Talk:Pony

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For me it was difficult to understand that "The ancestors of most modern ponies developed small stature due to living on the margins of livable horse habitat." means that (I had to read a Russian language version to understand this) these animals lived in an environment where there was too little food, hence being small helped them to survive.

Is there a certain term, idiom or grammar construct which I should know, which would make it easier to parse that sentence?

Gryllida (talk) 13:31, 6 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I have changed "due to living" into "because they lived" for a little more clarity. I'm not really an expert on English grammar, but I'd think this was a gerund. Huon (talk) 14:41, 6 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Huon, that IS clearer! Montanabw^(talk) 19:39, 6 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is not that. The problem is in the "margins of livable horse habitat" phrase not being clear enough (to me) about that it's not spatial margin (i.e. an edge) but is a margin of how much food they have. Gryllida (talk) 00:10, 7 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Well, now you understand the use of the phrase. Margin means "edge" both literally and metaphorically. This isn't Simple Wikipedia, but perhaps this article could be ported over there and simplified for beginning English users. Montanabw^(talk) 03:21, 7 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

"Living on the margins of livable horse habitat" DOES suggest the spatial sense due to the way it's phrased. I have changed it to "living on marginally livable horse habitat" which I hope others will agree is clearer. Malevan (talk) 18:58, 23 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]