Running smelt is also going to be a confusion for new English speakers. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
I'll bet you can find spelt in use at your local hippie organic food stop. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spelt
"Clairvoyance" is a general term that refers to any ability a person has that allows him to know something that he has no way to know. It refers to supernatural phenomena. Precognition is more specific. It refers to an ability to know what will happen in the future. Both kinds of abilities are fictitious.
Maybe we are in a parallel universe, clicked on an ad for CuriosityStream and was watching an episode on that. Unfortunately, for now, could only watch the preview. I am very familiar with the two words and use them both often, have heard them used numerous times. Could be something that goes unnoticed.
This is the English language, though, and such confusion is ignored when context more often than not enables understanding: I felt the felt and felt it to be the right felt. I spelt spelt correctly but the spelt refused to spell spelt at all, possibly because it was deaf. Or dead. Or just wheat. Of course, you can deliberately make nonsense out of such "confusing" words: If we put our pigs in a pen, can we still write with it? If we board the plane, can we still use it to make the wood smooth? Etc.
Some people write that way, but these spellings are not yet in the dictionary. As an editor, I would put the space back in.
The first use of the German word Doppelgänger was in a novel written in 1796 by the German writer Johann Paul Friedrich Richter, better known by his shorter French nickname Jean Paul. Its original meaning was simply a person who looks exactly (or almost exactly) like someone else. Over the centuries the word has been appropriated by believers in the paranormal--or simply people who enjoy stories about the paranormal. As a result, it is often used to imply something fantastic. However, the original meaning is still in use, and in fact it's the first meaning in the dictionary. A Doppelgänger firm, then is simply a company that was formed to be a copy of an existing company, usually for nefarious purposes such as fooling customers into doing business with the wrong company--and probably losing their money. I suppose that "phantom company" would be as good a definition as any. And of course most American writers have abandoned the German spelling, doing away with the capital D (all German nouns are capitalized) and the umlaut, so you will usually see it written simply "doppelganger." However, my spell checker insists that this is incorrect. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
I remember this from my school Latin class! Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! The idiom "to take with a grain (or pinch) of salt" comes from someone (Pliny, probably - if in doubt, always say it's from Pliny!) who described an antidote to poison, which included a "grain of salt", the idea being that the salt made the swallowing of the antidote easier. The modern idiom means that the truth of a claim can be accepted with a bit of skepticism, i.e. not literally. The "salt" is the skepticism.
In German, the word still lacks any paranormal meaning. It just means a person who looks very much like another one, so that they are impossible or at least very hard to tell apart. I've been surprised when I met that word in Englisch. Didn't expect that to be borrowed Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Foist upon = to force an individual or group to accept something they would rather not have by applying pressure. The thing could be a concept, "Extended opening hours for pubs", or a person, "an unwelcome relative". Cows are said to be sacred in Hinduism (I believe this may not be strictly true, but many non-Hindus believe it to be true). In business or politics a sacred cow is some principle that cannot be touched, or significantly amended. So, no sacred cows means that in a business or political decision any proposals are open for consideration. I have never heard of swoon theory.
