Glossary entry (derived from question below)
French term or phrase:
aux deux tiers
English translation:
to two-thirds
French term
Australia
aux deux tiers
Examples:
- "Lorsque le liquide s'est évaporé *aux deux tiers*, ajouter les tomates."
- "Mettre le jus de pomme dans une casserole, le faire réduire *aux deux tiers*."
Logic tells me this means to reduce "by a third" ("to two thirds" of the original quantity), and that if they meant "reduce by two thirds" they'd say "de deux tiers".
But then I read headlines like "Montréal déneigé aux deux tiers", where this mean "les deux tiers de son territoire sont déneigés" (http://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/regional/montreal/201301/0... and I start to doubt my grasp of fractions (not a strong point).
I feel like this issue has been discussed before on Kudoz, but couldn't locate anything.
Thanks for any confirmation/clarification.
| 5 +10 | to two-thirds |
Tony M
|
Apr 2, 2013 10:30: Sheila Wilson changed "Level" from "PRO" to "Non-PRO"
Apr 3, 2013 10:14: Tony M Created KOG entry
Non-PRO (3): Tony M, Nikki Scott-Despaigne, Sheila Wilson
When entering new questions, KudoZ askers are given an opportunity* to classify the difficulty of their questions as 'easy' or 'pro'. If you feel a question marked 'easy' should actually be marked 'pro', and if you have earned more than 20 KudoZ points, you can click the "Vote PRO" button to recommend that change.
How to tell the difference between "easy" and "pro" questions:
An easy question is one that any bilingual person would be able to answer correctly. (Or in the case of monolingual questions, an easy question is one that any native speaker of the language would be able to answer correctly.)
A pro question is anything else... in other words, any question that requires knowledge or skills that are specialized (even slightly).
Another way to think of the difficulty levels is this: an easy question is one that deals with everyday conversation. A pro question is anything else.
When deciding between easy and pro, err on the side of pro. Most questions will be pro.
* Note: non-member askers are not given the option of entering 'pro' questions; the only way for their questions to be classified as 'pro' is for a ProZ.com member or members to re-classify it.
Proposed translations
to two-thirds
--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 8 mins (2013-04-02 10:10:21 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------
Although we do often see 'reduce by a third' in recipes, you do also find 'reduce to two-thirds (of its original volume)'
And there is no inconsistency there with 'two thirds of it has been cleared of snow' — it's just because the differing verbs invite a different interpretation of their qualifier.
--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 1 hr (2013-04-02 11:07:31 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------
I'm copying here the explanation kindly given by Writeaway in a peer comment, in order to give it greater visibility:
"réduit à is 'reduced to' and réduit de is 'reduced by'."
Thanks again!
| Thanks Tony, I suspected I was overthinking this one. |
Something went wrong...