ESL General English Grammar Questions

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Yoong Liat — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 16:04:15 GMT

Awence

So , you guys mean that "drugs" is a countable noun? Ops..it's abit confusing.

'Drug' is a countable noun. The plural of 'drug' is 'drugs'. It's not confusing.

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

ytsirk — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 18:49:24 GMT

Kooyeen
MrP's example was different... It shows you could say "parents" could take a singular verb: Parents is not spelled parence.

Do you mean "percent"?

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Kooyeen — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 18:05:02 GMT

Hi Awence,
yes, you can say "a drug", or "several drugs". With plurals you use a plural verb in those kinds of structures:
Some of the drugs are dangerous. One half of the drugs are dangerous. Fifty percent of the drugs are dangerous.
MrP's example was different... It shows you could say "parents" could take a singular verb: Parents is not spelled parence.

By the way, I just remembered there might also be some differences between American and British English regarding plural vs singular verbs.

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Awence — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 14:49:43 GMT

So , you guys mean that "drugs" is a countable noun? Ops..it's abit confusing.

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

ytsirk — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 13:33:12 GMT

1. 95% of ten-year-olds have a mobile phone.
2. 95% of ten-year-olds is a very high figure.

In #1, the underlined part pre-modifies the subject ("ten-year-olds"). Thus the verb is plural.

In #2, the underlined part post-modifies the subject ("95%"). Thus the verb is singular.

Best wishes,

MrP

Thank you MrP for another illustration that proves the proximity theory (while not always wrong) is not the best way to be taught.

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Marius Hancu — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 23:18:10 GMT

Can't argue with your examples, MrP.

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

MrPedantic — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 23:00:19 GMT

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Marius Hancu — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 22:40:58 GMT

Anonymous
Edamame
Thank you all. I thought I might have to consider "more than 90% of the drugs" as one group. But in this case, it seems I can simply consider that the number of drugs mentioned here is more than 1; therefore, I should use "are."

Yes. That way you'll be more correct more often than if you go with Marius' thought process.

I am relaxed here.

I'm in company (better said protected) of Swan and grammarians even greater than him who have validated the proximity process mentioned.

So by the time some of you finish your thought process, you'll be in the wake of my glorious smoke

And, BTW:

Google hits:

0 for "percent of the drugs is"
383,000 for "percent of the drugs are"

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Cool Breeze — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 21:48:29 GMT

Both singular and plural suit me just fine: More than 90 percent of the drugs is/are wasted...

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Anonymous — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 21:35:31 GMT

Edamame
Thank you all. I thought I might have to consider "more than 90% of the drugs" as one group. But in this case, it seems I can simply consider that the number of drugs mentioned here is more than 1; therefore, I should use "are."

Yes. That way you'll be more correct more often than if you go with Marius' thought process.

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Edamame — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 21:32:22 GMT

Thank you all. I thought I might have to consider "more than 90% of the drugs" as one group. But in this case, it seems I can simply consider that the number of drugs mentioned here is more than 1; therefore, I should use "are."

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Anonymous — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 21:19:13 GMT

ytsirk

Kooyeen
It's not true "more" is plural... if you had water instead of drugs, you would say that more than 50% of the water is polluted, wouldn't you? Water is uncountable, so you use a singular verb...

I apologize for not qualifying my comment. In that sentence, more is plural. Yes it is.

I agree with ytsirk. Y'all need better examples though. "More" isn't a good example because it can be singular or plural depending on context.

But if you say something like "One of the apples is missing." Then you don't want to teach people to think about the proximity of apples, do you? The subject is "One" and so the verb is singular. If you teach someone to look at the word closest to the verb, they won't learn it correctly.

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

ytsirk — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 21:13:15 GMT

Kooyeen
It's not true "more" is plural... if you had water instead of drugs, you would say that more than 50% of the water is polluted, wouldn't you? Water is uncountable, so you use a singular verb...

I apologize for not qualifying my comment. In that sentence, more is plural. Yes it is.

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Yoong Liat — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 20:51:46 GMT

Edamame
Hello all,
Could you tell me which is correct?

""More than 90% of the drugs are.. " or "More than 90% of the drugs is" or "More than 90% of the drugs is.."

Thank you very much.

"More than 90% of the drugs are.. " It should be 'are'. Half of the pupils were absent. "Half of the pupils" is definitely more than one pupil.

'More than 90% of the drugs' should be many tablets, capsules, etc of the drugs. Therefore, you should use 'are'.

Re: treat this as singular or plural?

Kooyeen — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 20:49:21 GMT

ytsirk
The subject of a sentence is never in a prepositional phrase like that. More is the subject, and more is plural. You always say "more are," not "more is."

Hi,
I think it should be "are" because it agrees with "drugs". It's not true "more" is plural... if you had water instead of drugs, you would say that more than 50% of the water is polluted, wouldn't you? Water is uncountable, so you use a singular verb...