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Which of these is grammatically correct?

skunk said:
Quite apart from the convention being different on each side of the pond, "Manchester United" is a singular form of team name, whereas "Detroit Tigers" is a plural form, so I would expect the verb following to be in plural form even over there - which was my point. "The team's name" refers to the Detroit Tigers in the quote. The Manchester United example was my example of a singular form with a singular verb for the benefit of your compatriots, though "MU are going to win the cup" would be more common over here. Separated by a common language indeed.
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Sorry, what did you say?

Ah well, the examples are complicated by the fact that virtually every sports team name over here ends in an "s" which implies a plural right off. If you take a company name for example, the conventional US English usage is singular and the British English is plural. That certainly is are confusing.
 
Much Ado said:
Well that's not a sentence either, so we'll call it even. :p
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Oh, but it is: sentences are separated by full stops, and mine only had a colon. :)

IJ Reilly said:
Sorry, what did you say?

Ah well, the examples are complicated by the fact that virtually every sports team name over here ends in an "s" which implies a plural right off. If you take a company name for example, the conventional US English usage is singular and the British English is plural. That certainly is are confusing.
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It are indeed.
 
A) The problem is a known issue, it is currently being worked on.
B) The problem is a known issue, it is currently being worked.
 
I'm just gonna throw this out there and hopefully one of you can debunk it.

I heard that if 2/3 of the population uses a word, it automatically becomes a word. SO, if 2/3 of the population uses the word "Ain't" it technically is a word.

Is that true or false?
 
Much Ado said:
And I don't have the appetite for a pun war
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Hannibal did. Oh no, that was Punic, wasn't it?

Prof. said:
I'm just gonna throw this out there and hopefully one of you can debunk it.

I heard that if 2/3 of the population uses a word, it automatically becomes a word. SO, if 2/3 of the population uses the word "Ain't" it technically is a word.

Is that true or false?
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"Ain't" is actually two words. As for the 2/3 "rule", I'm afraid that's nonsense too. How on earth would you establish the numbers anyway?
 
elcid said:
A) The problem is a known issue; it is currently being worked on.
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Tut tut, did someone forget his semicolons? ;)
Prof. said:
You say "I" in the middle of a sentence and you say "me" and the end of a sentence.
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Absolutely not. "I" is a subject pronoun, while "me" is an object pronoun. Their use has nothing to do with their position in a given sentence; it has everything to do with whether they are doing the action or are the object of an action. For example,
  1. The chair in the back of the room is beckoning me to come towards it.

    In this sentence, the chair is the subject while "me" is an object.
  2. I am being beckoned by that chair in the back of the room.

    If you want an example that uses the "her + pronoun" method:
  3. Prof and I are discussing grammar.
  4. Grammar held me and Prof captivated for hours.

Prof. said:
Then my grade school english teachers were wrong. That's how we were taught.
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Balderdash. I know a grade school teacher and I know that that isn't the method used to teach. It's likely that it was a general rule that works most of the time but not all the time (like i before e except after c or in "ay" like neighbor and weigh).
Prof. said:
I'm just gonna throw this out there and hopefully one of you can debunk it.

I heard that if 2/3 of the population uses a word, it automatically becomes a word. SO, if 2/3 of the population uses the word "Ain't" it technically is a word.

Is that true or false?
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False. Whether or not a populace uses a word has nothing to do with a word's definition. I doubt 2/3s of the population uses "plethora" on a daily basis, but that doesn't make it any less of a word.
 
CalBoy said:
Their use has nothing to do with their position in a given sentence; it has everything to do with whether they are doing the action or are the subject of an action.
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Tut, tut. Don't you mean "the object of an action"?
I doubt 2/3s of the population uses "plethora" on a daily basis, but that doesn't make it any less of a word.
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I use "plethora" 2/3 of the time. Does that count?
 
elcid said:
Maybe, but you still picked the wrong one. This came up from a Jobs e-mail.
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Well I hadn't really "picked" it, I was just using it to insert my semicolon.

But, now that you mention it, why is B correct? How does one work a problem? The preposition "on" clarifies what you're working on.
 
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