Numbers and Numerals
İp uçları:
•
Sayısal bilgi içeren bir sözcükten önce gelen boşluğa,
yaklaşıklık anlamına gelen, “some, by, roughly, about, virtually, almost,
approximately,” sözcüklerinden biri gelir.
- I saw about 50 students.
-
According to the generally accepted platetectonics theory, scientists
believe that Earth’s surface is broken into a number of shifting plates, which
average about 50 miles in thickness.
Structrue: number + measurement unit+ in length
- A dolphin six feet in length can move as fast
as most ships.
High: measuring a long distance
from the bottom to the top, 100 feet/30 metres high
The groups
of three digits in numerals of one thousand and higher are usually separated by
a comma, counting from the right: 4,286; 12,345; 378,925; 6,540,210.
Some
manuals of style recommend writing four-digit numerals without a comma: 1570;
2358; 5625.
In numbers
written as words in British English, the conjunction "and" is used
before tens or before ones if there are no tens, starting with hundreds:
-
one hundred
and twenty-three (123); four hundred and seven
(407);
-
three thousand five hundred and thirty-eight (3,538); seventy-three
thousand and five (73,005);
- five million three hundred thousand and fifty (5,300,050).
Note the use of more than one conjunction "and"
in large numbers in British English:
- two million six hundred and twenty-five
thousand three hundred and ten (2,625,310).
In American English, the conjunction "and" is
generally not used before tens or ones:
- one hundred twenty-three (123); four hundred
seven (407);
-
three thousand
five hundred thirty-eight (3,538); seventy-three thousand five (73,005);
-
two million six hundred twenty-five thousand three hundred ten
(2,625,310); five million three hundred thousand fifty (5,300,050).
In British
English, the conjunction "and" is also used before tens or ones in
ordinal numerals above one hundred: one
hundred and tenth (110th); three thousand and fifth (3005th).
But
"and" is not used in American ordinals: one hundred tenth (110th); three thousand fifth (3005th).
The words "digit, figure, numeral, number" may present some
difficulty. For example, you can say "the digit 3; the figure 3; the
numeral 3; the number 3", but the meanings of these word combinations are
not the same.
The
word "digit" refers to any of Arabic figures from 0 to 9. Examples:
the digit 4; the digit 7; a three-digit number; a group of three digits; use
digits to write these numbers.
The
word "figure" refers to a numerical symbol for a number and can also
refer to the numerical value of a number. Examples: the figure 4; Arabic
figures; a six-figure number; a figure of 3.5 million; round figures; write
these numbers in figures and in words. The word "figures" can also
mean "arithmetic": He is good at figures.
A
numeral is a name used for denoting a number. Numerals can be in the form of
any symbols denoting a number. In texts of general character, numerals are
usually written as figures or words. Examples: the numeral 7; the numeral
seven; ordinal numerals; Arabic numerals, Roman numerals.
The
word "number" refers to quantity or amount (in various fields of
application) and is one of the main concepts in mathematics. Examples: whole
numbers; natural numbers; prime numbers; even numbers; odd numbers; large numbers;
round numbers; negative numbers; the number 12; the number twelve; the number 165.
One
of the meanings of the word "number" is "numeral". Because
of that, the word "number" can be used in many cases where the word
"numeral" is meant, for example, you can say "cardinal
numerals" or "cardinal numbers"; "ordinal numerals" or
"ordinal numbers".
Numbers in compound adjectives before nouns:
•
With a hyphen: a
five-kilometer bicycle path; a 100-meter dash; a three-day visit; a two- hour
drive; a ten-minute break; a five-year-old child; a 5-year-old child; a
six-story building; a five-point star; a 50-dollar bill; a 60-watt light bulb;
a two-thirds majority; a three-fourths majority.
•
Two numerals next to each
other: three 2-liter bottles; three two-liter bottles; two 60-cent stamps; 15
two-page essays; five 10-page reports.
•
No hyphen: two 3L
containers; a 3m rope; a $50 bill; a 10% discount; a 10 percent discount; a ten
percent discount. (pronounced "two three-liter containers; a three-meter
rope; a fifty-dollar bill; a ten percent discount)
•
No hyphen: three months' vacation; two weeks'
pay; four days' work; ten hours' delay.
