word meaning - Difference between idiot and dummy? - English . . . Although idiot and dummy do commonly have the same meaning, the use of idiot in this joking phrase draws particular attention to a specific sense of idiot From Merriam-Webster's definition of idiot: 1 : a foolish or stupid person It's the use of foolish in the definition that's relevant From Merriam-Webster's definition of dummy: 1 c : a
grammar - Can the word THIS be a dummy subject? For example: This is . . . 5 I think the "dummy subject"you are talking about is that which is known as an expletive subject A good example is It is raining In the text you quote I don't believe this is used in quite the same way Even though there is no this at whom one could point, it could refer to a person named in the letter from David Hutton
pronouns - English Language Learners Stack Exchange It's an anticipatory "it", as "it" could be replaced with "you joining us" It's not a dummy as it does actually refer to something specific The second is the same, although calling it anticipatory seems a bit odd Both could be rewritten as "You joining us would be awesome" By the way, "would" is better than "will" in both cases "Will" sounds wrong with "if"
Subject and predicate in sentences starting with there? Here, it says that the real subject is "a book and a pen" but I know that "there" can also be called a "dummy subject" What should be the most suitable subject and predicate in this context?
I dont like it when it is rainy. VS I dont like it raining. In the simple sentence " It's raining ", "it" is a dummy pronoun that represents nothing at all It's just there to provide a subject for the sentence because all declarative English sentences require explicit subjects It's an idiomatic use of "it" that we use to talk about weather conditions The structure is [ "it's" + weather condition ] The sentence, " I don't like it raining ", however
There is some or There are some- which is correct? Initial There's is OK before anything When it's at the beginning of the sentence, it's just a dummy, with no meaning or plural, and it's reified into one word before anything plural can happen in the sentence By the time the real subject comes along, plural or not, the listener will've forgotten how the sentence started Since it didn't start with anything meaningful except the dummy