Does it ring the same to you?

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Believer  #287991  Tue, 31 Oct 06 11:48 PM

Hi,

How2die had this sentence in his post and I want to ask some questions on it. You can kindly give a general answer that will encompass all or answer individually.

Unfakeable demonstrations of a superiority that has as least some underlying genetic component are almost unfailingly attractive to the opposite sex.

1. Does 'a' there indicate it is a special kind of superiority and not the superiority in the general sense?

2. Would you say if one replaces with the article 'the', the original intention of the writer might get distorted?

3. Is this kind of thing normal in the world of English writing -- taking an uncountable noun with a restrictive clause following it to change its nature(?) simply by one very tiny stroke of pen which resulted in inserting/putting a one-word determiner?

  
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Clive  #288015  Wed, 01 Nov 06 01:01 AM

Hi,

Unfakeable demonstrations of a superiority that has as least some underlying genetic component are almost unfailingly attractive to the opposite sex.

1. Does 'a' there indicate it is a special kind of superiority and not the superiority in the general sense? Yes

2. Would you say if one replaces with the article 'the', the original intention of the writer might get distorted? Yes

3. Is this kind of thing normal in the world of English writing -- taking an uncountable noun with a restrictive clause following it to change its nature(?) simply by one very tiny stroke of pen which resulted in inserting/putting a one-word determiner? It's not unusual. eg 'With you, I have found a happiness that I have never known before."

Best wishes, Clive

  
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