Clive wrote:

I've noticed that many of the Chinese people who post to the Forum use the word 'Chinese' in a way that is not natural. eg Natural     - On the bus, I sat beside three Chinese people. Unnatural - On the bus, I sat beside three Chinese.

Hi Clive

I have mentioned in another thread that Chinese as a noun referring to people was originally used only with the article to refer to the entire nation:

The Chinese eat a lot of rice.

However, it is becoming more and more common to use it without the with numerals, for example: three Chinese. This may be more common among the Chinese, as you say , but native speakers of English are certainly "guilty" of the same thing. Grammatically it is equivalent to saying three English, which native speakers wouldn't say, as far as I know. I don't quite know what to think about three Chinese; and English will obviously evolve and change regardless of what I think anyway. I am just an observer and I appreciate your comment. I thought three Chinese was so common that no native speaker saw anything unusual about it.

CB

EDIT: Webster's disciples see nothing wrong with Chinese as a plural either. 40 years ago I would have agreed with Clive and said it's unnatural. I might have preferred to say it's wrong. Perhaps subconsciously I still avoid using these ese-words in the plural except when the is before them, like any other adjective. But, "live and let live."