English Language Learners Asked by user118555 on October 1, 2021
Sentence: Scientists have predicted that a large earthquake will hit western Japan before the end of the decade.
The word "decade" has the meaning of "a period of ten years", so does the sentence mean that in less than 10 years there might be an earthquake? My teacher interpreted this way, but I don’t think so. When we use the word decade in these kind of cases, doesn’t it mean like the year 2000, 2010, 2020, 2030, and so on? Say we are in 2017, and what the sentence is saying that before 2020, there might be an earthquake. Which interpretation is correct?
The expression can be taken either way, but because the expression is "the end of the decade" I would normally assume it is the current 10-year period ending in December 2010, 2020, 2030 etc. Some people take decades from 2010-2019 etc instead of 2011-2020 etc, so the exact end of a decade can be ambiguous. "The end of another decade" would be more likely to mean within 10 years from the speech. "The end of a decade from now" is unambiguous, and means 10 years from now.
Answered by Peter on October 1, 2021
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