20-letter words containing c, o, m, n, s, e
- precision instrument — finely-tuned device
- price discrimination — the practice of offering identical goods to different buyers at different prices, when the goods cost the same.
- prince william sound — a sound in the Gulf of Alaska, on the S coast of Alaska: S end of Trans-Alaska oil pipeline at port of Valdez.
- pseudoparenchymatous — (in certain fungi and red algae) a compact mass of tissue, made up of interwoven hyphae or filaments, that superficially resembles plant tissue.
- psychological moment — the proper or critical time for achieving a desired result: She found the right psychological moment to make her request.
- psychometric testing — the use of psychometric tests, often as a selection method
- random access memory — RAM.
- random-access memory — RAM.
- real-time processing — data-processing by a computer which receives constantly changing data, such as information relating to air-traffic control, travel booking systems, etc, and processes it sufficiently rapidly to be able to control the source of the data
- recommended standard — (standard) (RS) A series of EIA standards including EIA-232.
- request for comments — (standard) (RFC) One of a series, begun in 1969, of numbered Internet informational documents and standards widely followed by commercial software and freeware in the Internet and Unix communities. Few RFCs are standards but all Internet standards are recorded in RFCs. Perhaps the single most influential RFC has been RFC 822, the Internet electronic mail format standard. The RFCs are unusual in that they are floated by technical experts acting on their own initiative and reviewed by the Internet at large, rather than formally promulgated through an institution such as ANSI. For this reason, they remain known as RFCs even once adopted as standards. The RFC tradition of pragmatic, experience-driven, after-the-fact standard writing done by individuals or small working groups has important advantages over the more formal, committee-driven process typical of ANSI or ISO. Emblematic of some of these advantages is the existence of a flourishing tradition of "joke" RFCs; usually at least one a year is published, usually on April 1st. Well-known joke RFCs have included 527 ("ARPAWOCKY", R. Merryman, UCSD; 22 June 1973), 748 ("Telnet Randomly-Lose Option", Mark R. Crispin; 1 April 1978), and 1149 ("A Standard for the Transmission of IP Datagrams on Avian Carriers", D. Waitzman, BBN STC; 1 April 1990). The first was a Lewis Carroll pastiche; the second a parody of the TCP/IP documentation style, and the third a deadpan skewering of standards-document legalese, describing protocols for transmitting Internet data packets by carrier pigeon. The RFCs are most remarkable for how well they work - they manage to have neither the ambiguities that are usually rife in informal specifications, nor the committee-perpetrated misfeatures that often haunt formal standards, and they define a network that has grown to truly worldwide proportions. See also For Your Information, STD.
- restriction fragment — a length of DNA cut from the strand by a restriction enzyme.
- rocky mountain sheep — bighorn.
- saint john ambulance — an organization that provides first aid and first-aid training
- save someone's bacon — to help someone to escape from danger
- scientific socialism — Marxist socialism
- second law of motion — any of three laws of classical mechanics, either the law that a body remains at rest or in motion with a constant velocity unless an external force acts on the body (first law of motion) the law that the sum of the forces acting on a body is equal to the product of the mass of the body and the acceleration produced by the forces, with motion in the direction of the resultant of the forces (second law of motion) or the law that for every force acting on a body, the body exerts a force having equal magnitude and the opposite direction along the same line of action as the original force (third law of motion or law of action and reaction)
- second-degree murder — Law. the killing of another human being under conditions specifically covered in law. In the U.S., special statutory definitions include murder committed with malice aforethought, characterized by deliberation or premeditation or occurring during the commission of another serious crime, as robbery or arson (first-degree murder) and murder by intent but without deliberation or premeditation (second-degree murder)
- secure accommodation — an institution where young offenders are kept in custody
- send someone packing — to dismiss or get rid of (someone) peremptorily
- senior aircraftwoman — a rank in the Royal Air Force comparable to that of a private in the army, though not the lowest rank in the Royal Air Force
- societal development — the formation and transformation of social life, customs, institutions, etc.
- solitary confinement — the confinement of a prisoner in a cell or other place in which he or she is completely isolated from others.
- sound motion picture — a motion picture with a soundtrack.
- south american plate — a major tectonic division of the earth's crust, comprising the continent of South America and several ocean basins and bounded on the north by the Caribbean Plate, on the east by the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, on the west by a submarine trench that borders the western coast of the continent, and on the south by the Antarctic Plate.
- space-time continuum — Also called space-time continuum. the four-dimensional continuum, having three spatial coordinates and one temporal coordinate, in which all physical quantities may be located.
- specific performance — (especially in the sale of land) literal compliance with one's contractual promises pursuant to a judicial mandate.
- subpoena duces tecum — a writ directing a person to appear in court and to bring some document described in the writ.
- synoptic meteorology — a branch of meteorology analyzing data collected simultaneously over a wide region, for the purpose of weather forecasting.
- systemic circulation — the circulatory system in general.
- terms and conditions — commerce: rules, restrictions
- the gnomes of zurich — Swiss bankers and financiers
- the price of someone — what someone deserves, esp a fitting punishment
- the ten commandments — the commandments summarizing the basic obligations of man towards God and his fellow men, delivered to Moses on Mount Sinai engraved on two tables of stone (Exodus 20:1–17)
- thermodynamic system — a system whose states of equilibrium can be specified by a few macroscopic properties.
- thomas of erceldoune — Thomas of, Thomas of Erceldoune.
- to cost someone dear — If something that someone does costs them dear, they suffer a lot as a result of it.
- toxic shock syndrome — a rapidly developing, sometimes fatal infection characterized by sudden onset of fever, gastrointestinal upsets, a sunburnlike rash, and a drop in blood pressure: caused by a Staphylococcus aureus toxin and occurring especially in menstruating women using high-absorbency tampons. Abbreviation: TSS.
- trigonometric series — an infinite series involving sines and cosines of increasing integral multiples of a variable.
- ultimate constituent — an element of a construction that cannot be further divided into grammatical constituents: the morphemes of an utterance are usually considered to be its ultimate constituents.
- under the microscope — If you say that something is under the microscope, you mean that it is being studied very closely, usually because it is believed that something is wrong with it.
- watch someone's back — the rear part of the human body, extending from the neck to the lower end of the spine.
- webbing clothes moth — a small brown moth, Tineola biselliella, the larva of which feeds on woolens and spins a web when feeding.
- wilson cloud chamber — cloud chamber.
- winter olympic games — an international contest of winter sports, esp skiing, held every four years
- your marching orders — If you give someone their marching orders, you tell them that you no longer want or need them, for example as your employee or as your lover.