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fw
Joined: 12 Oct 2005
Posts: 361
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 Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2009 3:40 pm Post subject: Birds have a power or sense quite outside our own experience |
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How birds find their way after they have started on their migrations is still a great mystery. Some recent experiments seem to suggest that birds have a power or sense quite outside our own experience.
How do you analyze the last half of the second sentence above, #1 or #2 below?
1. birds have a (power or sense) quite outside our own experience.
2. birds have (a power)(,) or (sense quite outside our own experience).
I think #1 is appropriate, because I think the phrase �quite outside our own experience� modifies �a power or sense."
#2 means that �birds have a power, that is, sense quite outside our own experience.�
What do you think? |
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dragn
Joined: 17 Feb 2009
Posts: 450
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| Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2009 5:34 pm Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
How do you analyze the last half of the second sentence above, #1 or #2 below?
1. birds have a (power or sense) quite outside our own experience.
2. birds have (a power)(,) or (sense quite outside our own experience).
I think #1 is appropriate, because I think the phrase �quite outside our own experience� modifies �a power or sense."
#2 means that �birds have a power, that is, sense quite outside our own experience.� |
If I am interpreting your question correctly, I would agree that #1 would be the correct interpretation of the sentence. I assume that the reason the writer says it this way is because he simply isn't sure what to call it. That's precisely the point. Birds are able to do something we can't even comprehend. We don't know how they do it. They have some kind of mysterious power or sense; but whatever you want to call it, it's quite outside our experience.
The second interpretation seems as if you are considering a sense quite outside our own experience as the definition of a power. It's not.
Greg |
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