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Comment by Jugurtha | Hacker News Reader

I couldn't parse this paragraph:

>To JB Straubel, one of the brains behind Tesla Inc., TSLA -1.13%▲ that refuse holds the key to driving the electric car revolution forward—and making the vehicles affordable enough for everyone to own one.

Could someone help?

>Mr. Straubel said in his first in-depth interview about his new venture since it was formed in 2017 while still at Tesla.

Was that with Tesla's blessing?

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Are you missing that “refuse” can be a noun?

Absolutely. I'm a native French speaker, but the comma separating the ticker symbol from the company name mislead me into understanding "one of the brains behind Tesla Inc [..] that refuse", and given the common pattern in articles in which either employees, shareholders, or investors join their forces against X, I bought it hook, line, and sinker. Thank you! I completely ignored the possibility.

Refuse (noun): worthless or useless part of something.

(Prounuced 'ref-use', rhymes with 'refuge'.)

Where are you from? I'm en-gb native and refuse doesn't rhyme with refuge.

Ref-use: ref as in referee, use as in noose, or loose.

But then in en-gb we'd say "waste" or maybe "rubbish".

In en-US, refuse (verb) is pronounced reh-fuse ("I refuse to do that."), while refuse (noun) is pronounced ref-use ("This refuse must be disposed of.") The accent switches syllables.

Pretty sure they meant a "slant rhyme", the stress and first syllable of refuse (n.) and refuge are the same.

In the US we say ref as in referee, use as in news or lose, fwiw.

I'm en-us. It doesn't rhyme because they end with different consonants, but I pronounce 'refuse' exactly like 'refuge' (obviously changing the soft G sound to an S sound).

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24318964

I'm en-gb native too and it checks out here.

Ref-oos? TIL.

Much appreciated!

It was easy to guess this article was written by Tim Higgins before I even clicked the link.

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