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22-letter words containing o, t, l, i

  • born in/out of wedlock — If a baby is born in wedlock, it is born while its parents are married. If it is born out of wedlock, it is born at a time when its parents are not married.
  • brachiocephalic artery — a major artery, arising from the arch of the aorta, that supplies blood to the right arm and the head.
  • british library method — (algorithm)   Brute force searching. According to legends circulating in the 1970s, in the British Library books are searched for by examining each book sequentially in the first shelf, then the next shelf, continuing until the book is found or the entire library has been searched. The term was referred to in a Dutch coursebook, "Inleiding In De Informatica" (Introduction to Informatics) from a course given by C.H.A. Koster and Th.A. Zoethout. This was based on a course given at the TU Berlin.
  • british national party — a far-right political party
  • bug-for-bug compatible — Same as bug-compatible, with the additional implication that much tedious effort went into ensuring that each (known) bug was replicated.
  • calculus of variations — a branch of calculus concerned with maxima and minima of definite integrals
  • cargo cult programming — (programming, humour)   A style of (incompetent) programming dominated by ritual inclusion of code or program structures that serve no real purpose. A cargo cult programmer will usually explain the extra code as a way of working around some bug encountered in the past, but usually neither the bug nor the reason the code apparently avoided the bug was ever fully understood (compare shotgun debugging, voodoo programming). The term "cargo cult" is a reference to aboriginal religions that grew up in the South Pacific after World War II. The practices of these cults centre on building elaborate mockups of aeroplanes and military style landing strips in the hope of bringing the return of the god-like aeroplanes that brought such marvelous cargo during the war. Hackish usage probably derives from Richard Feynman's characterisation of certain practices as "cargo cult science" in his book "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman" (W. W. Norton & Co, New York 1985, ISBN 0-393-01921-7).
  • cast in one's lot with — to share in the activities or fortunes of (someone else)
  • categorical imperative — (in the ethics of Kant) the unconditional moral principle that one's behaviour should accord with universalizable maxims which respect persons as ends in themselves; the obligation to do one's duty for its own sake and not in pursuit of further ends
  • cavity wall insulation — insulation injected into the space between cavity walls
  • central locking device — a small device that controls the central locking on a motor vehicle
  • chemical sympathectomy — the chemical destruction of one or more parts of the sympathetic nervous system
  • chemical-sympathectomy — sympathectomy (def 2).
  • chip off the old block — a person who resembles one of his or her parents in behaviour
  • chlorotrifluoromethane — a colorless gas, CClF 3 , used chiefly as a refrigerant, in the hardening of metals, and in pharmaceutical processing.
  • chromosomal aberration — any irregularity or abnormality of chromosome distribution, number, structure, or arrangement.
  • cirrhosis of the liver — liver disease
  • city of brotherly love — Philadelphia, Pa. (used as a nickname).
  • classical conditioning — the alteration in responding that occurs when two stimuli are regularly paired in close succession: the response originally given to the second stimulus comes to be given to the first
  • coiled tubing drilling — Coiled tubing drilling is drilling using a narrow (1.75 to 3.5in) seamless tube of high-grade steel, wound onto a reel.
  • collateral circulation — circulation of blood through a network of minor vessels that become enlarged and joined with adjacent vessels when a major vein or artery is impaired, as by obstruction.
  • collective pitch lever — a lever in a helicopter to change the angle of attack of all the rotor blades simultaneously, causing it to rise or descend
  • collective unconscious — In psychology, the collective unconscious consists of the basic ideas and images that all people are believed to share because they have inherited them.
  • color graphics adapter — (hardware, graphics)   (CGA) One of IBM's earliest hardware video display standards for use in IBM PCs. CGA can display 80*25 or 40*25 text in 16 colors, 640*200 pixels of graphics in two colors or 320*200 in four colors (IBM PC video modes 0-6). It is now obsolete.
  • combinatorial analysis — the branch of mathematics concerned with the theory of enumeration, or combinations and permutations, in order to solve problems about the possibility of constructing arrangements of objects which satisfy specified conditions
  • combinatorial topology — the branch of topology that deals with the properties of geometric figures by considering the figures as being composed of elementary geometric figures, as points or lines.
  • command line interface — (operating system)   A means of communication between a program and its user, based solely on textual input and output. Commands are input with the help of a keyboard or similar device and are interpreted and executed by the program. Results are output as text or graphics to the terminal. Command line interfaces usually provide greater flexibility than graphical user interfaces, at the cost of being harder for the novice to use. Consequently, some hackers look down on GUIs as designed For The Rest Of Them.
  • committee of the whole — (in the US) all the members of the House of Representatives, regarded as a committee
  • common external tariff — the common tariff of charges imposed by the members of a customs union on imports from non-members
  • common snapping turtle — a large aggressive North American river turtle, Chelydra serpentina, having powerful hooked jaws and a rough shell
  • communication channels — the ways in which people communicate
  • comparative literature — the comparative study of various national literatures, stressing their influence one upon another, their use of similar forms, their treatment of similar themes, etc.
  • comparative musicology — ethnomusicology.
  • comparative psychology — the study of the similarities and differences in the behaviour of different species
  • complementary medicine — the treatment, alleviation, or prevention of disease by such techniques as osteopathy, homeopathy, aromatherapy, and acupuncture, allied with attention to such factors as diet and emotional stability, which can affect a person's wellbeing
  • complete metamorphosis — physical changes in the development of certain insects that include egg, larva, pupa, and adult stages, as in beetles, moths, or bees
  • complete quadrilateral — a polygon consisting of four lines and their six points of intersection
  • compulsory liquidation — the liquidation of a business in order to settle its debts
  • computational geometry — (mathematics)   The study of algorithms for combinatorial, topological, and metric problems concerning sets of points, typically in Euclidean space. Representative areas of research include geometric search, convexity, proximity, intersection, and linear programming.
  • computational learning — grammatical inference
  • congressional district — (in the US) an electoral division of a state, entitled to send one member to the US House of Representatives
  • constitutional monarch — the sovereign in a constitutional monarchy
  • constructive dismissal — If an employee claims constructive dismissal, they begin a legal action against their employer in which they claim that they were forced to leave their job because of the behaviour of their employer.
  • contextual advertising — a form of targeted advertising used on websites or other media, such as content displayed in mobile browsers
  • continental philosophy — a general term for related philosophical traditions that originated in 20th-century continental Europe, including critical theory, deconstruction, existentialism, hermeneutics, phenomenology, and structuralism (contrasted with analytic philosophy).
  • continuous welded rail — a long, continuous rail formed by welding many short rails.
  • conversational quality — (in public speaking) a manner of utterance that resembles the spontaneity and informality of relaxed personal conversation.
  • convertible loan stock — a stock or bond that can be converted into a stated number of shares at a particular date
  • cornell list processor — (CLP) A list processing language, an extension of CORC, used for simulation.
  • cotton-wool generation — the children and teenagers of the early 21st century, viewed as having been overprotected while growing up
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