All native opinions kindly requested.

Re: All native opinions kindly requested.


The first question is almost impossible to answer without a context. The only answer that wouldn't work is D. All the others are possibilities. BTW, I believe that complementing should be complimenting.

The answer to the second question is C--consumption.

Both questions one and two, without regard to what word is placed in the blank space, are very poor English, and were either the product of someone who is not a native speaker of English, or were produced by a careless and lazy native speaker of English.

When you say "we," as in "we find the following two . . . etc."--is that because you have a mouse in your pocket?

Thank you Roberta and Set for taking time to answer. Set don't pick on me I can't help it my hempster comes with me wherever I go.

Let me explain, I am Turkish, even though I lived in Long Island,New York almost 20 years (I was 24 when I immigrated.)
I graduated high school in Turkey and having 2 hours a week English classes for 3 years didn't help much as you can tell.(NO college education)
Now I am back in Turkey and came across a language forum while surfing the net, this forum is for Turkish students who are preparing to take University Entrance exams, having nothing much to do on the net I became a member and thought maybe I could help these kids a little.
I was under the impression that I spoke pretty good English and possibly had something to offer.
Guess what, I was dead wrong.
So now from time to time I face questions that are so ambiguous I find myself feeling like a one legged man in a ass-kicking contest.(little humor there, not bad for a Turk with no college education huh.)

I agree with you that these questions are badly written, probably by a half ass English speaking Turk like me, who knows.

When I saw this this site and forum on one of my google searches light bulb went on and I thought I can ask you native speakers about these questions.

I hope you don't mind I'll be picking your brains from time to time, like the song says:
I am just a soul whose intentions are good.

Stay healthy and happy.

(I used to pump gas , ended up owning couple of gas stations on Long Island thus the nick.)

P.S. Roberta on second question I was defending the choice ''efficiency''
since my understanding of the sentence was they were talking about the amount of fossil fuels world must use not the total fossil fuels world has.

Re: All native opinions kindly requested.
Don't worry about it, Boss. I could not have known that you had written the questions, but that would not alter that they were in error. Nonetheless, your English is quite good, and it is "polished" to the extent that you know and correctly use idiomatic expressions. If you are doing this for the purposes of teaching English, you might consider posting your course materials here before using them, so you can get corrections or advice on the most common or most understandable usages. There is a Chinese gentleman here who has an excellent command of the English language, and teaches English. He frequently posts the texts he intends to use as course materials here so that he can get advice and editing before using them. Here are the errors i saw:

1. We must find some way to give them a[/u] fairly complete and realistic picture of the situation, but without _______ them too much.

A minor error in this case, it still stands out to a native speaker of English.

2. The rise in energy ______ has led to a reduction of the[/u] fossil fuels that the world must use.

This one is a little more ambiguous. The original construction was not necessarily wrong, but it doesn't "scan" as typical English. I have added the definite article because "fossil fuels that the world must use" is a complete phrase which cannot be reduced to constituent parts while preserving the sense of the sentence. That phrase specifies certain fossil fuels--those that the world must use. There might, arguably, be other fossil fuels that the world does not need to use, and the sentence does not make clear whether or not that is true. So i added the definite article ("the").

Don't mind Set, he's grumpy until he's had his second cup of coffee. Good on ya, pj, ask something whenever you feel like it. We'll answer and then flame each other bitterly because we disagree about what's correct. Watch out for Contrex. He talks British English.

He doesn't do badly . . . for someone speaking the minority version of the language. He is, however, much grumpier than i am, and much more likely to flame people.

ah, Set had his coffee between posts, I see. Good morning, Set, lovely day, isn't it? (metaphorically speaking; it's gray, cold, and rainy in Boston)

It ain't much better in T.O.--actually, i wish it would rain, and get rid of the residual snow which hasn't yet melted away . . .

Re: All native opinions kindly requested.


I agree with Roberta that C is correct for the sentence as you wrote it. For you to use B, you need to change it to:

The rise in energy efficiency has led to reduced world-wide usage of fossil fuels.

Or something of that nature. Your "must use" is the problem with B being correct.

Thank you all for answering. I appreciate it
Set I am sorry if I gave you the impression that I wrote the questions.
Actually I didn't and don't know who did, I was just agreeing with you that they were badly written.
I was trying to help kids find the right answers to these questions, since they are practice questions and similar ones can come up in the real test .
They have a book with these questions also gives answers with a letter(like A,B,C,D)
but no explanations which causes arguments,if the book says answer is B.
some kid goes why not A or whats wrong with C
And the questions I brought here were that kind.

Thanks again I'll be back with more controversial questions as they come up.

If something like this comes again, PJ, bring the material here before you present it to the class, and maybe someone here can help you to anticipate the questions, and have answers ready when the students begin asking them.