# Let's debate the rules of grammar and usage **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 15, 2006, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461 "2006-03-15T15:57:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2006, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/21 "2006-03-16T02:25:56Z")
Jeez, In never knew you were such a conservative, **ITR**. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2006, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/22 "2006-03-16T02:28:33Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > In English, nothing. It was an attempt to force fit English into a Latin sentence structure. Same with **split infinitives**. A Latin infinitve is one word, which cannot be split. English, which is much less inflected than Latin, has its own rules and needn’t copy that dead language. In fact, that is something up with which we should not put. 🙂 Good lord man! You can’t really mean this! Without split infinitives, our miltiary would be crippled! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2006, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/23 "2006-03-16T02:33:44Z")
Without split infinitives and the misuse of the reflexive pronouns in award write-ups, they’d be crippled. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2006, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/24 "2006-03-16T04:30:18Z")
[QUOTE=Tevildo] This is an rule of _Latin_ grammar which was artificially introduced to English by Dryden. We might as well get “This is the sort of English up with which I will not put” out of the way, and continue our regular worship of Fowler. Some examples from [This page](http://www.eng-lang.co.uk/fowler.htm): [ul] [li]He’s a man you shouldn’t trifle with. (…with whom you shouldn’t trifle.)[/li][li]They got more than they bargained for. (They got more than that for which they bargained.)[/li][li]Guess who I bumped into. (Guess into whom I bumped.)[/li][li]He’s someone you can count on. (…on whom you can count.)[/li][li]It’s an opportunity I’d leap at. (…at which I’d leap.)[/ul][/li][/QUOTE] And don’t forget the most famous split infinitive “To boldly go where no man has gone before.” ---
**Author:** ![sundog66](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@sundog66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sundog66)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2006, 8:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/25 "2006-03-16T08:47:23Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > I’ll get us started: What’s wrong with ending a sentence with a preposition? Okay, I think we’ve thoroughly exhausted that topic, and I’d like to propose the next rule to debate: What is up with the rule in English that an if-clause cannot be infinitival? Observe: 1a. He doesn’t know whether he wants to go. 1b. He doesn’t know if he wants to go. (both okay) 2a. He doesn’t know whether to go. 2b. \*He doesn’t know if to go. (whoa, what went wrong with 2b?) This restriction is completely illogical, and I challenge anyone to try to convince me that English should not be changed to permit sentences like 2b. ---
**Author:** ![Tevildo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Tevildo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tevildo)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2006, 11:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/26 "2006-03-16T11:32:54Z")
> [@sundog66](#): > > This restriction is completely illogical, and I challenge anyone to try to convince me that English should not be changed to permit sentences like 2b. Because nobody would ever want to say, let alone write, a sentence like 2b. “He doesn’t know if to go” isn’t English in the first place, so _a fortiori_ doesn’t conform to the rules of English grammar. It’s not as if English speakers (or the native speakers of any language) construct their sentences logically following an arbitary set of grammatical rules. We just speak the language, and what people say determine what the rules are. If people, for some unfathomable reason, wanted to start saying “He doesn’t know if to go” but were frustrated by over-pedantic editors and proofreaders, then you’d have a case for changing the rule. But that’s not going to happen. ---
**Author:** ![CJJ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecc23a/32.png) [@CJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CJJ)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2006, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/27 "2006-03-16T18:15:32Z")
> [@](#): > > 1a. He doesn’t know whether he wants to go. > 1b. He doesn’t know if he wants to go. > > (both okay) > > 2a. He doesn’t know whether to go. > 2b. \*He doesn’t know if to go. “Whether” and “if” are not interchangeable (I’m not saying **sundog66** believes this, but just making a clarifying point). “Whether” is always used to introduces alternatives (e.g. the “whether” in 1a is short for “whether or not”), while “if” only sometimes introduces alternatives, and more frequently is used to introduce conditionals. I’d argue then that sentence 1b. could be ambiguous, because it could mean (taking if as introducing an alternative) “He doesn’t know if he wants to go or if he wants to stay.”, or (taking “if” as a conditional) “He doesn’t know what happened, if he wants to go.” Admittedly, the ambiguity is slight, but consider a similar sentence like “Let him know if he is a winner.” Do you inform the person in question if he is a winner or a loser, or only if he is a winner? The comma between the clauses helps, but we don’t always pronounce commas, do we Bottom line: Best to avoid “if” when introducing an alternative unless that is clearly the only way it could be understood. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2006, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/28 "2006-03-16T18:39:17Z")
