18-letter words containing a, g, h, o, s
- greenhouse warming — the increase in the mean temperature of the earth attributed to the greenhouse effect
- hash house slinger — a person who serves in a cheap cafe
- have got to do sth — You use have got to when you are saying that something is necessary or must happen in the way stated. In informal American English, the 'have' is sometimes omitted.
- hepatosplenomegaly — Enlargement of both the liver and spleen.
- hidalgo y costilla — Miguel [mee-gel] /miˈgɛl/ (Show IPA), 1753–1811, Mexican priest, patriot, and revolutionist.
- histomorphological — histology.
- historical geology — the branch of geology dealing with the history of the earth.
- horizontal tasting — a tasting of wines from the same year but from different vineyards, producers, etc.
- horseless carriage — an automobile: The horse and buggy were eventually replaced by the horseless carriage.
- house of delegates — the lower house of the General Assembly in Virginia, West Virginia, and Maryland.
- human rights group — a group that campaigns for human rights
- hungry programmers — (body) A group of programmers producing free software.
- huntington station — a town on W Long Island, in SE New York.
- hypogastric artery — iliac artery (def 3).
- immunohistological — the microscopic study of tissues with the aid of antibodies that bind to tissue components and reveal their presence.
- james-lange theory — a theory that emotions are caused by bodily sensations; for example, we are sad because we weep
- johannes gutenberg — Johannes [yoh-hahn-uh s] /yoʊˈhɑn əs/ (Show IPA), (Johann Gensfleisch) c1400–68, German printer: credited with invention of printing from movable type.
- king of the castle — most powerful figure
- king-of-the-salmon — a ribbonfish, Trachypterus altivelis, of northern parts of the Pacific Ocean.
- knights of pythias — a fraternal order founded in Washington, D.C., in 1864.
- lagrange's theorem — the theorem that the order of each subgroup of a finite group is a factor of the order of the group.
- laying on of hands — Theology. a rite in which the cleric's hands are placed on the head of a person being confirmed, ordained, or the like.
- lithostratigraphic — Of or pertaining to lithostratigraphy.
- logarithmic spiral — log r = aθ
- logarithmus dualis — (mathematics) (ld) Latin for logarithm base two. More commonly written as "log" with a subscript "2". Roughly the number of bits required to represent an integer.
- logical shift left — logical shift
- lubber grasshopper — plains grasshopper.
- magic switch story — Some years ago, I was snooping around in the cabinets that housed the MIT AI Lab's PDP-10, and noticed a little switch glued to the frame of one cabinet. It was obviously a homebrew job, added by one of the lab's hardware hackers (no-one knows who). You don't touch an unknown switch on a computer without knowing what it does, because you might crash the computer. The switch was labelled in a most unhelpful way. It had two positions, and scrawled in pencil on the metal switch body were the words "magic" and "more magic". The switch was in the "more magic" position. I called another hacker over to look at it. He had never seen the switch before either. Closer examination revealed that the switch had only one wire running to it! The other end of the wire did disappear into the maze of wires inside the computer, but it's a basic fact of electricity that a switch can't do anything unless there are two wires connected to it. This switch had a wire connected on one side and no wire on its other side. It was clear that this switch was someone's idea of a silly joke. Convinced by our reasoning that the switch was inoperative, we flipped it. The computer instantly crashed. Imagine our utter astonishment. We wrote it off as coincidence, but nevertheless restored the switch to the "more magic" position before reviving the computer. A year later, I told this story to yet another hacker, David Moon as I recall. He clearly doubted my sanity, or suspected me of a supernatural belief in the power of this switch, or perhaps thought I was fooling him with a bogus saga. To prove it to him, I showed him the very switch, still glued to the cabinet frame with only one wire connected to it, still in the "more magic" position. We scrutinized the switch and its lone connection, and found that the other end of the wire, though connected to the computer wiring, was connected to a ground pin. That clearly made the switch doubly useless: not only was it electrically nonoperative, but it was connected to a place that couldn't affect anything anyway. So we flipped the switch. The computer promptly crashed. This time we ran for Richard Greenblatt, a long-time MIT hacker, who was close at hand. He had never noticed the switch before, either. He inspected it, concluded it was useless, got some diagonal cutters and diked it out. We then revived the computer and it has run fine ever since. We still don't know how the switch crashed the machine. There is a theory that some circuit near the ground pin was marginal, and flipping the switch changed the electrical capacitance enough to upset the circuit as millionth-of-a-second pulses went through it. But we'll never know for sure; all we can really say is that the switch was magic. I still have that switch in my basement. Maybe I'm silly, but I usually keep it set on "more magic".
- menthol cigarettes — cigarettes that are flavoured with menthol
- microsoft exchange — (messaging) Microsoft's messaging and enterprise collaboration server. Exchange's primary role is as an electronic mail message store but it can also store calendars, task lists, contact details, and other data.
- moccasin telegraph — the transmission of rumour or secret information; the grapevine
- monographic series — a series of monographs issued in uniform style or format and related by subject or by issuing agency.
- move the goalposts — to change the aims of an activity to ensure the desired results
- negative cash flow — the situation when income is less than payments
- neo-pythagoreanism — a philosophical system, established in Alexandria and Rome in the second century b.c., consisting mainly of revived Pythagorean doctrines with elements of Platonism and Stoicism.
- neurophysiological — the branch of physiology dealing with the functions of the nervous system.
- neuropsychological — Of or pertaining to neuropsychology, the relation or combination of brain and mind.
- nightmare scenario — If you describe a situation or event as a nightmare scenario, you mean that it is the worst possible thing that could happen.
- not a pretty sight — If you say that someone or something is not a pretty sight, you mean that it is not pleasant to look at.
- not by a long shot — absolutely not
- offset lithography — offset (def 6).
- on the danger list — critically ill in hospital
- open heart surgery — surgery performed on the exposed heart while a heart-lung machine pumps and oxygenates the blood and diverts it from the heart.
- open-heart surgery — surgery performed on the exposed heart while a heart-lung machine pumps and oxygenates the blood and diverts it from the heart.
- orthotungstic acid — an oxyacid acid of tungsten. Formula: H2WO4
- oscillographically — By means of oscillography.
- parathyroid glands — any of several small oval glands usually lying near or embedded in the thyroid gland.
- phantasmagorically — having a fantastic or deceptive appearance, as something in a dream or created by the imagination.
- photochemical smog — air pollution containing ozone and other reactive chemical compounds formed by the action of sunlight on nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons, especially those in automobile exhaust.
- physical geography — the branch of geography concerned with natural features and phenomena of the earth's surface, as landforms, drainage features, climates, soils, and vegetation.