17-letter words containing c, a, l, d, t, r
- compound interval — an interval that is greater than an octave, as a ninth or a thirteenth.
- continental drift — Continental drift is the slow movement of the Earth's continents towards and away from each other.
- coordinate clause — one of two or more clauses in a sentence having the same status and introduced by coordinating conjunctions
- courtship display — behaviour that is aimed at attracting a mate
- credit facilities — a type of loan made by a bank
- cylinder capacity — the cylinder volume that is swept by the pistons of an internal-combustion engine
- dagestan republic — a constituent republic of S Russia, on the Caspian Sea: annexed from Persia in 1813; rich mineral resources. Capital: Makhachkala. Pop: 2 584 200 (2002). Area: 50 278 sq km (19 416 sq miles)
- decellularization — (biology, medicine) The loss of cells from tissue.
- decriminalisation — (chiefly, British) Alternative form of decriminalization.
- decriminalization — to eliminate criminal penalties for or remove legal restrictions against: to decriminalize marijuana.
- dehydrochlorinate — to remove hydrogen chloride or chlorine and hydrogen from (a substance).
- delay instruction — delayed control-transfer
- denatured alcohol — ethanol rendered unfit for human consumption by the addition of a noxious substance, as in methylated spirits
- dendroclimatology — The science that uses dendrochronology to reconstruct historical climate conditions.
- dessert chocolate — cooking chocolate
- deterministically — the doctrine that all facts and events exemplify natural laws.
- dialect geography — linguistic geography
- diaphragmatically — By use of the diaphragm; in a diaphragmatic way.
- digital recording — a method of sound recording in which an input audio waveform is sampled at regular intervals, usually between 40,000 and 50,000 times per second, and each sample is assigned a numerical value, usually expressed in binary notation.
- discreditableness — Quality of being discreditable.
- discrete variable — a variable that may assume only a countable, and usually finite, number of values.
- disrespectability — Lack of respectability.
- distance learning — education in which students receive instruction over the Internet, from a video, etc., instead of going to school.
- dollars-and-cents — considered strictly in terms of money: from a dollars-and-cents viewpoint.
- double refraction — the separation of a ray of light into two unequally refracted, plane-polarized rays of orthogonal polarizations, occurring in crystals in which the velocity of light rays is not the same in all directions.
- double track line — a railway line with double track
- douglas macarthur — Douglas, 1880–1964, U.S. general: supreme commander of allied forces in SW Pacific during World War II and of UN forces in Korea 1950–51.
- duality principle — the principle that a mathematical duality exists under certain conditions.
- electric retarder — An electric retarder is an electromagnetic transmission brake that is only effective when a vehicle is moving.
- electricity board — a company which supplies electricity
- electrocardiogram — A record or display of a person’s heartbeat produced by electrocardiography.
- esprit d'escalier — clever repartee one thinks of too late
- exception handler — Special code which is called when an exception occurs during the execution of a program. If the programmer does not provide a handler for a given exception, a built-in system exception handler will usually be called resulting in abortion of the program run and some kind of error indication being returned to the user. Examples of exception handler mechanisms are Unix's signal calls and Lisp's catch and throw.
- fendalton tractor — a four-wheel drive recreational vehicle
- first-aid classes — classes which teach people how to give immediate medical help in an emergency
- flagrante delicto — Law. in the very act of committing the offense.
- floating dry dock — a dock that floats and can be lowered in the water for the entrance of a ship, and then raised for use as a dry dock
- fluid lubrication — lubrication in which bearing surfaces are separated by an oil film sustained by the motion of the parts
- fractal dimension — (mathematics) A common type of fractal dimension is the Hausdorff-Besicovich Dimension, but there are several different ways of computing fractal dimension. Fractal dimension can be calculated by taking the limit of the quotient of the log change in object size and the log change in measurement scale, as the measurement scale approaches zero. The differences come in what is exactly meant by "object size" and what is meant by "measurement scale" and how to get an average number out of many different parts of a geometrical object. Fractal dimensions quantify the static *geometry* of an object. For example, consider a straight line. Now blow up the line by a factor of two. The line is now twice as long as before. Log 2 / Log 2 = 1, corresponding to dimension 1. Consider a square. Now blow up the square by a factor of two. The square is now 4 times as large as before (i.e. 4 original squares can be placed on the original square). Log 4 / log 2 = 2, corresponding to dimension 2 for the square. Consider a snowflake curve formed by repeatedly replacing ___ with _/\_, where each of the 4 new lines is 1/3 the length of the old line. Blowing up the snowflake curve by a factor of 3 results in a snowflake curve 4 times as large (one of the old snowflake curves can be placed on each of the 4 segments _/\_). Log 4 / log 3 = 1.261... Since the dimension 1.261 is larger than the dimension 1 of the lines making up the curve, the snowflake curve is a fractal. [sci.fractals FAQ].
- full load current — A full load current is the largest current that a motor or other device is designed to carry under particular conditions.
- good-time charlie — an affable, sociable, pleasure-loving man.
- grand climacteric — Physiology. a period of decrease of reproductive capacity in men and women, culminating, in women, in the menopause.
- grandfather clock — a pendulum floor clock having a case as tall as or taller than a person; tall-case clock; long-case clock.
- grandmother clock — a pendulum clock similar to a grandfather's clock but shorter.
- greater celandine — celandine (def 1).
- greenland current — the ocean current flowing clockwise around S Greenland.
- grey-faced petrel — a dark-coloured New Zealand petrel, Pterodroma macroptera gouldi
- henry cabot lodge — Henry Cabot, 1850–1924, U.S. public servant and author: senator 1893–1924.
- heterochlamydeous — (of a plant) having a perianth consisting of distinct sepals and petals
- historical method — the process of establishing general facts and principles through attention to chronology and to the evolution or historical course of what is being studied.