meaning of "There is no guessing"

[Kati Svaby]

Hello Alan,

Thank you very much for your clear explanation. I enjoy and value your interpretation, it always gives me peacefulness, - I say this than a retired teacher -your explanations are equivalent to your newsletter.

Thanks again:
Kati Svaby
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We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

[Niaz1]

it does not still make sense to me,why we could not say there is no guessing...
i read that you said there is no knowing it's expression but it'a really strange!!! you said the meaning of there is no knowing is there is no guessing but we could not use there is no guessing?????

[Beeesneees]

It's simply not the way it's said.
Please read Alan's earlier reply here:
meaning of "There is no guessing"
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Cheers m' dears!

[Kati Svaby]

Hello Niaz,

I read again the whole thread and I think that we have to accept that in the English (also) there are set expressions
Alan says:
" 'There's no knowing' is a set expression whereas 'there's no guessing' isn't a set expression."
What to do? We have to accept it. And I don't know how but we should learn 'set expressions' as much as possible.

Kati
_________________
We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

[Kati Svaby]

Hello Niaz,

Set phrase /or set expressions -I think it is same/

The dictionary says:

set phrase
a set phrase that is always used in a same form.

Its example is very good:
Don't worry about the grammar, just learn this as a set phrase.

Don't worry, be happy...

Kati
_________________
We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

[Kati Svaby]

Hello,

What are the collocation?

According my Dictionary:
1.(C) a combination of words in a language, that happens very often and more frequently that would happen by chance 'resounding success' and 'crying shame' are English collocations.

2.(U) The fact of two or more words often being used together, in a way that happens more frequently than would happen by chance.
Advanced students need to be aware of the importance of collocation.

I don't understand what is the difference between 1 and 2? Why is the first an uncountable noun and the second is a countable noun?

Regards:
Kati Svaby
_________________
We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

[Beeesneees]

countable - individual different collocations

uncountable - the technical term 'collocation' applied to that aspect of English.
_________________
Cheers m' dears!

[Kati Svaby]

Helo Alan,

If you read my previous two letters you can see what is my problem.
Why do collocations have countable and uncountable form? What do we have to know about this? Does a set expression mean same than a collocation? Or is there a difference between them?

I can't answer these question?

Many thanks.
Regards:
Kati Svaby
_________________
We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

[Kati Svaby]

Hello Bez,

I understand anyhow. I accept it.

I would like if you tell me there is a difference between set expressions and collocations of 1.

Regards:
Kati
_________________
We always deceive ourselves twice about the people we love - first to their advantage, then to their disadvantage.

[Alan]

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Hi Kati,

That's a very good question and is also difficult to answer. I'll try. A collocation is a group of words that happen to go well together in a sequence and is a problem for someone learning the language because you have to choose the right word or words. For example you would describe someone not saying anything as 'tight lipped' and not 'close lipped' . You also find phrasal verbs as examples of collocations where the added preposition or particle has to be the right one with the right verb. You would use 'speak up' to describe speaking in a louder voice and not 'speak higher'. In most cases and I am generalising here, the collocation can be understood from the words themselves as they are grouped and they don't have a hidden or idiomatic meaning. There is if you like no history attached to that particular group of words. A set expression is more akin to an idiom and in this sense has a history as to why this is an expression that is accepted because it originates from something that was created in the past. An example of a set expression would be 'let the cat out of the bag' ,meaning expose a secret. This comes from the days when unscrupulous traders would sell you what they claimed was a pig in a sack but in fact when you opened it, you found it was just a cat.

I have only scratched the surface of this topic (by the way that's a collocation - 'scratch' not 'scrape'). The main difference between 'collocation' and 'set expression' is that the former can be more readily understood from the group of related words than the set expression, which invariably has a historical background.

Alan
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English as a Second Language
You can read my ESL story Present Simple

[Kati Svaby]