Once again I need your help. I was answering some multiple choice exercises when I came across this sentence:

 

This ship has a ____ of fifteen people.

 

A team      B cast      C crew      D company

 

I immediately answered "C", but since I had no idea in which contexts is th word "company" used when referring to a group of people, I looked it up in the dictionary and found this definition: the people who work in a particular ship.

My question: could answer "D" be right?

 

Some months ago, one memeber of this community begged not to use the word "doubt" in "I have a doubt". Instead we should use "question". After looking up the meaning of this word in the dictionary, one f my students has written the following sentences in a composition: "Children �s education can be very complicated nowadays. Parents doubt which school they have to choose, which activities their children should do, etc. In my opinion, one of these doubts should be the matter of pocket money."

Do we use the word doubt when we only refer to two things? i feel even I use this word in a wrong way influenced by my mother tongue.

 

Thanks in advance for your help.

I found this meaning of "company" in the dictionary, but I have never seen it used that way. I would have answered C.

 

For your student �s examples, I would write, "Parents are unsure of which school they should (I wouldn �t say "have to" here) choose...". I really don �t understand the "pocket money" sentence, so I can �t suggest anything for that one. It doesn �t seem to fit the rest of the passage.

 

I hope this isn �t too confusing.

Bruce