18-letter words containing t, h, e, m
- chromatic semitone — the pitch difference between one note and its sharpened or flattened equivalent
- chromolithographer — One engaged in chromolithography.
- combustion chamber — an enclosed space in which combustion takes place, such as the space above the piston in the cylinder head of an internal-combustion engine or the chambers in a gas turbine or rocket engine in which fuel and oxidant burn
- come back to earth — to return to reality from a fantasy or daydream
- come down the pike — When something comes down the pike, it happens or occurs.
- come home to roost — If bad or wrong things that someone has done in the past have come home to roost, or if their chickens have come home to roost, they are now experiencing the unpleasant effects of these actions.
- come into the open — to become evident or public
- come the raw prawn — to attempt deception
- come to grips with — If you come to grips with a problem, you consider it seriously, and start taking action to deal with it.
- come to light with — to find or produce
- come to terms with — If you come to terms with something difficult or unpleasant, you learn to accept and deal with it.
- commercial attache — an attaché in an embassy or legation representing the commercial interests of his or her country.
- commodity exchange — an exchange where commodities are traded
- commonwealth games — an event held every four years in which sportspeople from the countries of the Commonwealth compete
- comparative method — a body of procedures and criteria used by linguists to determine whether and how two or more languages are related and to reconstruct forms of their hypothetical parent language.
- computer telephony — Computer Telephone Integration
- cot death syndrome — the unexplained sudden death of an infant during sleep
- crystal microphone — a microphone that uses a piezoelectric crystal to convert sound energy into electrical energy
- deanthropomorphism — the ridding of philosophy or religion of anthropomorphic beliefs and doctrines.
- 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).
- dermot macmurrough — ?1110–71, king of Leinster, who, by enlisting the support of the English to win back his kingdom, was responsible for the English conquest of Ireland
- destruct mechanism — a mechanism that causes the destruction of a rocket or missile when activated
- determinate growth — growth of a plant stem that is terminated early by the formation of a bud
- diatomaceous earth — an unconsolidated form of diatomite
- 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.
- dimethyl sulfoxide — DMSO.
- dimethylsulphoxide — a colourless odourless liquid substance used as a solvent and in medicine as an agent to improve the penetration of drugs applied to the skin. Formula: (CH3)2SO
- dimethyltryptamine — a hallucinogenic drug, C 12 H 16 N 2 , with an action of short duration. Abbreviation: DMT.
- diplomatic shuttle — a series of diplomatic visits to other states made by an official, such as an ambassador or envoy
- disenfranchisement — to disfranchise.
- disodium phosphate — sodium phosphate (def 2).
- 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
- double achievement — a representation of the arms of a husband beside those of his wife such that a difference of rank between them is shown.
- drug on the market — Pharmacology. a chemical substance used in the treatment, cure, prevention, or diagnosis of disease or used to otherwise enhance physical or mental well-being.
- dysthymic disorder — a psychiatric disorder characterized by generalized depression that lasts for at least a year
- eastern hemisphere — the eastern part of the terrestrial globe, including Asia, Africa, Australia, and Europe.
- eighty-column mind — (abuse) The sort said to be possessed by persons for whom the transition from punched card to paper tape was traumatic (nobody has dared tell them about disks yet). It is said that these people, including (according to an old joke) the founder of IBM, will be buried "face down, 9-edge first" (the 9-edge being the bottom of the card). This directive is inscribed on IBM's 1402 and 1622 card readers and is referenced in a famous bit of doggerel called "The Last Bug", the climactic lines of which are as follows: He died at the console Of hunger and thirst. Next day he was buried, Face down, 9-edge first. The eighty-column mind is thought by most hackers to dominate IBM's customer base and its thinking. See fear and loathing, card walloper.
- elementary teacher — a teacher in an elementary school
- emmenthal (cheese) — a hard, pale-yellow Swiss cheese with a mild flavor and large holes
- establishmentarian — Adhering to, advocating, or relating to the principle of an established church.
- ethical investment — an investment in a company whose activities or products are not considered by the investor to be unethical
- ethnomethodologist — A person engaged in ethnomethodology.
- ethnomusicological — Relating to or pertaining to ethnomusicology.
- euclid's algorithm — (algorithm) (Or "Euclidean Algorithm") An algorithm for finding the greatest common divisor (GCD) of two numbers. It relies on the identity gcd(a, b) = gcd(a-b, b) To find the GCD of two numbers by this algorithm, repeatedly replace the larger by subtracting the smaller from it until the two numbers are equal. E.g. 132, 168 -> 132, 36 -> 96, 36 -> 60, 36 -> 24, 36 -> 24, 12 -> 12, 12 so the GCD of 132 and 168 is 12. This algorithm requires only subtraction and comparison operations but can take a number of steps proportional to the difference between the initial numbers (e.g. gcd(1, 1001) will take 1000 steps).
- executive chairman — the most senior internal position within a company, combining the duties of chairman and chief executive
- family-tree theory — a theory that describes language change in terms of genetically related languages developing in successive splits from a common parent language, such as Indo-European, as depicted by a family tree diagram.
- farm the long acre — to graze cows on the verge of a road
- farmer in the dell — a game, accompanied by a song with several verses, in which one person, designated as the farmer, occupies the center of a circle of persons and is joined in the circle by other players designated as wife, child, nurse, cat, rat, and cheese, these then leaving the circle in order except for the one designated as cheese, who is left standing alone in the circle at the end.
- feldenkrais method — a system of gentle movements that promote flexibility, coordination, and self-awareness