Dollars

[Terra]

I noticed this oddity in German class. Consider the following sentences.

Ten dollars is more than five dollars.
Zehn Euro *sind* mehr als fünf Euro. - (Ten euros is more than five euros.)

Why does the verb in the English sentence act is if it was conjugating with a singular noun and not a plural one? I get the feeling that it's similar to why the verb conjugates for the singular in """Five apples is enough.""", but I can't quite pin down what's going on.

[Gulliver]

I think we, in English, create a dummy singular noun to carry the concept of "ten dollars" when comparing amounts. It becomes a non-count noun, I guess. Or something like that.

N are more... - suggests N out of many. Two dresses (there) are more more expensive than one dress (here), so we should go back to the other place.
N is more... - suggests N as a grouped singular thingy thing. Two dresses is more expensive than one dress, you numpty. Stop buying dresses and learn basic mathematics.

[finlay]

Here's a maths joke:
Q: If two's company and three's a crowd, what are four and five?
A: Nine!

The joke seems to hinge on the fact of English grammar that means that you would actually expect "what is four and five?" if you were asking what the sum of the two is – the sum, after all, is singular. It does make sense, though, and it's probably not as simple as that.

[Ulrike Meinhof]

A similar phenomenon occurs in Swedish, although with gender rather than number agreement. Neuter singular adjectives are used with common and/or plural nouns when talking about some unspecific, general idea, or when the noun is used to refer to a situation in which it would be involved in some way:

Sill är gott
herring(CMN) is good.NTR
'Herring tastes good'

Sillen är god
herring.DEF is good.CMN
'The herring tastes good'

* Sill är god
* Sillen är gott

En blåare himmel vore vackert
a bluer sky(CMN) would_be beautiful-NTR
'It would be beautiful if the sky were bluer'

En blåare himmel vore vacker
a bluer sky(CMN) would_be beautiful.CMN
'A bluer sky would be beautiful'

[CrazyEttin]

I think we, in English, create a dummy singular noun to carry the concept of "ten dollars" when comparing amounts. It becomes a non-count noun, I guess. Or something like that.

This happens at least in finnish.

Ten dollars is more than five dollars.
Kymmenen dollaria on enemmän kuin viisi dollaria.

Where dollar is declined in partitive case.

[Legion]

French can have it both ways:

Plural:

10 euros valent plus que 5 euros.
10 euros font plus que 5 euros.

Singular:

10 euros, ça vaut plus que 5 euros.
10 euros, ça fait plus que 5 euros.

(verbs "valoir" (to be worth) and "faire" (to do, to make))

With "être" (to be) however, I think only the singular is possible:

10 euros, c'est plus que 5 euros.

[Ser]

10 dólares valen más que 5 dólares.
10 dólares vale más que 5 dólares.
10 dólares son más que 5 dólares.
10 dólares es más que 5 dólares.

I feel they're correct in either the singular or the plural, but that using the singular involves topicalizing those bucks, a bit as in "the opportunity of making a profit of 10 dollars is better than that opportunity of gaining 5 dollars", or whatever context these sentences may be used in. Hmm...

[Viktor77]

10 dólares valen más que 5 dólares.
10 dólares vale más que 5 dólares.
10 dólares son más que 5 dólares.
10 dólares es más que 5 dólares.

I feel they're correct in either the singular, but that using the singular involves topicalizing those bucks, a bit as in "the opportunity of making a profit of 10 dollars is better than that opportunity of gaining 5 dollars", or whatever context these sentences may be used in. Hmm...

Why are you using "más que?" It should be "más de," no?

Tengo más de tres amigos.
I have more than three friends.

[Yng]

Why are you using "más que?" It should be "más de," no?

I assume it's the same reason Legion used 'plus que' instead of 'plus de'.

[bulbaquil]

I think in English, when measurements are used as substantives, they take the singular, as if there's a hidden "The amount of...", i.e.

(The amount of) 10 dollars is more than (the amount of) 5 dollars.
(The distance of) 50 inches is longer than (the distance of) four feet.
(The weight of) two kilograms is less than (the weight of) five pounds.

[sirred]

That makes a certain amount of sense.
We say "50 inches is longer than 4 feet." but not "Snakes is longer than worms."*

[Ser]

10 dólares valen más que 5 dólares.
10 dólares vale más que 5 dólares.
10 dólares son más que 5 dólares.
10 dólares es más que 5 dólares.

