18-letter words containing m, o, r, l
- gravitational mass — the mass of a body as measured by its gravitational attraction for other bodies.
- grease the palm of — to influence by giving money to; bribe
- grist for the mill — If you say that something is grist for the mill, you mean that it is useful for a particular purpose or helps support someone's point of view.
- hamilton's problem — Hamiltonian problem
- heimlich manoeuvre — a technique in first aid to dislodge a foreign body in a person's windpipe by applying sudden upward pressure on the upper abdomen
- histomorphological — histology.
- home of the hirsel — Baron, title of Sir Alec Douglas-Home, formerly 14th Earl of Home. 1903–95, British Conservative statesman: he renounced his earldom to become prime minister of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (1963–64); foreign secretary (1970–74)
- homeowner's policy — a form of home insurance that provides compensation for damage, loss, or injury of property, personal belongings, or persons due to fire, theft, accidents, etc.
- honourable mention — If something that you do in a competition is given an honourable mention, it receives special praise from the judges although it does not actually win a prize.
- hydroflumethiazide — A diuretic drug.
- hyper-metaphorical — a figure of speech in which a term or phrase is applied to something to which it is not literally applicable in order to suggest a resemblance, as in “A mighty fortress is our God.”. Compare mixed metaphor, simile (def 1).
- hyperaldosteronism — aldosteronism.
- hypercholesteremia — Alternative spelling of hypercholesteraemia.
- hypermodern school — a style of chess characterized by control of the centre from the flanks
- immunofluorescence — any of various techniques for detecting an antigen or antibody in a sample by coupling its specifically interactive antibody or antigen to a fluorescent compound, mixing with the sample, and observing the reaction under an ultraviolet-light microscope.
- immunopharmacology — the branch of pharmacology concerned with the immune system
- impressionableness — The quality of being impressionable.
- in complete flower — a flower without one or more of the normal parts, as carpels, sepals, petals, pistils, or stamens.
- in terrorem clause — a clause in a will stating that a beneficiary who contests the will shall lose his or her legacy.
- incommensurability — not commensurable; having no common basis, measure, or standard of comparison.
- industrial diamond — a small often synthetic diamond, valueless as a gemstone, used in cutting tools, abrasives, etc
- information island — (jargon) A body of information (i.e. electronic files) that needs to be shared but has no network connection.
- informatory double — a double intended to inform one's partner that one has a strong hand and to urge a bid regardless of the strength of his or her hand.
- instruction manual — how-to, usage guide
- interior monologue — Literature. a form of stream-of-consciousness writing that represents the inner thoughts of a character.
- involuntary muscle — muscle: contracts involuntarily
- isothermal process — a process that takes place without change in temperature.
- james-lange theory — a theory that emotions are caused by bodily sensations; for example, we are sad because we weep
- jerusalem syndrome — a delusive condition affecting some visitors to Jerusalem in which the sufferer identifies with a major figure from his or her religious background
- komsomolsk-on-amur — city in SE Russia, on the Amur River: pop. 309,000
- lactogenic hormone — prolactin.
- lagrange's theorem — the theorem that the order of each subgroup of a finite group is a factor of the order of the group.
- lambda abstraction — A term in lambda-calculus denoting a function. A lambda abstraction begins with a lower-case lambda (represented as "\" in this document), followed by a variable name (the "bound variable"), a full stop and a lambda expression (the body). The body is taken to extend as far to the right as possible so, for example an expression, \ x . \ y . x+y is read as \ x . (\ y . x+y). A nested abstraction such as this is often abbreviated to: \ x y . x + y The lambda expression (\ v . E) denotes a function which takes an argument and returns the term E with all free occurrences of v replaced by the actual argument. Application is represented by juxtaposition so (\ x . x) 42 represents the identity function applied to the constant 42. A lambda abstraction in Lisp is written as the symbol lambda, a list of zero or more variable names and a list of zero or more terms, e.g. (lambda (x y) (plus x y)) Lambda expressions in Haskell are written as a backslash, "\", one or more patterns (e.g. variable names), "->" and an expression, e.g. \ x -> x.
- lambeth conference — a convention of the bishops of the Anglican communion, held about every 10 years at Lambeth Palace to confer but not to define doctrine or to legislate on ecclesiastical matters.
- launching ceremony — a ceremony that celebrates the launch of a ship for the first time into the water
- lay down your arms — If soldiers lay down their arms, they stop fighting and give up their weapons.
- limited government — confined within limits; restricted or circumscribed: a limited space; limited resources.
- linear combination — a sum of products of each quantity times a constant: The expression aX + bY + cZ is a linear combination of X, Y, and Z, where a, b, and c are constants.
- linear programming — any of several methods for finding where a given linear function of several nonnegative variables assumes an extreme value and for determining the extreme value, the variable usually being subjected to constraints in the form of linear equalities or inequalities.
- list comprehension — (functional programming) An expression in a functional language denoting the results of some operation on (selected) elements of one or more lists. An example in Haskell: This returns all pairs of numbers (x,y) where x and y are elements of the list 1, 2, ..., 10, y <= x and their sum is less than 10. A list comprehension is simply "syntactic sugar" for a combination of applications of the functions, concat, map and filter. For instance the above example could be written: The term "list comprehension" appears in the references below. The earliest reference to the notation is in Rod Burstall and John Darlington's description of their language, NPL. David Turner subsequently adopted this notation in his languages SASL, KRC and Miranda, where he has called them "ZF expressions", set abstractions and list abstractions (in his 1985 FPCA paper [Miranda: A Non-Strict Functional Language with Polymorphic Types]).
- literae humaniores — (at Oxford University) the faculty concerned with Greek and Latin literature, ancient history, and philosophy; classics
- locked-in syndrome — a condition in which a person is conscious but unable to move any part of the body except the eyes: results from damage to the brainstem
- 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.
- lone-parent family — a family in which there is only one parent
- loosestrife family — the plant family Lythraceae, characterized by herbaceous plants, shrubs, and trees having usually opposite or whorled, simple leaves, clusters of flowers, and fruit in the form of a capsule, and including the crape myrtle, loosestrifes of the genus Lythrum, and the henna shrub.
- loschmidt's number — the number of molecules in one cubic centimeter of an ideal gas at standard temperature and pressure, equal to 2.687 × 10 19.
- lose one's marbles — If you say that someone has lost their marbles, you mean that their ideas or behaviour are very strange, as if they have become insane.
- low-start mortgage — a mortgage in which interest only is repaid for a fixed period at the outset, to make it more affordable
- lower klamath lake — See under Klamath Lakes.