What's the difference between rather and whether?

Rather


Definition:

  • (a.) Prior; earlier; former.
  • (a.) Earlier; sooner; before.
  • (a.) More readily or willingly; preferably.
  • (a.) On the other hand; to the contrary of what was said or suggested; instead.
  • (a.) Of two alternatives conceived of, this by preference to, or as more likely than, the other; somewhat.
  • (a.) More properly; more correctly speaking.
  • (a.) In some degree; somewhat; as, the day is rather warm; the house is rather damp.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) For some time now, public opinion polls have revealed Americans' strong preference to live in comparatively small cities, towns, and rural areas rather than in large cities.
  • (2) They’re no crack force either; many are rather portly!
  • (3) It has recently been suggested that procaine penicillin existed in solution in vitro and in vivo as a "procaine - penicillin" complex rather than as dissociated ions.
  • (4) Recent data collected by the Games Outcomes Project and shared on the website Gamasutra backs up the view that crunch compounds these problems rather than solving them.
  • (5) The Cole-Moore effect, which was found here only under a specific set of conditions, thus may be a special case rather than the general property of the membrane.
  • (6) The pancreatic changes are unlikely to be an artefact, but rather a direct toxic effect of the alcohol as confirmed by the biochemical changes.
  • (7) Reactive metabolites which suppress splenic humoral immune responses are thought to be generated within the spleen rather than in distant tissues.
  • (8) These results indicate that HBV markers in cord blood are either false-positive or due to contamination by maternal blood rather than an indication of in utero infection.
  • (9) As a group, the three mammalian proteins resemble bovine serum conglutinin and behave as lectins with rather broad sugar specificities directed at certain non-reducing terminal N-acetylglucosamine, mannose, glucose and fucose residues, but with subtle differences in fine specificities.
  • (10) Several interpretations of the results are examined including the possibility that the effects of Valium use were short-lived rather than long-term and that Valium may have been taken in anticipation of anxiety rather than after its occurrence.
  • (11) Women seldom occupy higher positions in a [criminal] organisation, and are rather used for menial, but often dangerous tasks ,” it notes.
  • (12) It is time to start over with an approach to promoting wellbeing in foreign countries that is empirical rather than ideological.
  • (13) In one of the cirrhotic patients, postmortem correlation of sonographic, angiographic, and pathological findings showed that the dilated vessels seen on sonography were cystic veins draining normally into the portal vein rather than portosystemic anastomoses.
  • (14) Communicating sustainability is a subtle attempt at doing good Read more And yet, in environmental terms it is infinitely preferable to prevent waste altogether, rather than recycle it.
  • (15) Current recommendations regarding contraception in patients with diabetes are not appropriate for the adolescent population and therefore tend to support this phenomenon rather than relieve it.
  • (16) Hence the major role of the 14-A arm of carboxybiotin is not to permit a large carboxyl migration but, rather to permit carboxybiotin to traverse the gap which occurs at the interface of three subunits and to insinuate itself between the CoA and keto acid sites.
  • (17) These later results suggest that dopamine agonists increase sensorimotor reactivity measured with acoustic startle by acting on sensory rather than motor parts of the reflex arc.
  • (18) This was due to the fact that stale bread was fed ad lib, rather than concentrates.
  • (19) Rather, academics need to involve themselves in managerial roles.
  • (20) Decreased synthesis rather than increased utilization accounted for the nucleoside effect.

Whether


Definition:

  • (pron.) Which (of two); which one (of two); -- used interrogatively and relatively.
  • (conj.) In case; if; -- used to introduce the first or two or more alternative clauses, the other or others being connected by or, or by or whether. When the second of two alternatives is the simple negative of the first it is sometimes only indicated by the particle not or no after the correlative, and sometimes it is omitted entirely as being distinctly implied in the whether of the first.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Here we have asked whether protection from blood-borne antigens afforded by the blood-brain barrier is related to the lack of MHC expression.
  • (2) This study was undertaken to determine whether the survival of Hispanic patients with squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck was different from that of Anglo-American patients.
  • (3) We determined whether serological investigations can assist to distinguish between chronic idiopathic autoimmune thrombocytopenia (cAITP) and immune-mediated thrombocytopenia in patients at risk to develop systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE); 82 patients were seen in this institution for the evaluation of immune thrombocytopenia.
  • (4) Whether hen's egg yolk can be used as a sperm motility stimulant in the treatment of such conditions as asthenospermia and oligospermia is subjected for further study.
  • (5) The present study examined whether the lack of chronic hemodynamic effects of ANP in control rats was due to changes in vascular reactivity to the peptide.
  • (6) Because many wnt genes are also expressed in the lung, we have examined whether the wnt family member wnt-2 (irp) plays a role in lung development.
  • (7) A remarkable deterioration of prognosis with increasing age rises the question whether treatment with cytotoxic drugs should be tried in patients more than 60 years old.
  • (8) We investigated whether these peptides also affect the sleep EEG in humans when given intravenously by comparing polysomnographically the effects of four boluses of (1) placebo, (2) 50 micrograms GHRH or (3) 50 micrograms SRIF administered at 22.00, 23.00, 24.00 and 1.00 h to 7 male controls.
  • (9) In experiments performed to determine whether PtdIns(4,5)P2 hydrolysis induced by TRH may have been caused by the elevation of [Ca2+]i, the following results were obtained: the effect of TRH to decrease the level of PtdIns(4,5)P2 was not reproduced by the calcium ionophore A23187 or by membrane depolarization with 50 mM K+; the calcium antagonist TMB-8 did not inhibit the TRH-induced decrease in PtdIns(4,5)P2; and, most importantly, inhibition by EGTA of the elevation of [Ca2+]i did not inhibit the TRH-induced decrease in PtdIns(4,5)P2.
  • (10) To determine whether or not the glycan moieties in hTPO play a role in the disease-associated epitopes in Hashimoto's thyroiditis, radiolabeled recombinant hTPO was immunoprecipitated after digestion with N-glycanase.
  • (11) Many problems at the macroscopic level require clarification of how an animal uses a compartment of suite of muscles and whether morphological differences reflect functional ones.
  • (12) Friend erythroleukemia cells were induced to differentiate by dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) and hexamethylene-bis-acetamide (HBMA) in order to investigate whether their lipid characteristics, common to other systems of transformed cells, revert to a normal differentiation pattern.
  • (13) When you have been out for a month you need to prepare properly before you come back.” Pellegrini will make his own assessment of Kompany’s fitness before deciding whether to play him in the Bournemouth game, which he is careful to stress may not be the foregone conclusion the league table might suggest.
  • (14) The Hamilton-Wentworth regional health department was asked by one of its municipalities to determine whether the present water supply and sewage disposal methods used in a community without piped water and regional sewage disposal posed a threat to the health of its residents.
  • (15) We investigated the incidence of skin cancer among patients who received high doses of PUVA to see whether such incidence increased.
  • (16) There is, however, conflicting evidence as to whether squamous cell NPCs are also EBV-associated.
  • (17) One of the most interesting aspects of the shadow cabinet elections, not always readily interpreted because of the bizarre process of alliances of convenience, is whether his colleagues are ready to forgive and forget his long years as Brown's representative on earth.
  • (18) The authors describe the special medical expertise of the psychiatrist and define 11 indicators, such as a patient's need for new psychotropic medication or the presence of symptoms requiring medical or laboratory procedures, that can be used to determine whether psychiatric expertise is needed.
  • (19) It was not clear whether Mn2+ acted at the presynaptic membrane, the postsynaptic membrane or both.
  • (20) Thus it is unclear how a language learner determines whether German even has a regular plural, and if so what form it takes.