I feel they're correct in either the singular, but that using the singular involves topicalizing those bucks, a bit as in "the opportunity of making a profit of 10 dollars is better than that opportunity of gaining 5 dollars", or whatever context these sentences may be used in. Hmm...

Why are you using "más que?" It should be "más de," no?

Tengo más de tres amigos.
I have more than three friends.

No, in those sentences que is used. Using de would sound like saying *10 dollars is more 5 dollars. But in this example of yours it should indeed be de and not que. I honestly can't tell you why...

I think in English, when measurements are used as substantives, they take the singular, as if there's a hidden "The amount of...", i.e.

(The amount of) 10 dollars is more than (the amount of) 5 dollars.
(The distance of) 50 inches is longer than (the distance of) four feet.
(The weight of) two kilograms is less than (the weight of) five pounds.

That does seem to apply to Spanish too.

[Legion]

Probably because más que 5 dólares/plus que 5 dollars is a comparison, whereas más de 5 dólares/plus de 5 dollars is nominal group expressing "a quantity that is superior to 5 dollars" (the trick being that, at least in French, "plus", while usually an adverb, can be a noun: "qui peut le plus peut le moins" > who can do more can do less).

[Ser]

Probably because más que 5 dólares/plus que 5 dollars is a comparison, whereas más de 5 dólares/plus de 5 dollars is nominal group expressing "a quantity that is superior to 5 dollars"

That explanation doesn't work looking at Viktor's example and other similar ones...

• Tengo más de tres amigos.
  Tengo más de trece años.

I'm not sure if you'd use the same structure here in French, or would you, actually? "J'ai plus de trois amis, j'ai plus de treize ans"?

(the trick being that, at least in French, "plus", while usually an adverb, can be a noun: "qui peut le plus peut le moins" > who can do more can do less).

Is it really a noun...? It still "feels" like an adverb to me if that makes any sense (I reckon I'm just talking out of my ass here)... Other than being able to take the article, what other noun-like behaviour does it show? Can it be modified by adjectives? Can it be replaced by a pronoun?

[Legion]

Probably because más que 5 dólares/plus que 5 dollars is a comparison, whereas más de 5 dólares/plus de 5 dollars is nominal group expressing "a quantity that is superior to 5 dollars"

That explanation doesn't work looking at Viktor's example and other similar ones...

• Tengo más de tres amigos.
  Tengo más de trece años.

I'm not sure if you'd use the same structure here in French, or would you, actually? "J'ai plus de trois amis, j'ai plus de treize ans"?

I'm not sure how that contradict what I said:

J'ai plus de trois amis > I have more than three friend, I have a quantity of friends that is superior to three; here it clearly behaves like a nominal group, and thus can normally be the complement of a verb, but it can also be a subject:

Plus de 5 personnes sont entrées > more than 5 persons came in

But *Plus que 5 personnes sont entrées.

(the trick being that, at least in French, "plus", while usually an adverb, can be a noun: "qui peut le plus peut le moins" > who can do more can do less).

Is it really a noun...? It still "feels" like an adverb to me if that makes any sense (I reckon I'm just talking out of my ass here)... Other than being able to take the article, what other noun-like behaviour does it show? Can it be modified by adjectives? Can it be replaced by a pronoun?[/quote]

It can take adjectives yes:

"C'est un petit plus" > this is a small addition.
"Le vrai plus" > the real good point.

It can be replaced by a pronoun too but in French almost anything can, since most of our pronouns can replace entire propositions.
"Le plus, je te le dirai plus tard" > I'll tell you later about the positive side.

[Izambri]

You can use both numbers in Catalan, but I see a difference in using the singular or the plural:

Deu euros és més que cinc euros "10 euros is more than 5 euros" implies that the value of 10 euros is higher than that of 5 euros. As a concept, as if saying [El concepte de] deu euros és més que [el] de cinc euros "[The concept of] 10 euros is more than [that of] 5 euros". Also, the use of the singular indicates a "neutral" and/or "general truth". IWS that the singular form is the most common.

Deu euros són més que cinc euros "10 euros are more than 5 euros" seems to imply that 10 euros is more than 5 euros as an amount of money (as if counting with coins), as the sentence could be understood as Deu euros són més [diners] que 5 euros "10 euros are more [money - coins] than 5 euros". But here is necessary to understand the idea of Catalan diner and diners, both "money".