•
Examples with ordinal
numerals: first-rate equipment; a first-aid kit; a second-best option; a
second-floor apartment; the second-largest city; the third-largest company; a
third-rate product; a third-degree burn.
Number,
quantity:
- She has four dogs, five cats, and seven
canaries. She wrote 132 stories for children.
- Three hundred (and) forty students were
present at the conference.
- Belgium has a population of about eleven
million people.
- In 1990 Los Angeles had a population of
3,485,398 people.
-
She bought a pound of cheese, two pounds of beef, three loaves of bread,
a gallon of milk, and a five-ounce bar of chocolate.
-
He bought two five-gallon cans of gasoline and two quarts of motor oil
and put them in the trunk.
Distance:
- One mile is equal to 5280 feet, or 1609
meters. There are about 3.28 feet in one meter.
-
The distance from my house to the train station is about two and a half
miles. The distance from my house to the train station is about four kilometers.
-
The village where his sister lives is at a distance of thirty kilometers
from Moscow. The village where she
lives is thirty kilometers from Moscow.
- He watched them from a distance of about ten meters.
-
The gap between the plates was no more than one-third of a centimeter. The gap was no more than a
third of a centimeter.
- This race is of three miles. It is a
three-mile race.
Length, width, height, depth:
- This rope is five and a half meters long.
This rope is six yards long.
-
The Volga River is 3530 kilometers long. The Volga is the longest river
in Europe (3530 km, or 2,195 mi).
- Her table is fifty-six centimeters wide. Her
table is twenty-two inches wide.
-
That hill is
18 meters high. That hill is 59 feet high.
- She lives on the fifth floor of an old
five-story house.
-
Lake Baikal is the world's deepest lake (1640 m, or 5,380 ft). The depth
of Lake Baikal is 1640 meters. Lake Baikal is 5,380 feet deep.
Area, volume:
- The area of this room is 20 square meters.
-
The new amusement park has an area of 10 acres, which equals 4.047
hectares, or 40470 square meters.
-
Monaco, the smallest state in Europe after Vatican City, has a total area
of 1.8 square kilometers, or 0.7 square miles.
- Find the volume of the cube in liters if the
length of its side is 20 centimeters.
-
On the average, approximately 250 cubic feet (7 cubic meters) of natural
gas is needed for heating for one day an average-sized one-family house in
Canada.
- This car has engine size 1598 cm (115 hp) and
a 5-speed automatic gearbox.
Height, weight, age:
- She is 170 centimeters tall. She is 1.7 meters tall.
- She is five feet seven inches tall. She is
five feet seven. Informal: She is five foot
seven.
-
His height is almost two meters. His height is 198 centimeters. His
height is six feet six inches.
- He weighs almost ninety kilograms. He weighs
almost two hundred pounds.
-
Her weight is
sixty-five kilograms. Her weight is 143 pounds.
-
He is five
years old. He will be six in October.
- His mother is 26 years old. His mother is
twenty-six years old. His mother is 26.
Speed:
-
Her car was doing about sixty-five kilometers an hour. Her car was doing
about forty miles an hour.
-
He was driving at fifty miles an hour in a thirty-mile-an-hour zone. He
was going fifty miles per hour in a thirty-mile-per-hour zone. He was going 50
in a 30 mph zone.
-
If not posted otherwise, the speed limit in Florida is 70 mph (113 km/h)
on Interstate highways, 55 mph on all other roads, 30 mph (48 km/h) in
residential areas, and 20 mph (32 km/h) in school zones.
-
When it started to fly in 1935, the Douglas DC-3 could carry 21
passengers at 193 mph (310 km/h).
-
Light travels through a vacuum at about 300,000 kilometers per second.
The speed of light in a vacuum is
about 186,000 miles per second.
-
Cold westerly
wind at 25 mph (40 km/h) gusting to 40 mph (64 km/h) is expected tomorrow.
Temperature:
-
Normal body temperature is 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit. Normal body
temperature is 36.6 degrees Celsius.
