MSGID: 2:221/6.0 5ccc8aec   
   REPLY: 3:640/1384 5ccc1f5b   
   PID: JamNNTPd/Cygwin32 1.3 20190208   
   CHRS: LATIN-1 2   
   TZUTC: 0300   
   TID: hpt/w32-mvc 1.9.0-cur 2019-01-08   
   Hi, Paul Quinn!   
   I read your message from 03.05.2019 13:48   
      
    AK>> [The lack of oxygen at this height saps power.] "saps" is related   
    AK>> to "lack" and oxygen doesn't make "lack" uncountable.   
      
    PQ> IMHO: saps is related to power. Power is the thing being sapped by   
    PQ> a lack of oxygen.   
      
   But "lack" is the subject, and "saps" is the predicate to "lack"   
      
    AK>> or an uncountable form:   
      
    AK>> [Their apparent lack of progress mean they are not doing their job   
    AK>> properly.]   
      
    PQ> IMHO: this is unnatural to a native speaker.   
      
   Yes, you are right it was my fault. That example from the dictionary was in   
   the form of a question (Does their apparent lack of progress mean...) and I   
   remade it wrongly.   
      
   So, "Their apparent lack of progress MEANS they are not doing their job   
   properly." -- here we have "lack" uncountable.   
      
   [a lack of food]   
   here we use "lack" as singular noun.   
      
    PQ>  (I don't know where   
    PQ> Mike got his rule from, although it may be correct for 99.99% of   
    PQ> cases in his locale.) The passage should read: "... lack of   
    PQ> progress means they are not...".   
      
   If we apply Mike's rule we'll see that "progress" is an uncountable noun, as   
   should be "lack", and, therefore, it should be "lack of progress MEAN they are   
   not..." So the rule is not working.   
      
    PQ> It could be countable, in either   
    PQ> the case of there being many (persons) involved, or in the singular   
    PQ> case of one person, when speaking of 'their'. English can be   
    PQ> annoyingly imprecise at times.   
      
      
   Bye, Paul!   
   Alexander Koryagin   
   english_tutor 2019   
      
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