Clouds

[tomolonight]

Dear friends,

I would like to seek your advice on the following phrases:

1) There are masses and masses of clouds in the sky.
- Is that meant many groups of clouds such as cumulonimbus, sirrus, cumulus and so on?
- 'cloud' is singular. Is 'masses of cloud' more suitable. (such as food and foods have diffrerent meanings?)

2) i saw masses and masses of food are wasted.
- '...are wasted' refers to piles of food (more than one pile), is it correct?

3) There are many 'types of flowers' or 'types of flower'.
- Is there any difference in the meanings of which?

Thanks!

[Anglika]

Dear friends,

I would like to seek your advice on the following phrases:

1) There are masses and masses of clouds in the sky.
- Is that meant many groups of clouds such as cumulonimbus, sirrus, cumulus and so on? It means the sky is filled with clouds, which may be any of these types of cloud.
- 'cloud' is singular. Is 'masses of cloud' more suitable. (such as food and foods have diffrerent meanings?) No, because generally the clouds are discrete objects, unless there is a mass low cloud which has brought rain.

2) I saw masses and masses of food are was/being wasted.
- '...are wasted' refers to piles of food (more than one pile), is it correct? It means total quantity rather than a single pile.

3) There are many 'types of flowers' or 'types of flower'.
- Is there any difference in the meanings of which? The former is specific [there are different species of plants]; the latter is general [flower as term of reference].

Thanks!

.

[BobK]

:UP: ... and incidentally, it's "cirrus"; "Sirius" is a star; but I don't think there's a "sirrus". You could have masses of cloud if it was a stratus cloud, but normally - as Anglika said - people think of clouds as discreet entities (even though they're a bit fuzzy round the edges).


b

[Anglika]

:UP: ... and incidentally, it's "cirrus"; "Sirius" is a star; but I don't think there's a "sirrus". You could have masses of cloud if it was a stratus cloud, but normally - as Anglika said - people think of clouds as discreet entities (even though they're a bit fuzzy round the edges).


b

discreet or discrete entities?

[tomolonight]

.

'types of flower' is general [flower as term of reference].

question: what do you mean 'general' ? can you give me more example.

Thanks

[BobK]

discreet or discrete entities?

- I'm always getting that one wrong. I have a feeling that some dictionaries would accept either, but I try to observe the OED's spelling.

b