- Zero degrees Celsius is thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit.
-
Boston has cold winters and warm summers. Average temperature in January
is about 30 degrees Fahrenheit, and average temperature in July is about 70
degrees Fahrenheit.
- The temperature dropped twenty-five degrees
within two hours.
- Simmer the sauce for 10 to 15 minutes at a
temperature of 185°F (85°C), stirring frequently.
-
Water boils at
212°F. (at two hundred twelve degrees Fahrenheit)
-
Water freezes
at 0°C. (at zero degrees Celsius)
-
The temperature outside is 18 degrees below zero. The temperature outside
is minus 18 degrees.
- It's cold outside. It is about three degrees
above zero.
- It's very hot outside. It's about thirty-five degrees.
-
My temperature
is normal. My temperature is 36.6 degrees. (thirty-six point six)
Addresses:
-
She lives at 10 Riverstone Street, Apartment 54. (pronounced "ten
Riverstone Street, Apartment fifty-four")
- Her address is 32 Lakeview Road, Apt. 3B,
Madison, Wisconsin.
-
Here is his
postal address: John Doe, 180 Green Avenue, Apt. 12, Houston, Texas 77013.
Money:
- This bag costs twenty-seven dollars and fifty
cents. This bag is $27.50.
-
I owe you
thirty dollars. You owe me nine hundred rubles. Are we even?
-
These washing machines range in price from $350 to $1,200. These washing
machines range in price from three hundred fifty to twelve hundred dollars.
-
The company invested two and a half million U.S. dollars in the project.
They invested 2.5 million U.S. dollars in the project. They invested $2.5
million in the project. (pronounced "two-
point-five million dollars")
- He was offered a nice job, with a salary of
more than a hundred thousand dollars.
Time, date, century, year:
- It's nine o'clock. It's 9:00 a.m. It's 9:00 p.m.
-
We had a
15-minute break at 11:45 after the fourth lesson.
- We left at six-thirty. We left at 6:30.
-
We will be
there in two hours. We arrived three hours later.
-
This monument was built in the sixteenth century. This monument was built
in the 16th century.
- Springfield became the capital of Illinois in 1837.
-
He wrote his
best novels in the 1990s. He wrote his best novels in the nineties.
-
She left on the eighteenth of April. She left on April eighteenth. She
left on April 18th. She left on April 18.
-
They arrived in Chicago on July 10, 2011. (pronounced "on the tenth
of July / on July tenth, two thousand eleven")
Telephone numbers:
- His telephone number is 123-4567. (pronounced
"one-two-three four-five six-seven")
- His cell phone number is (903) 234-5678.
-
Call him at
555-6677 after five o'clock.
- Could you connect me with 321-0987, extension
102, please?
Floor, room, chapter, page, size of clothes:
- The meeting will take place in Room 60 on the
sixth floor. (pronounced "room sixty")
- Are you going up? Floor 6, please.
(pronounced "floor six")
-
Chapter 3
begins on page 42. (pronounced "chapter three; page forty-two")
- The third page of her diary was torn out.
- This dictionary was published in four
volumes. I wasn't able to find volume 2.
- He wears size 50 clothes. He wears clothes in
size 50. (pronounced "size fifty")
-
She wears size
38 shoes. She wears shoes in size 38. (pronounced "size thirty-eight")
Numerals are divided into
cardinal numerals and ordinal numerals.
Cardinal
numerals:
Cardinal numerals show the number or the size of
objects.
- one, two, three, four, five, six, seven,
eight, nine, ten (1, 2, … 10);
- eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen,
seventeen, eighteen, nineteen
(11, 12,
…19);
- twenty, thirty-seven, forty-two, fifty-one,
sixty-five, seventy, eighty-three, ninety-eight;
-
one hundred eighty-six (186); two hundred (200); three hundred forty
(340); four hundred (400);
- five hundred three (503); eight hundred
twelve (812); nine hundred one (901);
- one thousand six hundred seventy-nine
(1,679); four thousand (4,000);
- fifteen thousand (15,000); sixty-three
thousand four hundred ninety-five (63,495);
-
seven hundred
eight thousand thirty-four (708,034); five million (5,000,000);
- thirteen million nine hundred sixty-seven
thousand one hundred eleven (13,967,111);
-
six billion three hundred forty-nine million twenty-five thousand six
hundred eighty-two (6,349,025,682).
