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EveryLingua

 ·  36 lists  ·  1287 words

The natural sciences

As far as a factual text needs them.

What holds these lists together

Not a degree course, but what really appears in an explanatory article, a set of instructions or a warning on a label — and, further on, the fields in which French specialists write for each other. The value lies less in the science than in the places where French draws its lines differently from English. Un physicien studies physics and will not examine you; a doctor is un médecin. Un milliard is a thousand million, and un billion is a thousand times more, so a French figure read with English eyes is out by a factor of a thousand. Small words, and sentences that go quietly wrong without them.

The 36 lists

B2Biology and ecologySpecies, habitat, cycle, decline — the words in every nature report and every environmental story.50 wordsB2Physics and forcesForce, pressure, friction, inertia — the words an explanation starts with instead of stopping at.50 wordsB2Chemistry and materialsSubstance, solution, alloy, corrosion — the words for what things are made of and why they fail.50 wordsB2Geography and earth scienceMountain, river, earthquake — and the map that goes with them.51 wordsB2The weather, more preciselyFrom drizzle to storm surge, with the bulletin that reports it.50 wordsC1Woodland and timberFrom the standing tree to the board — the stand, the harvest, the drying.41 wordsC1Hunting and gameThe high seat, the close season and the cull quota — populations rather than prey.40 wordsC1Watching birdsPlumage, migration, call — and what a field guide is actually telling you.38 wordsC1Maps and surveyingScale, contour, datum — the work of getting the ground onto the sheet.36 wordsC1BeekeepingColony, hive and the turn of the year, from the first flight to the harvest.41 wordsC1Geology and miningRock, bedding, fault — and how you get at the ore.59 wordsC1Waste and the circular economyFrom the bin to the secondary raw material, and what is lost along the way.34 wordsC1Water and waste waterAbstraction, treatment, discharge, and what happens when the rain comes hard.35 wordsC2GlaciologyIce that flows, and the record it keeps as it goes.31 wordsC2ForestryA forest planned across generations.26 wordsC2Amphibians and reptilesAnimals whose body heat comes from outside.24 wordsC2MycologyFungi — the third kingdom beside plant and animal.34 wordsC2Farm machineryMachines doing heavy work on soft ground.30 wordsC2EvolutionVariation, selection, inheritance — and the words that assume no purpose.40 wordsC2VolcanologyWhat gives an eruption away, and what is decided after it.33 wordsC2Landscape architectureA design that is not finished for decades.29 wordsC2Meteorology and the forecastPressure field, front, model run — and what a percentage actually tells you.55 wordsC2BiochemistryEnzyme, bond, regulation — chemistry under the obligation to stay alive.40 wordsC2EntomologySix legs, and more species than everything else put together.30 wordsC2Useful plants and their usesPlants that people have been using for thousands of years.29 wordsC2Air pollution controlWhat is in the air, how it is measured and what helps against it.30 wordsC2Wildlife managementWhere wild animals and people share the same ground.25 wordsC2SeismologyHow to measure a tremor nobody in the room felt.29 wordsC2OceanographyLayers, currents and series of measurements rather than waves and open water.42 wordsC2FalconryA form of hunting with a vocabulary of its own, centuries old.20 wordsC2Soil scienceThe top layer that nearly everything hangs on.32 wordsC2OrnithologyHow a bird is identified, counted and tracked.20 wordsC2PalaeontologyHow a bone becomes a date and a living creature.26 wordsC2Floristry and ornamental growingCut flowers go on living after the cut, but not for long.24 wordsC2FisheriesA stock nobody can count and everybody harvests.32 wordsC2The weather serviceA statement about something that has not happened yet.31 words

Spread across the levels

The category runs across the levels — it is an area, not a difficulty. If you practise it, you can also choose a level at the top of the practice page and then get only the part that sits there.

LevelWordsShare
B225120 %
C132425 %
C271255 %

Practise this category

Multiple choice and gaps, across all 36 lists and all 1287 words. Whatever you get wrong comes back tomorrow.