> [@ITR champion](#): > > For instance, they never learned the difference between “got” and “have”. They may say: “I got a book.” This indicates current possession of the book, which is what I would mean if I said: "I have a book Well, yes, but usually members of the same speech community find ways to get their ideas across, and ways to tell each other when something is unclear or ambiguous, in order to communicate what they want to say. (And _got_ meaning _have_ is a truncation of _have got_, which is perfectly acceptable in British English.) > [@ITR champion](#): > > In the long run, this will have a very negative effect on these kids’ prospects if they want to get a college education and a middle-class job. Only if they don’t learn how to code switch, which most people usually do when they’ve been given the opportunity to experience the kind of environment where different forms of English are used. And as mentioned above, the difference between writing and speaking is huge, since the former is essentially artificial, and that gets a lot of people in the mood to make “rules.” ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/29 "2006-03-17T06:37:06Z")
**ITR** , setting aside your arguments for the moment as to whether language _should_ be standardized, do you think it both relevant and true that it has become quite clear, empirically, that the communal practice of linguistic usage _can’t_ be brought into conformity with any preconcieved standard? -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/30 "2006-03-17T06:46:01Z")
Something I learned from a class on usage: some rules are “drilled into” English speakers at an early age by teachers who want to attack a particular problem common in young writers via a shortcut. For example, the rule that nixes sentences starting with “and” or “but” is a shortcut used to attack a problem you see in childrens’ speech all the time: short, choppy sentences that could be put together into longer ones. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/31 "2006-03-17T06:51:20Z")
Oh, and **ITR** , one of our assignments in this class was to compare various usage guides, both ones we used in class and online. There were some differences in issues that were relatively common, the main one being how “seriously” to treat them. So I’d say that there are good many rules that, while everyone knows them, everyone’s NOT sure whether they’re worthwhile, or still apply. I’m not so sure we should drag everyone down just to satisfy the whim of some author in the 1400’s. ---
**Author:** ![sundog66](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ee7513/32.png) [@sundog66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sundog66)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/32 "2006-03-17T07:01:53Z")
> [@Tevildo](#): > > Because nobody would ever want to say, let alone write, a sentence like 2b. “He doesn’t know if to go” isn’t English in the first place, so _a fortiori_ doesn’t conform to the rules of English grammar. It’s not as if English speakers (or the native speakers of any language) construct their sentences logically following an arbitary set of grammatical rules. We just speak the language, and what people say determine what the rules are. If people, for some unfathomable reason, wanted to start saying “He doesn’t know if to go” but were frustrated by over-pedantic editors and proofreaders, then you’d have a case for changing the rule. But that’s not going to happen. I agree with everything you say. Not to start a meta-debate, but my (very subtle) point was that because the status of putative grammar rules can be ascertained only through empirical data (as in, what do people say/write?), there is no sense in “debating” them to begin with. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/33 "2006-03-17T12:48:03Z")
The OP isn’t a debate anyway. It’s sort of a poll question about your opinion of ending sentences with prepositions. ---
**Author:** ![pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@pseudotriton\_ruber\_ruber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pseudotriton_ruber_ruber)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/34 "2006-03-17T12:50:57Z")
Grammar and usage good. Fire bad. ---
