關於Continual的意思和用法的提問

A: https://grammarist.com/usage/continual-continuous/

A: Just going to say that "continual" is not really a common word, but "continuous" is.

Continual means reoccurring frequently.

Discontinuous means something is no longer continuing uninterrupted. However, this adjective is mainly used in mathematics.

A: Yes.

A: "Continual" means that it goes on and on and on with brief interruptions. For example, "It's been raining continually for the past for days."

"Continuous" means the same thing but with no interruptions. For example, "It's been raining continuously for the past three hours. It hasn't stopped for a second."

A: Continual means start and stop, while continuous means never-ending. The roar from the crowd was continual. It occurred every time the home team scored. The continuous storm caused massive flooding. Constant and continuous are synonyms.

Continual things come and go, like arguments or rain. If your parents' continual arguing drives you crazy, just be glad they stop sometimes! With continual rain, you'll get some sunny breaks, as Ireland's forecasters like to say.

A: I think that even most native speakers do not clearly know the difference. Here is an explanation from the Oxford Dictionary of English 3rd Edition:

There is some overlap in meaning between continuous and continual, but the two words are not wholly synonymous. Both can mean roughly ‘without interruption’ ("a long and continual war"; "five years of continuous warfare"), but continuous is much more prominent in this sense and, unlike continual, can be used to refer to space as well as time, as in "the development forms a continuous line along the coast". Continual, on the other hand, typically means ‘happening frequently, with intervals between’, as in "the bus service has been disrupted by continual breakdowns". Overall, continuous occurs much more frequently than continual (almost five times more often in the Oxford English Corpus).