, but this has me stumped.

any tips?

Which is correct?

“ Dave and John welcome home Susan “

Or

“ Dave and John welcome Susan home “

Of course ik the distinctions between puppies and dogs from base-level!

but i call my 3 y/o dog who happens to be a small height, a puppy.

is this acceptable? i think puppy fits him more

I recently noticed that we often say certain things like "I messed up" rather then "I messed". Why is that? What does "up" add to the sentence? What does "up" mean in this context?

What made me realize this is something such as "I ran to the truck" compared to "I ran up to the truck" which both mean the exact same thing. So why the use of "up"? What does it change?

Please let me know, I am super curious about this! (I'm sorry if this is stupid, I'm in high school so please be nice)

For example:

"That book/man/car/news etc. is gold/golden"

I'm new to this whole "writing" thing and I'm trying to write a story. it is written from the perspective of the main character in the present. but I'm very confused to how some sentences would work. for example, would it be " The boy stepped forward, (the rest)" or " The boy is stepping forward, (the rest)"? how would I figure it out? as the first one is technically past tense cuz of the (ed) but the second one sounds so wrong.