A grammar discussion : omitting "that"

[allen_zhang]

Hi All,
I raised a discussion about omitting "that" before. I am going to discuss it again as I found some useful information.
For example:

"I believe you are right."
vs.
"I believe that you are right."

"There’s a possibility he might say yes."
vs.
"There’s a possibility that he might say yes."

Today, I found a very informative website which explains this issue.
http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/educat ... %9D?page=1

In fact, it is a very complicated issue.
The suggestion for native speaker is to go by ear.
The suggestion for non-native speaker is to keep it unless you are sure that omitting "that" sounds better.

[youngsherlock]

Hi,
I want to add something. Let's take a look at this:

That that is that that that that is that.

I saw this monster sentence long ago when taking sentence diagramming course at a university in The US. One student came up writting this "artful piece", that was exactly what he valued his sentence, on the board and had others try to do antomy of his puzzle.

Nobody could unearth this "what-the-hell-is-that" sentence.

I learned later that "That" could function (parts of speech) as pronoun, adjective, adverb, relative pronoun, and conjunction.

That was the most fundamentally important day of my life in overdosing the language. After that, I went crazy anatomying every complex sentence and famous people's quotations.

Sentence Diagramming really helps me read and write at a speed of A Porche.

And, now I also have something to substract.

Diagramming sentence doesn't work for everyone, particularly for those who don't like Math. And, pls be careful 'cause u can get easily obsessed with the anatomy like I used to be.

I gonna take the test on June 7, and this is my first time.
I need Band 8. ^ ^
Anyone interested in adding me in : Skype youngsherlockschool

[Johnson zhang]

youngshelock

very interesting post. I guess a lot of writers would have been in a similar stage at some point in their life.

[allen_zhang]

What the hell is that that that is that that that that is that.

Good luck with your test!