17-letter words containing s, e
- field penny-cress — the common penny-cress, Thlaspi arvense.
- field post office — a place to which mail intended for military units in the field is sent to be sorted and forwarded
- field sales force — a team of people selling a product or service in the field as opposed to over the telephone, etc
- financial adviser — A financial adviser is someone whose job it is to advise people about financial products and services.
- financial futures — futures in a stock-exchange index, currency exchange rate, or interest rate enabling banks, building societies, brokers, and speculators to hedge their involvement in these markets
- find one's tongue — to recover the ability to talk, as after shock or embarrassment
- fire commissioner — the senior or officer at state or provincial level in charge of fire prevention and fire safety
- fire extinguisher — a portable container, usually filled with special chemicals for putting out a fire.
- fire-extinguisher — a portable container, usually filled with special chemicals for putting out a fire.
- firehose syndrome — (networking, jargon) An absence, failure or inadequacy of flow control mechanisms causing the sender to overwhelm the receiver. The implication is that, like trying to drink from a firehose, the consequenses are worse than just loss of data, e.g. the receiver may crash. See ping-flood.
- first commandment — “Thou shalt have no other gods before me”: first of the Ten Commandments.
- first performance — the first time that a play or concert is performed
- first triumvirate — the political alliance of Caesar, Crassus, and Pompey, formed in 60 bc
- first-aid classes — classes which teach people how to give immediate medical help in an emergency
- first-degree burn — a burned place or area: a burn where fire had ripped through the forest.
- first-order logic — (language, logic) The language describing the truth of mathematical formulas. Formulas describe properties of terms and have a truth value. The following are atomic formulas: True False p(t1,..tn) where t1,..,tn are terms and p is a predicate. If F1, F2 and F3 are formulas and v is a variable then the following are compound formulas: The "order" of a logic specifies what entities "For all" and "Exists" may quantify over. First-order logic can only quantify over sets of atomic propositions. (E.g. For all p . p => p). Second-order logic can quantify over functions on propositions, and higher-order logic can quantify over any type of entity. The sets over which quantifiers operate are usually implicit but can be deduced from well-formedness constraints. In first-order logic quantifiers always range over ALL the elements of the domain of discourse. By contrast, second-order logic allows one to quantify over subsets.
- fish out of water — any of various cold-blooded, aquatic vertebrates, having gills, commonly fins, and typically an elongated body covered with scales.
- fishnet stockings — leg coverings for women, made from an open mesh fabric resembling netting
- fitness programme — a plan to help someone improve their health and physical condition
- five-spice powder — a mixture of spices used especially in Chinese cooking, usually including cinnamon, cloves, fennel seed, pepper, and star anise.
- flat as a pancake — without any curves or bumps
- flea in one's ear — a sharp rebuke
- flexible response — a military strategy that enables the response to an attack to be adapted to the nature and strength of the attack
- flickertail state — North Dakota (used as a nickname).
- flight instrument — any instrument used to indicate the altitude, attitude, airspeed, drift, or direction of an aircraft.
- flight supplement — an additional charge payable on the price of an air ticket
- flog a dead horse — a large, solid-hoofed, herbivorous quadruped, Equus caballus, domesticated since prehistoric times, bred in a number of varieties, and used for carrying or pulling loads, for riding, and for racing.
- floppy disk drive — disk drive
- florentine stitch — a straight stitch worked in a high and low relief pattern to form a variety of zigzag or oblique designs.
- flowers of sulfur — sublimed sulfur in the form of a fine yellow powder, used in medicine chiefly to kill parasites and fungi and to treat certain skin diseases.
- fluorescent light — a fluorescent lamp in domestic or commercial use; a fluorescent strip
- fluorescent strip — a fluorescent light in the form of a long strip
- fluvioterrestrial — (of animals) able to live in rivers and on land
- follow one's nose — the part of the face or facial region in humans and certain animals that contains the nostrils and the organs of smell and functions as the usual passageway for air in respiration: in humans it is a prominence in the center of the face formed of bone and cartilage, serving also to modify or modulate the voice.
- follow the hounds — to hunt a fox, etc. on horseback with hounds
- foolscap envelope — an envelope of dimensions suitable to hold an unfolded sheet of foolscap paper
- foot-pound-second — of or relating to the system of units in which the foot, pound, and second are the principal units of length, mass, and time. Abbreviation: fps, f.p.s.
- footmen's gallery — the rearmost section of seats in the balcony of an English theater, especially in the late 17th and early 18th centuries.
- for heaven's sake — expressing frustration
- for the most part — a portion or division of a whole that is separate or distinct; piece, fragment, fraction, or section; constituent: the rear part of the house; to glue the two parts together.
- fore-and-aft sail — any of various sails, as jib-headed sails, gaff sails, lugsails, lateen sails, spritsails, staysails, and jibs, that do not set on yards and whose normal position, when not trimmed, is in a fore-and-aft direction amidships.
- foreign relations — (used with a singular verb) the field of foreign affairs: an expert in foreign relations.
- foreign secretary — foreign minister.
- forensic evidence — evidence obtained by the use of science, for example DNA evidence, etc
- forensic medicine — the application of medical knowledge to questions of civil and criminal law, especially in court proceedings.
- forest enterprise — a British government department responsible for maintaining and expanding forests
- foundation course — A foundation course is a course that you do at some colleges and universities in order to prepare yourself for a longer or more advanced course.
- four-eyed opossum — a small opossum, Metachirops (Philander) opossum, ranging from Mexico to Brazil, having a white spot above each eye.
- four-letter words — any of a number of short words, usually of four letters, considered offensive or vulgar because of their reference to excrement or sex.
- four-star general — high-ranking military officer