Example sentences of "[adj] if not impossible [verb] " in BNC.
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| 1 | Since no outside authority — whether the employers , the journeymen or the union — ever gratified women 's skills with the respect accorded to men 's , women compositors must have found it hard if not impossible to think of themselves as skilled , or to have even a semblance of the mentality of the skilled journeyman and union member . |
| 2 | In two cases the " unlawful act " is hard if not impossible to find despite the requirement of an unlawful act . |
| 3 | The main argument is summarized by McKendrick : ‘ In a society in which the social distance between classes is too great to bridge , as say between a landed aristocracy and a landless peasantry , or in which the distance is unbridgeable , as in a caste society , then new patterns of increased expenditure on consumer goods are extremely difficult if not impossible to induce ‘ ( 1983 : 20 ) . |
| 4 | That is true , but if somebody applied for planning permission tomorrow or a or a renewal of planning permission , it would be difficult if not impossible to refuse permission for those to be committed . |
| 5 | By sticking to a small basic unit ( 100 or 120 hours of student effort ) delivered across terms ( three per year , and with the development of a summer school , potentially four ) Oxford has established a pattern of regular assessment , and regular award-making examinations boards , that depends upon an intensity of academic staff commitment that other institutions would find difficult if not impossible to implement within the current framework of practice and conditions of service . |
| 6 | Once personal information gets into such a network it will be difficult if not impossible to restrict access to it ; it could be that such an open system could be justified to the data subject as the latest desirable addition to the role of consumer in the acquisitive society — why not order one 's claret from one 's fireside by the keyboard direct from the château , with instant payment by electronic fund transfer at point of sale , debiting one 's bank account instantaneously ? |
| 7 | Large interiors such as church halls and workshops are difficult if not impossible to light to the standards which are the norm for small interiors . |
| 8 | The risk , however , is that come the day of dispute adequate proof of the business practices will be difficult if not impossible to assemble and that the default provisions of the Partnership Act ( see below ) will have to be applied to sort out the problem . |
| 9 | So flowers keep their nectar behind locks to which only a small group or even a single species has the key , which is of such a specialised design that its owner finds it difficult if not impossible to use on any other flower . |
| 10 | These have proved difficult if not impossible to pin down in any precise terms and demand for them appears to be similarly volatile … . |
| 11 | But in a cold , late spring I find it difficult if not impossible to work up a good tilth in time for mangolds . |
| 12 | In addition , apparently unrelated and contradictory theories appear to coexist in economics , and given the nature of economic data it is difficult if not impossible to distinguish between such theories using classical statistical methods . |
| 13 | Your comment that there should be ‘ a clear distinction between medicolegal intervention requested by the police and health care ’ may be an ideal but in practice it is often difficult if not impossible to distinguish clearly between the two . |
| 14 | Jung ( 1964 ) has described these hidden facets as being creatively generative , but possessed of danger in any confrontation and difficult if not impossible to harness ; for they are in effect alternative domains of power . |
| 15 | It will be difficult if not impossible to secure payment from those who frequently move to another address . |
| 16 | So here was an instance of the son of a local worthy insisting on recording his name differently from his father , making sure the charge was not described as a mangonel , and further trying to ensure that any of his father 's descendants who sought to use the arms should spell their name Magnall , a form from which it is difficult if not impossible to divine the relevance and punning nature of the heraldic charge . |