Without being limited by any theoretical explanation
English translation: vide infra
| 21:34 Nov 18, 2006 |
| English language (monolingual) [PRO] Law/Patents - Law: Patents, Trademarks, Copyright / test procedure | |||||||
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|  Selected response from: Richard Benham France Local time: 12:19 | ||||||
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| Discussion entries: 2 | |
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Answers
18 mins confidence: 
| without being limited by any theoretical explanation although the results may not be supported by accepted theories Explanation: chemistry is not my field so I can't be sure |
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22 mins confidence:
| without being limited by any theoretical explanation There is no specific theoretical explanation for this phenomenon Explanation: The better dissolution of asphaltenes in two polar organic solvents could not be grounded on any specific chemical theory. |
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32 mins confidence: peer agreement (net): +1
peer agreement (net): +1| without being limited by any theoretical explanation comment Explanation: IMHO this is a poor translation, clumsy writing, or someone trying to sound knowledgeable without knowing what they're doing. However, I'm far from being an expert in patent language, so this may well be related to some common form of expression in that area. Nevertheless, 'it is believed that the combination... asphaltenes' simply restates as a theory what was previously stated as an observed fact ('the combination of these two... in the composition' ). At best it is unfortunate wording, and at worst it is an attempt to dress an observation up as a hypothesis. That being said, perhaps what the author meant with 'without being limited by any theoretical explanation' is 'although there is no theoretical explanation for this (or we are not aware of any...)' -- but this is an interpretation, and perhaps a rather generous one. |
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4 hrs confidence:
| without being limited by any theoretical explanation without reference to any established theory Explanation: The broad conclusion that "the combination of two different polar organic solvents helps dissolve the asphaltness" has yet to be supported by (some) established chemical theories to make it more specific and accurate, e.g., preconditions to make it happen, expected results (say, asphaltness grade and consistency), and so on. This part of the sentence "unexpectedly resulted in better dissolution" might indicate that it was more pragmatic than theoretical-based experiment. The conclusion was then reached w/o reference to any theory, so no theoretical explanation had yet established limits (= preconditions, expectable results) to it. |
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9 hrs confidence: peer agreement (net): +3
peer agreement (net): +3| without being limited by any theoretical explanation vide infra Explanation: There is a grammatical mismatch here, of course: "it" is the subject of the main clause, and "it" can't be limited by a theoretical explanation. In fact, "it", as an anticipatory subject, IS the theoretical explanation given later. However, I think the problem everyone seems to be having here is with the meaning of "limited". I think "limited" here means "limited", in the usual legal sense. The applicant does not want to be limited by the theoretical explanation. That is to say, whoever it is does not want the scope or applicability of the patent to be restricted by the validity or otherwise of the theoretical explanation. So if the theoretical explanation turns out to be wrong, they don't want the patent to be invalidated by this. Similarly, they don't want some smartarse using the same combination of solvents, but with a different theoretical explanation of why it works to get around the patent. -------------------------------------------------- Note added at 18 hrs (2006-11-19 16:29:45 GMT) -------------------------------------------------- Hello Andrea. If you put a participial phrase at the beginning of the sentence, it modifies the subject of the sentence. So, for example, "Walking home, I was hit on the head by a coconut." This means that I was walking home when the coconut hit me. If I said "Walking home, a coconut hit me on the head", this is nonsense, because it implies the coconut was walking home. (I got this example from one of my university teachers, who used to teach schoolkids in tropical Africa--hence the reference to cocunuts!) The same goes if you put "without" in front of the phrase. So "Without limiting myself by any theoretical explanation, I postulate that..." is fine, because I am the one not being limited. Similarly, if I say, "Without being limited by anty theoretical explanation, I postulate that...", that is fine too for the same reason. If I say, however, "Without being limited by any theoretical explanation, it is believed that....", what does the phrase "Without being limited by" apply to? Logically, it can only apply to "it", which doesn't make any sense. In answer to your question, the "it" is impersonal, but it is a special type of impersonal "it", namely an anticipatory subject. The "real" subject is the clause. In English, where the subject is a clause, particularly if it is a long clause, we use the dummy subject "it" and defer the actual subject to the end. We could say, quite grammatically, "That the combination of two polar solvents helps dissolve the asphaltenes is believed", but this is a very clumsy sentence and would never be used by a native speaker of English (although the parallel construction is used A LOT in academic German!). Hope that helps. |
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