I subscribe to a “phrase a day” email service from www.phrasen.com (well, actually it is Phrasen des Tages and there are three phrases per post). Mostly they are idiomatic phrases, which is why I subscribe, but sometimes I have no idea why they believe the phrase is one people might need (or want) to learn. For example, this arrived on the last day of May:
Deutsch: Die Beschaffenheit des Felsens lässt auf einen vulkanischen Ursprung schließen
Englisch: “The nature of the rock implies/suggests that it is volcanic in origin”
Lucky for me, this phrase just happens to be related to earth science and thus is useful given each Wednesday I try to concoct a post that somehow simultaneously discusses learning German and falls under the “earthquake” banner. But for other people without such a particular need, is this a phrase that would make them say, “Gosh, I sure am glad phrasen.com shared that with me!” No, probably not.
Now, I’m assuming that the point of this rather random sentence is to give you meaning for the rather complicated verb form schließen lassen auf – “to be indicative of” or “to imply.” However this feels quite different from expressions such as Probieren geht über Studieren – “The proof is in the pudding” (dict.cc also offers “Suck it and see”) or im Dreck herumwühlen – “to muckrake” – which, while they aren’t things you will be saying each and everyday, are usable “as is” by everyone, not solely geologists, vulcanologists or people whose blogs happen to mention earth science concepts in their titles. Perhaps a little more Studieren is in order at phrasen.com?
Earthquake Words/Erdbeben Wörter 