Word: saltingly
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...Salt is back. Blamed for everything from high blood pressure to hijacking the true taste of food, this essential chemical compound is once again welcome on the table. Step into any upmarket restaurant or food shop, and you'll discover a love affair with the flavor enhancer that was once on every nutritionist's hit list...
...clearest example is ordinary politeness. When you are at a dinner party and want the salt, you don't blurt out, "Gimme the salt." Rather, you use what linguists call a whimperative, as in "Do you think you could pass the salt?" or "If you could pass the salt, that would be awesome...
Taken literally, these sentences are inane. The second is an overstatement, and the answer to the first is obvious. Fortunately, the hearer assumes that the speaker is rational and listens between the lines. Yes, your point is to request the salt, but you're doing it in such a way that first takes care to establish what linguists call "felicity conditions," or the prerequisites to making a sensible request. The underlying rationale is that the hearer not be given a command but simply be asked or advised about one of the necessary conditions for passing the salt. Your goal...
...Mekong Delta, where the river finally meets the sea, is a vast web of waterways that serves as a giant rice bowl, providing the nation with half of its total agricultural output. Yet in part because of the increasing number of dams reducing the flow of the river, salt water from the South China Sea has begun traveling up the Mekong. The influx of brackish water over the past few years has ravaged farms and fisheries. This spring in the delta's Mo Cay district, Nguyen Thi Hong and her husband watched helplessly as salt water infiltrated their fish farms...
...happened at the Wise County Fairgrounds in the mountains of southwestern Virginia, where he was interviewing health advocates and patients. Everybody said their bit except for one man-slim as a stick, with thick brown hair combed straight back from a well-worn face that was anchored by a salt-and-pepper goatee. He didn't say a word until Edwards noticed him. He reminded the candidate of men who'd worked in the mills with his father. "I'd like to hear from you," Edwards said...