How far can a gun shot be heard from?
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SoothingDave
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"How far away can a gun shot be heard?" is how I would put it.
Phaedrus
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The problem is that people who are not deaf can hear a gunshot five hundred feet away, and they can also do so ten thousand miles away.
In other words, gunshots can be heard by non-deaf people wherever a gun is fired.
Here's how I'd paraphrase Tufguy's sentence:
How far (away) can one be from a gunshot and still hear it?
SoothingDave
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I have no idea what point you're trying to make. How can one hear something 10,000 miles away?
Phaedrus
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A gunshot can be heard (by people who can hear) 10,000 miles away from where I am right now and from wherever you are right now.
A gun can be fired most any place the world over, legally or not, and wherever one is fired, people nearby will be able to hear it.
I was trying to make two points:
1) The question "How far away can a gunshot be heard?" can be answered by any distance measurable on the earth.
2) Because of the first point, I don't think "from" should be deleted from Tufguy's sentence. We could front it, though, if you like:
From how far away can a gunshot be heard?
SoothingDave
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I think "from the gunshot" is understood.
Phaedrus
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Consider the following, grammatically parallel case:
Q: How far away can this post be read?
A: It can be read wherever the Internet can be accessed, no matter how far away that is.
Q: From how far away can this post be read?
A: It can be read from a distance of about ten feet, though this will depend on the quality of one's eyesight and the display configurations on one's computer.
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