In a sentence, a
numeral can serve as a subject, attribute, object, predicative complement, or
adverbial modifier.
-
I saw four men
in the car. The road is twenty miles long.
- The boy is twelve years old. He is six feet
tall. He has three brothers.
-
There are
twelve students in my group. There are nine books on the table.
- How many feet are there in a mile? – There
are 5280 feet in a mile.
- Ten students took part in the competition.
Three of them received awards.
-
Twenty cars
were sold on the first day. Five of them were sports cars.
- There are 135 employees in this company. We
talked to 45 of them.
-
How many cakes
did you buy? – I bought five. I ate two.
- How old is your grandfather? – He is 72. He
was born in 1940.
- Thirty thousand people died of that deadly disease last summer.
- Shortly after the accident, two dozen police
were sent to the spot to keep order.
- By 8:00, eleven members had arrived, after a
while a twelfth got here.
- Robert served in the army in the 1990s, when
he was in his twenties.
-
When he moved
to England with his family in the fifties, he was already in his forties.
- I have told you hundreds of times.
- When is your birthday? It is on Thursday the
eleventh of May.
- They will be more than 3 hundred teams taking
part in the contest.
- He died at the age of 82.
Numbers at the
beginning of the sentence should be written out in words. If you need to use
figures, restructure your sentence.
-
Fifty-six
workers were fired yesterday. Yesterday 56 workers were fired.
Numerals used in
the same function in a sentence are usually written either as words or as
figures.
-
He wrote one
hundred thirty essays, fifty-two stories, and seven novels.
-
He wrote 130
essays, 52 stories, and 7 novels.
Multiples of one hundred:
In less formal
speech and writing, especially in American usage, four-digit numbers that are
multiples of 100 are often named in the following way:
1100 – eleven hundred;
2300
– twenty-three hundred; 4400 –
forty-four hundred; 5600 – fifty-six hundred.
In British English, such use is more common for round
numbers between 1,100 and 1,900.
Note that
1000, 2000, 3000, etc., are pronounced as "one thousand, two thousand,
three thousand", etc.; that is, such numbers are generally not expressed
in hundreds.
Ordinal
numerals:
Ordinal
numerals show the position in a series. Any ordinal numeral except "first,
second, third" has the suffix "th". Examples: fifth, sixth,
eighth, ninth, twelfth, fifteenth, nineteenth, twentieth, twenty-fourth,
thirtieth, forty-fifth, hundredth.
-
first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, tenth
(1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th,
10th);
-
eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth, sixteenth,
seventeenth, nineteenth (11th, 12th, 13th, 14th, 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th);
-
twentieth, thirty-seventh, forty-second, fifty-first, sixty-fifth,
seventieth, eighty-third, ninety- eighth (20th, 37th, 42nd, 51st, 65th, 70th,
83rd, 98th);
- one hundred eighty-sixth (186th); three
hundred fortieth (340th); five hundred third
(503rd);
-
eight hundred
twelfth (812th);
-
one thousand
six hundred seventy-ninth (1,679th);
- nine thousand eight hundred fiftieth (9,850th);
-
two hundredth
(200th); three thousandth (3,000th);
- five millionth (5,000,000th).
Generally,
ordinal numerals are used as adjectives and stand before nouns. An ordinal
numeral is usually preceded by the definite article "the".
-
The first
story was interesting. The second was dull.
- The thousandth visitor received a prize.
-
John Kennedy
was the 35th president of the United States.
- The third part of the book is very funny.
-
He met her
during his second visit.
-
His office is
on the twenty-sixth floor.
- North Korea carries out fifth nuclear test.
An ordinal
numeral may have the meaning "another, one more", in which case it is
preceded by the indefinite article "a".
-
We sent them two letters, but they didn't answer. We are going to send
them a third letter today.
