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18-letter words containing m, e, n, s

  • conceptual realism — the doctrine that universals have real and independent existence.
  • considered harmful — (programming, humour)   A type of phrase based on the title of Edsger W. Dijkstra's famous note in the March 1968 Communications of the ACM, "Goto Statement Considered Harmful", which fired the first salvo in the structured programming wars. Amusingly, the ACM considered the resulting acrimony sufficiently harmful that it will (by policy) no longer print articles taking so assertive a position against a coding practice. In the ensuing decades, a large number of both serious papers and parodies bore titles of the form "X considered Y". The structured-programming wars eventually blew over with the realisation that both sides were wrong, but use of such titles has remained as a persistent minor in-joke.
  • consolato del mare — a code of maritime law compiled in the Middle Ages: it drew upon ancient law and has influenced modern law.
  • consumer terrorism — the practice of introducing dangerous substances to foodstuffs or other consumer products, esp to extort money from the manufacturers
  • contact dermatitis — dermatitis caused by direct contact with an irritating substance, as an allergen or chemical
  • continental system — French system.
  • costume department — the department in a theatre or television company that is responsible for actors' costumes
  • cot death syndrome — the unexplained sudden death of an infant during sleep
  • counterculturalism — The counterculture movement or lifestyle.
  • creeping featurism — (jargon)   /kree'ping fee'chr-izm/ (Or "feature creep") A systematic tendency to load more chrome and features onto systems at the expense of whatever elegance they may have possessed when originally designed. "The main problem with BSD Unix has always been creeping featurism." More generally, creeping featurism is the tendency for anything to become more complicated because people keep saying "Gee, it would be even better if it had this feature too". The result is usually a patchwork because it grew one ad-hoc step at a time, rather than being planned. Planning is a lot of work, but it's easy to add just one extra little feature to help someone, and then another, and another, .... When creeping featurism gets out of hand, it's like a cancer. Usually this term is used to describe computer programs, but it could also be said of the federal government, the IRS 1040 form, and new cars. A similar phenomenon sometimes afflicts conscious redesigns; see second-system effect. See also creeping elegance.
  • crystal microphone — a microphone that uses a piezoelectric crystal to convert sound energy into electrical energy
  • cumulative scoring — a method of scoring in which the score of a partnership is taken as the sum of their scores on all hands played.
  • cushing's syndrome — a medical condition characterized by obesity, hypertension, excessive hair growth, etc., caused by an overactive adrenal gland or large doses of corticosteroids
  • customer relations — Customer relations are the relationships that a business has with its customers and the way in which it treats them.
  • customs and excise — Customs and Excise is a British government department which is responsible for collecting taxes on imported and exported goods. Compare Customs Service.
  • customs inspection — an inspection carried out by a customs department
  • daytime television — television broadcasts that are shown during the daytime rather than in the evening
  • dead man's fingers — a soft coral, Alcyonium digitatum, with long finger-like polyps
  • dead-man's fingers — any of various fungi, sponges, plant roots, animal parts, etc., having fingerlike projections and a pale or dull color, as the gray-black woodland fungus Xylaria polymorpha or the whitish spongy gills of a food crab.
  • deanthropomorphism — the ridding of philosophy or religion of anthropomorphic beliefs and doctrines.
  • deep-sea fisherman — a person who takes part in deep-sea fishing
  • defensive medicine — the practice by a doctor of ordering extensive, often unnecessary tests in order to minimize liability if accused of negligence
  • delmarva peninsula — a peninsula of the northeast US, between Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic
  • demand liabilities — the assets of a financial institution that are demandable by depositors
  • demorgan's theorem — (logic)   A logical theorem which states that the complement of a conjunction is the disjunction of the complements or vice versa. In symbols: not (x and y) = (not x) or (not y) not (x or y) = (not x) and (not y) E.g. if it is not the case that I am tall and thin then I am either short or fat (or both). The theorem can be extended to combinations of more than two terms in the obvious way. The same laws also apply to sets, replacing logical complement with set complement, conjunction ("and") with set intersection, and disjunction ("or") with set union. A (C) programmer might use this to re-write if (!foo && !bar) ... as if (!(foo || bar)) ... thus saving one operator application (though an optimising compiler should do the same, leaving the programmer free to use whichever form seemed clearest).
  • departmental store — a department store.
  • destruct mechanism — a mechanism that causes the destruction of a rocket or missile when activated
  • development system — a computer system, including hardware and software, that is specifically designed to aid in the development of software and interfaces
  • diaminofluorescein — (organic compound) A fluorescein into which two amino groups have been substituted.
  • didot point system — a Continental system of measurement for type, based on a unit of 0.0148 inches (0.3759 mm).
  • dietary supplement — a substance taken in addition to what you eat in order to promote health
  • digital humanities — (used with a singular verb) the study of literature, philosophy, etc., as facilitated by computer technology or digital media: Digital humanities uses data analysis to find patterns in large bodies of text. the set of methodologies used in such scholarship.
  • dimensionalisation — Alternative spelling of dimensionalization.
  • dimensionalization — The process of dimensionalizing.
  • disenfranchisement — to disfranchise.
  • dispatch documents — documents sent with a parcel, etc, detailing information such as contents, delivery address, etc
  • dispensing chemist — a shop where drugs and medicines are sold or given out
  • domain name server — (spelling)   Domain Name System.
  • domain name system — (networking)   (DNS) A general-purpose distributed, replicated, data query service chiefly used on Internet for translating hostnames into Internet addresses. Also, the style of hostname used on the Internet, though such a name is properly called a fully qualified domain name. DNS can be configured to use a sequence of name servers, based on the domains in the name being looked for, until a match is found. The name resolution client (e.g. Unix's gethostbyname() library function) can be configured to search for host information in the following order: first in the local hosts file, second in NIS and third in DNS. This sequencing of Naming Services is sometimes called "name service switching". Under Solaris is configured in the file /etc/nsswitch.conf. DNS can be queried interactively using the command nslookup. It is defined in STD 13, RFC 1034, RFC 1035, RFC 1591.
  • domestic appliance — a machine used for household tasks, for example, a washing machine, refrigerator, etc.
  • donor insemination — a process which involves using sperm which has been voluntarily given for use in the insemination of another person
  • duodenojejunostomy — the formation of an artificial connection between the duodenum and the jejunum.
  • dynamically scoped — dynamic scope
  • east india company — the company chartered by the English government in 1600 to carry on trade in the East Indies: dissolved in 1874.
  • eastern hemisphere — the eastern part of the terrestrial globe, including Asia, Africa, Australia, and Europe.
  • eastern meadowlark — any of several American songbirds of the genus Sturnella, of the family Icteridae, especially S. magna (eastern meadowlark) and S. neglecta (western meadowlark) having a brownish and black back and wings and a yellow breast, noted for their clear, tuneful song.
  • economic sanctions — any actions taken by one nation or group of nations to harm the economy of another nation or group, often to force a political change
  • economies of scale — Economies of scale are the financial advantages that a company gains when it produces large quantities of products.
  • eigendecomposition — (linear algebra) The factorization of a matrix into a canonical form, whereby the matrix is represented in terms of its eigenvalues and eigenvectors.
  • electroluminescent — Having the quality of electroluminescence.
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