16-letter words containing a, n, o, t, e
- counterchallenge — A challenge made in response to another challenge.
- counterespionage — Counterespionage is the same as counterintelligence.
- counterfactually — a conditional statement the first clause of which expresses something contrary to fact, as “If I had known.”.
- counterguerrilla — (of operations, conflicts, etc) conducted against guerrillas
- counterirritants — Plural form of counterirritant.
- countermigration — a migration in the opposite direction.
- counternarcotics — Measures or activities designed to prevent the use or distrubution of iillegal narcotic drugs.
- counterproposals — Plural form of counterproposal.
- countersignature — second signature
- counterstatement — a statement made to deny or refute another statement.
- course of action — a way of proceeding
- court appearance — the appearance of an accused person before a court
- covariant theory — the principle that physical laws have the same form and interrelations in any system of coordinates in which they are expressed.
- cowichan sweater — a heavy sweater of grey, unbleached wool with distinctive designs that were originally black-and-white but are now sometimes coloured: knitted originally by Cowichan Indians in British Columbia
- cracked fraction — A cracked fraction is a petroleum fraction (= a portion separated according to a physical property) that has been broken down from a fraction with larger molecules.
- craftspersonship — The body of activities, skills, techniques, knowledge, and expertise pertinent to (a) particular craft(s).
- cream of coconut — coconut cream (def 1).
- cream-of-coconut — Also called cream of coconut. a creamy white liquid skimmed from the top of coconut milk that has been made by soaking grated coconut meat in water, used in East Indian cookery, mixed drinks, etc.
- creation science — teaching and research based upon the belief that the biblical account of the creation of the world is scientific fact
- creative commons — Sometimes, creative commons. a set of various licenses that allow people to share their copyrighted work to be copied, edited, built upon, etc., while retaining the copyright to the original work (often used attributively): We’re happy for other sites to share these photos under Creative Commons; a creative commons license.
- creative tension — a situation where disagreement or discord ultimately gives rise to better ideas or outcomes
- critical section — A non-re-entrant piece of code that can only be executed by one process at a time. It will usually terminate in bounded time and a process will only have to wait a bounded time to enter it. Some synchronisation mechanism is required at the entry and exit of the critical section to ensure exclusive use.
- cross-resistance — immunologic resistance to the pathogenic effects of a microorganism because of previous exposure to another species or type having cross-reactive antigens.
- crosscontaminate — Alternative spelling of cross-contaminate.
- crossopterygians — Plural form of crossopterygian.
- croydon facelift — the tightening effect on the skin of a woman's face caused by securing the hair at the back of the head in a tight ponytail
- cryopreservation — the storage of blood or living tissues at extremely cold temperatures, often -196 degrees Celsius.
- customary tenant — a tenant occupying a property under the customs of the manor, often a low-status tenant with little security of tenure
- cut one's throat — to bring about one's own ruin
- cute as a button — very sweet, adorable
- cyclohexamantane — (chemistry) A certain diamondoid, C26H30.
- dangling pointer — (programming) A reference that doesn't actually lead anywhere. In C and some other languages, a pointer that doesn't actually point at anything valid. Usually this happens because it formerly pointed to something that has moved or disappeared, e.g. a heap-allocated block which has been freed and reused. Used as jargon in a generalisation of its technical meaning; for example, a local phone number for a person who has since moved is a dangling pointer.
- dark of the moon — the period during which the moon is not visible.
- darwinian theory — Darwin's theory of evolution, which holds that all species of plants and animals developed from earlier forms by hereditary transmission of slight variations in successive generations, and that natural selection determines which forms will survive
- data compression — the act of compressing.
- data preparation — the process of converting data or information into a form that can be read by a computer, so that the data can then be entered into the computer
- data warehousing — the use of large amounts of data taken from multiple sources to create reports and for data analysis
- davidson current — a winter countercurrent that flows N along the W coast of the U.S.
- day of atonement — Yom Kippur
- de-anglicization — (in Ireland) the elimination of English influence, language, customs, etc
- de-concentration — to reduce the power or control of (a corporation, industry, etc.); decentralize.
- de-stalinization — the elimination of the influence of Stalin
- dead-man's float — a prone floating position, used especially by beginning swimmers, with face downward, legs extended backward, and arms stretched forward.
- dealcoholization — to remove some or all of the alcohol from (a drink).
- dear john letter — a letter from someone (esp to a man) breaking off a love affair
- dearborn heights — city in SE Mich.: suburb of Detroit: pop. 58,000
- debating society — a club, e.g. at a school or university, which regularly holds debates
- deboursification — (jargon) Removal of irrelevant newsgroups from the Newsgroups header of a followup. The term applies particularly to the removal of frivolous groups added by one of the Kooks. See also: sneck.
- decapitalization — to deprive of capital; discourage capital formation; withdraw capital from: The government decapitalized industry with harsh tax policies.
- decentralisation — Alternative spelling of decentralization.