Note the following typical
constructions with ordinal and cardinal numerals:
- the second lesson – Lesson 2 (pronounced
"lesson two");
-
the fifth unit
– Unit 5 (pronounced "unit five");
- the tenth chapter – Chapter 10 (pronounced
"chapter ten").
Note the use of Roman numerals
(pronounced as ordinal numerals) with the names of kings:
- Henry V (Henry the Fifth);
- Richard III (Richard the Third).
Difficult
spellings:
Pay attention to
the differences in the spelling and pronunciation of the following cardinal and
ordinal numerals.
-
two, twelve,
twenty, twenty-two – second, twelfth, twentieth, twenty-second;
-
three,
thirteen, thirty, thirty-three – third, thirteenth, thirtieth, thirty-third;
- four, fourteen, forty, forty-four – fourth,
fourteenth, fortieth, forty-fourth;
-
five, fifteen,
fifty, fifty-five – fifth, fifteenth, fiftieth, fifty-fifth;
-
eight,
eighteen, eighty, eighty-eight – eighth, eighteenth, eightieth, eighty-eighth;
- nine, nineteen, ninety, ninety-nine – ninth,
nineteenth, ninetieth, ninety-ninth;
Note the pronunciation of "five, fifth" and "nine,
ninth": five [faiv] – fifth
[fifθ]; nine [nain] – ninth [nainθ].
Numerals
like "eighteen" have two stresses: sixteen ['siks'ti:n]; eighteen
['ei'ti:n]. Depending on the position of the numeral in the sentence, primary
stress may fall on the first or on the last syllable.
Fractions:
The
numerator of the fraction is expressed by a cardinal numeral, and the
denominator is expressed by an ordinal numeral. The suffixes "rd, th,
ths" are not written in the denominator of the fractions written in
figures (1/3; 1/5; 3/7), but such fractions are pronounced in the same way as
fractions written in words (one-third; one-fifth; three-sevenths).
Fractions
are generally hyphenated, except in those cases where the numerator or the
denominator is already hyphenated: "one-fifth" but "one
twenty-fifth".
Some
manuals of style recommend writing without a hyphen fractions in the meaning of
nouns: a half / one half; one third; two thirds; three fourths / three
quarters; four fifths.
-
1/2 – one-half
/ a half; 1/3 – one-third; 1/4 – one-fourth / a quarter;
- 1/5 – one-fifth; 1/8 – one-eighth; 1/9 –
one-ninth; 1/10 – one-tenth;
- 1/12 – one-twelfth; 1/20 – one twentieth;
1/32 – one thirty-second;
-
1/100 –
one-hundredth; 1/1000 – one-thousandth;
- 2/3 – two-thirds; 4/5 – four-fifths; 3/4 –
three-fourths / three-quarters;
-
5/8 – five-eighths; 9/10 – nine-tenths;7/36 – seven thirty-sixths; 33/100
– thirty-three hundredths;
- 65/1000 – sixty-five thousandths;
-
1 1/2 – one
and a half; 1 1/4 – one and a quarter;
-
3 2/5 – three
and two-fifths; 6 3/7 – six and three-sevenths.
- This box weighs two-thirds of a kilogram.
-
He has already
written three-quarters of his new novel.
- A cent is one hundredth part of a dollar.
-
A milliliter
is one thousandth of a liter.
The use of "half"
- Add one-half cup of sugar to the mixture.
- The park is half a mile from here.
- I had to wait for an hour and a half.
- The fence was one and a half meters high.
-
I spent three
and a half weeks there.
Decimal fractions:
546.132 can be read as
"five hundred forty-six point one-three-two".
- 0.2 ("zero-point-two"); 0.001 (zero-point-zero-zero-one);
- 1.3 ("one-point-three"); 2.5
(two-point-five); 3.6 (three-point-six);
- 6.57 ("six-point-five-seven");
8.024 (eight-point-zero-two-four);
- 17.84
("seventeen-point-eight-four"); 99.99 (ninety-nine-point-nine-nine);
- 2056.831 ("two-thousand-fifty-six-point-eight-three-one").