**Author:** ![ITR\_champion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c67d28/32.png) [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2006, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/35 "2006-03-17T23:03:51Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > **ITR** , setting aside your arguments for the moment as to whether language _should_ be standardized, do you think it both relevant and true that it has become quite clear, empirically, that the communal practice of linguistic usage _can’t_ be brought into conformity with any preconcieved standard? Why not? I think that linguistic usage has been brought much closer to conformity than it used to be. There was a great deal more variety in 1800 than there is today. Some authors conveyed dialogue with quotes, others with dashes, and others seemed to write without a consistent system. There were variations in grammar, spelling, and specific definitions. Most of those differences have been eliminated. In particular, regional differences have all but disappeared. Try reading a seventeenth-century Scottish novel and you’ll see how far that dialect varied from English and American usage. Today a Scot wouldn’t have the slightest trouble communicate with people in London. We will never entirely eliminate minor variations, but there are cases where we’ve eliminated the major differences. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/36 "2006-03-18T00:25:43Z")
> [@Liberal](#): > > The OP isn’t a debate anyway. It’s sort of a poll question about your opinion of ending sentences with prepositions. Well, yes. There are hundreds of things about (the) English (language) that can be “polled,” and not definitively decided by some official “academy,” as they might do with French or Spanish. Personally, I like that about English; there really isn’t anyone who can say “you _can_” or “\*cannot \* do that.” That’s one way that words like “dis” come into the language. You might say that other words serve the “same purpose;” but I say they result because English has such a large variety of speech communities. [_I.e_., it’s one thing to insult someone; but it’s quite another to “_dis_” someone.] Am I off track here? ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/37 "2006-03-18T00:51:14Z")
> [@Tevildo](#): > > Because nobody would ever want to say, let alone write, a sentence like 2b. “He doesn’t know if to go” isn’t English in the first place, so _a fortiori_ doesn’t conform to the rules of English grammar. It’s not as if English speakers (or the native speakers of any language) construct their sentences logically following an arbitary set of grammatical rules. As a liguisist, I’d have to disagree. You are TOTALLY correct that native speakers of any language) construct their sentences logically following an arbitary set of grammatical rules. (And I’m talking about _ **speech** _ here, rather than writing.) There is a huge community that uses the past form when “grammar nazies” would insist upon the past particle form. ---
**Author:** ![Tevildo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Tevildo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tevildo)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/38 "2006-03-18T20:00:00Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > As a liguisist, I’d have to disagree. You are TOTALLY correct that native speakers of any language) construct their sentences logically following an arbitary set of grammatical rules. (And I’m talking about _ **speech** _ here, rather than writing.) There is a huge community that uses the past form when “grammar nazies” would insist upon the past particle form. I assume you meant to say “incorrect”. 🙂 I’m not an expert in linguistics, but I think our disagreement is over the word “construct”. When speaking and writing casually, we don’t consciously apply the rules of grammar to the concept we wish to express and “manufacture” a sentence, in the way that a non-native speaker of a language might. We just express the concept by saying it, with no intermediate stages. The grammarian then comes along, analyzes our speech (and writing), and models it with the grammatical rules; I personally find Chomsky’s idea that grammatical rules somehow underlie language, and are more fundamental than the actual words people use to express things, very convincing, but I must admit I’ve not studied it in that great a depth. ---
**Author:** ![Tevildo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9bd4f/32.png) [@Tevildo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tevildo)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/39 "2006-03-18T20:01:19Z")
> [@Tevildo](#): > > I personally find Chomsky’s idea… Make that “personally _don’t_ find”. Sorry. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2006, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461/40 "2006-03-18T21:26:19Z")
> [@Tevildo](#): > > I assume you meant to say “incorrect”. 🙂 No, I meant _correct_. Things like subject/verb correlation, syntax, etc. They’re flexible, and they change with time, but there are still “rules,” that is to say, “conventions,” that people follow. Some of the above mentioned examples which are “incomprehensible” show that, don’t they? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lets-debate-the-rules-of-grammar-and-usage/348461.md?page=3)