Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[missdaredevil]

Dear teachers,
Please help me with the questions I have.

Thank you so much.


1.Flying by the seat of one's pants means flying an airplane without any help from instruments -- the way it was done in the early days of aviation

Does it mean flying without proper seat belt and etc??

2.Music companies are *losing control to specialists* in online promotion.

The specialists are winning to the music companies?

3.This rock band *touched a nerve* with a lot of people.

It offended a lot of people?

4.This shelter can hold the *maximum* number of 15 people.
or should I use *maximal*?

[asterix]

No, it means flying with no instruments, except maybe an altimeter and an airspeed indicator. It is all done intuitively and by sight and "feel", in the same way that you ride a bicycle..

Music companies used to promote their records. Now it is done by companies who, for a fee, specialise in that kind of sales promotion.

It produced an emotional reaction, probably negative.

"This shelter can hold a maximum of 15 people", would be better.

[scottish_tiger]

Hi there,

I hope that you are enjoying your English studies, and that you are finding the help you get from teachers here useful. If you don't mind I would like to try to help you with your 4 questions.

The phrase "Flying by the seat of one's pants" has nothing to do with aviation or flying. It is a saying used to mean taking a chance in business where the person could either win or lose.

"losing control to specialists" this phrase is indicating that the music industry is finding that other sources of obtaining music are becoming more popular. For example, when I was a boy the only way to buy music was to go to a music store and by a record. Now CDs and music tracks can be bought online or downloaded from Itunes, so the music industry no longer has 100% control over the sale of their music.

"touched a nerve". This is a positive reaction rather than angering the crowd, in that many people were happy to hear the band play their songs because they were able to feel that the music was relevant to their own lives.

This shelter can hold the *maximum* number of 15 people.
or should I use *maximal*? I have never heard of the word "maximal". Basically this sentence is saying that the total number of people that can stay within the shelter is 15, so anymore that this and the shelter will have to say no or would be overcrowded.

I hope that this helps you with your questions, if you want me to explain these further let me know.

Scottish Tiger
_________________
I am always happy to help you learn English.

[redset]

Hi!

1) Instruments in a plane are things that give you information, like the speed indicator, the compass which shows the direction you're facing, a height indicator etc. So flying without this information means it's basically you, sitting in the plane, doing your best to fly it around safely.

We use the phrase in lots of situations, to mean that you're deciding what to do as you go along, reacting to things as they happen (maybe without knowing much about what you're doing).

2) The online promotion specialists are gaining control, you could say they're winning control from the music companies. Music labels traditionally controlled the industry, it was hard for small independent labels to get records into the stores, or to get people to hear their music. On the Internet it's much easier, and the major labels can't control it anymore!

3) If you poke a needle into your finger, it hurts right? Your nerves are what let you feel things, and they're very sensitive. The idea is that if you actually touched a nerve, not just through your skin, it would be a very intense feeling (hitting a raw nerve is a similar phrase). So when someone 'touches a nerve' it means they do something that causes a strong reaction and feeling - usually a negative reaction, but not necessarily.

4) Maximal is an adjective form of maximum (which we can also use as an adjective!), but it implies that the amount is the largest possible. So maybe the maximum number of people in the shelter is 15 (someone decided that was the limit), but if the shelter is big enough for 30 people, then 30 people would be maximal. It's similar to minimum/minimal (a minimal room has very little furniture or decoration, for example).

So your sentence is fine as it is, 'maximal' is very rarely used to be honest. The only thing I'd change is the word 'number' - we don't normally include that if we're saying the actual number (15):

The shelter can hold the maximum of 15 people.

The shelter can hold the maximum number of people.

By the way, 'the maximum' sounds as though the maximum is a rule that has already been decided - maybe there are lots of shelters, and somebody has said that no shelter can hold more than 15 people. So the maximum is set at 15, some shelters are too small to hold that many, but this one is large enough to hold the maximum. If you just want to say 'this shelter can hold up to 15 people':

The shelter can hold a maximum of 15 people.