If the whole
before the decimal point equals zero, the zero is sometimes omitted in writing
and not pronounced: 0.5 or .5 ("zero-point-five" or
"point-five"); 0.029 or .029 ("zero-point-zero-two-nine" or
"point-zero-two-nine"). It is advisable to write the zero before the
decimal point in such cases. In British English, a zero is usually read as
"nought": 1.03 (one-point-nought-three); 5.206 (five-
point-two-nought-six); 0.5 (nought-point-five); 0.001 (nought-point-nought-nought-one).
It is
considered preferable to use decimal fractions with the words "million,
billion" instead of the numerals with several zeros.
1,500,000
– 1.5 million (pronounced
"one-point-five million"); 16,400,000 –
16.4 million (pronounced "sixteen-point-four million");
3,200,000,000 – 3.2 billion
(pronounced "three-point- two billion").
Generally,
plural nouns are used after decimal fractions in English. Pay attention to the
difference in the use of the decimal point (English).
-
One meter
equals 3.28 feet.
- The distance between these objects is 23.6 miles.
- The distance between these lines is 0.8 centimeters.
-
This container
weighs 0.53 tons.
Hundred, thousand, million:
The words "hundred, thousand, million" can be used with
"one" or "a" (if "one" is meant). But only
"one" is used before these words if they are followed by numerals in
order to express an exact number.
-
I saw about a
hundred people there.
-
One hundred
thirty-five people were present at the meeting.
- The lake is about a hundred and fifty miles
from the nearest city.
-
The lake is at
a distance of one hundred fifty-two miles from the nearest city.
- Their house is almost a hundred and ten years
old. Their house is one hundred ten years old.
- A picture is worth a thousand words.
- She wrote exactly one thousand words.
- Can they pay a million dollars?
-
The price was
one million two hundred thousand dollars. (Usually written as $1.2 million.)
The words "hundred, thousand, million" do not take the plural
ending "s" when they are preceded by numerals in order to express an
exact number. But the words "hundred, thousand, million" can take the
plural ending "s" when they are followed by "of" + noun, in
which case they have the meaning "a great number, a lot of".
-
We need three
hundred volunteers. – We saw hundreds of people there.
- They sold two thousand cars. – There are
thousands of books in her collection.
-
The company
lost six million dollars. – The new radio program attracted millions of listeners.
Certain
fractions and ordinal numbers containing the words "hundred, thousand,
million" may sound alike in some cases. Note the differences in spelling:
-
three-hundredths
(3/100) – three hundredth (300th);
-
two-thousandths
(2/1000) – two thousandth (2000th).
The context usually makes the
meaning clear.
- Five-hundredths can be reduced to one-twentieth.
-
Yesterday the
five hundredth baby was born in our new maternity hospital.
Billion and milliard:
A billion is a thousand million in American English (i.e.,
1,000,000,000), and at present the word "billion" is used in British
English in the same meaning. The word "milliard" is also used in
British English for such numbers, but such use is becoming rare. The word
"milliard" is not used in American English. In older British usage,
the word "billion" was used in the meaning "million
million". A million million is a trillion in American English.
Numerals or words?
•
In formal writing of
nontechnical character, numbers from one to one hundred (nineteen;
seventy-five), round numbers (eight hundred; four thousand), and any numbers
that can be expressed in one or two words (ninety; three million) are usually
written out in words.
•
In less formal writing,
numbers from one to ten should be written as words (two students; six days),
and figures can be used for numbers above ten (16 students; 21 days).
•
Numbers at the beginning of
the sentence should be written as words: Thirty-seven books were lost. She
bought 28 books. She bought twenty-eight books.
•
Generally, style manuals
recommend writing numerals within one and the same sentence either as figures
or as words.
Generally,
numerals are used in the following cases: numbers that can't be expressed in
one or two words, numbers above one hundred, large numbers, decimal fractions,
percentages, dimensions, sizes, dates, exact time, exact sums of money, pages
in a book, addresses, telephone numbers, flight numbers, bus numbers.
Numerals
written as digits are widely used in scientific and technical texts, reference
materials, encyclopedias, newspaper and magazine articles, as well as in
various written materials of informal style.
