2

I often read in scientific papers a sentence of the form "X lies on the basis of Y." or "X lies at the basis of Y." to indicate that Y is caused by X in some fundamental way. Are both forms valid and common? (Maybe both are poor English?)

Improve this question
1
  • Take care that know whether "basis" is used as a term of art within some specific scientific field. If it is, then a simple linguistic analysis of its use isn't adequate. See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basis_(linear_algebra) for example. Since you didn't give much context (what field of science? what is X and what is Y?) it's hard to say what is correct. The Google N-Gram viewer doesn't differentiate contexts.
    – Canis Lupus
    Mar 24, 2013 at 18:22

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
3

The phrase "X lies at the basis of Y", while arguably clumsy, is used reasonably often in English. On the other hand, I do not believe that "X lies on the basis of Y" is something a native English speaker would say. Consider the following Google Ngram :

Ngram for at/on the basis of

Improve this answer
1
  • Thanks for showing the Ngram tool. That is really convincing.
    – Toon Verstraelen
    Feb 3, 2012 at 9:33
6

Both are clumsy. Simply "X is the basis of Y" would be better, so for example "The rule of law is the basis of our freedom".

Improve this answer
0

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.