"The situation dictates whether you pitch to him," the catcher said.
In other words, it's not the simple act of playing violent video games that dictates whether they have a negative effect.
Because it dictates whether or not you can afford to send your kids to the school you'd planned," the former banker explains.
It dictates whether insurers, including Medicare and Medicaid, will pay for treatment, and whether schools will expand financing for certain special-education services.
On the most basic level, the octane level dictates whether your engine makes knocking noises, which can happen if fuel burns inefficiently or continues to burn after the engine is turned off.
In racing this is called the car's "setup" and it dictates whether the car understeers (that is, tends to go straight as the wheel is turned) or oversteers (that is, turns freely).
But another goal has been simply to make sure that Mr. Bush goes into Tuesday's debate feeling as comfortable as possible, because that often dictates whether he seems clipped or convivial, herky-jerky or fluid.
"I really don't think that there's one particular person in the lineup that dictates whether the lineup plays well or not," said the TNT analyst Kenny Smith, who also serves as a part-time commentator on Knicks games.
At the next junction in the hierarchy, two parameters are at work: "optional polysynthesis" (in which polysynthetic prefixes are possible, but not required) and "head directionality," which dictates whether modifiers and other new words are added before or after existing phrases.
The Jacob classification dictates whether surgical intervention is required.
Nothing dictates whether the skies shall be marked off into constellations or other objects.
