Generate the answer for a given question. The question requires common knowledge of English. Make sure that the answer is in detail, long, consistent with the context, and requires general knowledge of English. To be less repetitive, please vary your language for each question. Give a proper explanation to answer, and if necessary, provide the definition of various terms. And conclude your answer if it's long. If you have used other resources (e.g., Merriam Webster's.) to answer the question, include citations in your answer. You don't need to paraphrase the context of your resources, but make sure that your answer is consistent and complete.

Input: Consider Input: As generally agreed and as extensively discussed in this question, 'an' should be used in place of the more common 'a' where the following word begins with a vowel sound. I have just encountered for the first time an instance of the phrasing an mule in the book Why Chemical Reactions Happen (James Keeler and Peter Wothers, Oxford University Press, 2003). (This book is not mine. I was sitting opposite a friend when the friend mentioned the unusual phrasing.) This phrasing appears to contradict the rule discussed above, since 'mule' is, as far as I am aware, pronounced /mjul/ (see Wiktionary). Here is the context. The author is using an analogy to explain a chemistry concept (the italics are not mine, but the bold emphasis is): A useful analogy here is that of an mule, which we get by crossing a horse with a donkey. To describe an mule as a horse or a donkey would be inaccurate and it certainly does not interconvert rapidly between the two! Rather we need to recognize that although an mule has parts that are reminiscent of a horse and parts that a reminiscent of a donkey, it is something altogether different. Looking for other examples online, I have managed to find one on Wikipedia's List of Siege engines. Discussing a Siege engine, the Scorpio: Similar to the ballista, but smaller. Was sometimes mounted on an mule-drawn cart. Other examples are difficult to find, but here's one from a user-posted question on Answers.com (referring, notably, to a kind of deer rather than the animal, a mule): Is an mule deer an omnivore? No. Mule deer are herbivores. ... What is going on? Is there an irregular pronunication of 'mule' of which I am not aware? Is this some strange language quirk, some archaic spelling that I am encountering for the first time?.

Output: The original printing had 'an ass' instead of 'an mule'. That error was not lost on the chemistry community. See, for instance, Krenos's 2004 review of the text in the Journal of Chemical Education: In Chapter 10, bonding in extended conjugated systems and resonance are introduced with the horse + donkey = ass analogy (it is likely the hybrid animal mule is intended instead of ass, however). It seems the editors subsequently made an error mistake.


Input: Consider Input: What's an antonym for 'virgin'? A single word would be preferable.

Output: This is OP's second question on EL&U, and the previous one refers to the fact that he's 'writing an application that deals with blind studies'. In light of that, I assume OP is effectively looking for a medical term. I'm not a doctor, but these people are, and they use the term coitally experienced. Here's an NGram showing they're not alone. In case anyone objects that (besides not being single-word) coitally experienced applies to males as well as females, I suggest post-coitarchal or perhaps my own neologism coitarchated (which I think would be well enough understood on first encounter by people working in that area). Coitarche (first experience of full intercourse) didn't really enter the lexicon until the early '80s, but it's clearly formed by association with menarche (a pubescent girl's first period), so I think that's good enough to say coitarche and derivatives relate more to the female than the male side of the experience.


Input: Consider Input: If I'm converting something from analogue to digital, I digitise it. What am I doing if I convert from digital to analogue?.


Output: You reconstruct, as in a reconstruction filter found in digital-to-analog converters: a reconstruction filter is used to construct a smooth analog signal from a digital input