[Ser]

I'm not sure how that contradict what I said: [...]

Oh I see. I guess it might be useful to tell students not to think of sentences like these as comparisons then, at least this kind of comparative sentence, just because they have "than" in English...

[Skomakar'n]

A similar phenomenon occurs in Swedish, although with gender rather than number agreement. Neuter singular adjectives are used with common and/or plural nouns when talking about some unspecific, general idea, or when the noun is used to refer to a situation in which it would be involved in some way:

Sill är gott
herring(CMN) is good.NTR
'Herring tastes good'

Sillen är god
herring.DEF is good.CMN
'The herring tastes good'

* Sill är god
* Sillen är gott

En blåare himmel vore vackert
a bluer sky(CMN) would_be beautiful-NTR
'It would be beautiful if the sky were bluer'

En blåare himmel vore vacker
a bluer sky(CMN) would_be beautiful.CMN
'A bluer sky would be beautiful'

I just can't consider this to be proper. I frown upon people phrasing it this way. I frown even more upon those actually using it in writing. It's just not grammatical at all to me to say sill är gott, because it's en sill, and not ett sill. I'm fine with det är gott med sill and det är gott att äta sill, but it has to be sill är god and sill är god att äta.

And don't get me started on my thoughts of people who conjugate god as though it was regular...

Dialect is dialect, and, sure, use this in speech if you want to (but it'll sting in my ears), but please, don't use it in writing, unless you're intentionally writing in your idiolect (you here is not referring to you, Ulrike, just to make sure I'm not misunderstood).

[Legion]

This coming from the guy who speaks in a condialect…

[Ulrike Meinhof]

This coming from the guy who speaks in a condialect…

Yeah. I'm not really going to listen to any arguments from Skomakarn. Nor should anyone who is interested in learning anything about normal Swedish.

[Ossicone]

A similar phenomenon occurs in Swedish, although with gender rather than number agreement. Neuter singular adjectives are used with common and/or plural nouns when talking about some unspecific, general idea, or when the noun is used to refer to a situation in which it would be involved in some way:

STUFF

Actually, I had a question about this the other day. I was told that it took the -t ending because it was an adverb but that seemed really weird to me.

In the end though, we came up with basically what you said above.

[*Ceresz]

I just can't consider this to be proper. I frown upon people phrasing it this way. I frown even more upon those actually using it in writing. It's just not grammatical at all to me to say sill är gott, because it's en sill, and not ett sill. I'm fine with det är gott med sill and det är gott att äta sill, but it has to be sill är god and sill är god att äta.

And don't get me started on my thoughts of people who conjugate god as though it was regular...

Dialect is dialect, and, sure, use this in speech if you want to (but it'll sting in my ears), but please, don't use it in writing, unless you're intentionally writing in your idiolect (you here is not referring to you, Ulrike, just to make sure I'm not misunderstood).

Seriously?

No... just... no.

@Ossicone: Yeah, that was the only explanation I could think of before realizing what Ulrike just posted.

[Skomakar'n]

This coming from the guy who speaks in a condialect…

Yeah. I'm not really going to listen to any arguments from Skomakarn. Nor should anyone who is interested in learning anything about normal Swedish.

Pancakes are gooder than hamburgers.

Seriously, though, I obviously don't walk around getting pissed at everyone phrasing things like this, because a lot of people I know do, and I don't like them any less because of it, and it is an interesting, dialectal variation. I just don't see how it could be considered proper, written Standard Swedish.

I have to stop acting so hostile around here... I hadn't really noticed. Sorry.

[Ulrike Meinhof]

Pancakes are gooder than hamburgers.

God just isn't part of the paradigm that continues bättre, bäst in modern Swedish. Bra has completely replaced it. Deal with it.

[Skomakar'n]

Pancakes are gooder than hamburgers.

God just isn't part of the paradigm that continues bättre, bäst in modern Swedish. Bra has completely replaced it. Deal with it.

It's so sad, though.

... But it hasn't been completely replaced. Almost, but not completely. Not everywhere. In Stockholm, it probably has. In Gothenburg, it hasn't. Almost, but not completely. To hear about someone who's had en god dag or the like, is not unheard of here.