Numbers
are often used with units of measure, such as meters, kilometers, kilograms,
liters, miles, feet, pounds, etc. (BrE: meter, kilometer, kilogram, liter.) In
scientific texts abbreviated forms of units of measure are written without full
stops and without plural endings (m, km, kg, mi, ft, lb). In English texts of
general character, such abbreviations may be written with full stops (mi., ft.,
lb., oz.).
Abbreviations
for units of measure are used only with numerals expressed in figures. They are
pronounced as full words in speech:
1 m – one meter; 3 m – three
meters; 1 ft – one foot;
10 ft – ten feet;
60 km/h – sixty
kilometers per hour; 55 mph – fifty-five
miles per hour; a 5 L can – a
five-liter can;
a 4 lb
chicken – a
four-pound chicken; a $20 bill – a
twenty-dollar bill.
Style
manuals recommend writing such abbreviations as full words in formal writing.
For example: one meter; fifty meters; 164 feet; two thousand miles; twenty
liters; 340 grams; twelve ounces.
Ordinal
numbers that can be expressed in one or two words are usually written as words
in formal writing: the second chapter; the fifteenth day; the twenty-first
century; the thousandth visitor.
Large
numbers that are not round numbers are rarely used as ordinals in texts of
general character. If used, they are written in figures: the 276th day; the
385th anniversary.
If the year
is indicated in a date, the day of the month is not written in the form of an
ordinal number: April 3, 1985; May 14, 2012.
If the year
is not indicated, the day may be written as follows: April third, April 3rd,
April 3; May fourteenth, May 14th, May 14.
Cardinal
numerals (not ordinal numerals) are used in phrases like "Chapter 2; page
21; Apartment 13; size 46; Flight 12", which are pronounced as
"chapter two; page twenty-one; apartment thirteen; size forty-six; flight
twelve". Nouns before numerals in such phrases are used without any
article: in Chapter 2; on page 21; in Room 30; in size 46.
Percentages:
Percentages
are usually written in figures. In texts of general character: 25 percent; 10
percent ("per cent" in British English).
In
scientific and technical texts: 25%; 10%. The percentage symbol (%) is not
separated from the numeral by a space.
- 90 % of Florida Keys homes destroyed or damaged.
Mathematics:
ʎ/4=Lambda divided by the four 4/5=Four-fifths of: beşte dördü
3 x 108
= three times ten to eigth (a + b) =
in parentheses a + b x2’ = The derivative of x over 2
3
+ 4 = 7 ("three plus four is/equals seven") 10 – 6 = 4 ("ten
minus six is/equals four")
5
x 4 = 20 ("five multiplied by four is/equals twenty") 30 : 6 = 5
("thirty divided by six is/equals five")
A dolphin is six feet in length
can move as fast as most ships.
How heavy:
how much does it weigh? How heavy did you say she is? Ten times: 10 katı
One tenth
of amount: miktarın 10 da biri
- Two plus four is six. Three times three is nine.
-
About four fifths of the employees in that big advertising company are
young people. ( Four- fifths of: beşte dördü).
When calculations are said aloud,
the verb is generally used in the singular, for example,
- two plus two is four; two plus two equals
four; two plus two makes four.
The verb "to equal" in
this case is a little more formal than the verbs "to be, to make".
In the case of addition, the plural form of the verb
is also used, for example,
two and two are four; two and two equal four; two
and two make four; two plus two make four.
A singular verb is used when referring to amounts in
the following way:
- Three-fifths of a mile is a little less than
one kilometer.
-
How much
is/are 35 percent of 470? Fifteen hours of waiting is too much.
In other cases, the choice of a singular or plural verb depends on the
noun that follows the numeral. If the noun is singular or uncountable, the
singular form of the verb is used. If a plural noun stands after the numeral,
the plural form of the verb is used. Compare these examples:
-
Half of the
house is occupied by his library. Half of his books are about children.
- A third (or One-third) of the equipment was
replaced last month.
-
A third (or
One-third) of the cars were bought on credit.
-
About 60
percent of the sum was provided by a sponsor.
- About 60 percent of the students were absent
on that day.
