Do we put a comma before except in: "In our third experiment, we did the same thing as experiment two, except we cooled A and B"

Question

In the sentence: "In our third experiment, we did the same thing as experiment two, except we cooled A and B ," do we need to put a comma before "except"?

Answer 1

Yes, in the example you provided, a comma would be necessary. Commas are great ways to separate ideas, or to create a pause where you would naturally pause when speaking.

 

A couple of questions/things for you to consider:

 

1. Are the experiments called "Experiment 1" and "Experiment 2"? You write "third experiment" and are comparing this to "experiment two." It would sound cleaner if you were consistent. So either "third experiment" and "second experiment" or "experiment 3" and "experiment 2."

 

2. Is there only one difference between experiment 2 and 3? If so, you could say, "For our third experiment, we followed the same procedure as our second experiment, with the exception of cooling A and B."

 

Hope this helps! Fortunately, I love science and English :)