MSGID: 1:153/716.0 cdb6c463   
   REPLY: 554.englisht@1:2320/105 213212d3   
   CHRS: IBMPC 2   
   Hi, Mike!  Recently you wrote in a message to ALEXANDER KORYAGIN:   
      
   MP>  I may be using "singular" and "uncountable" interchangably   
   MP>  (and incorrectly!), but I would use MEANS in your example   
   MP>  also.   
      
      
              IMHO your usage is correct, although you're not sure how to explain   
   it.  Maybe I can help a bit re the latter....  :-)   
      
      
      
              The term "singular" is used with reference to a noun indicating the   
   name of a single person, place, thing, idea, organization, or event:   
      
      
                  My friend Mary enjoys horseback riding.   
      
                  Vancouver, BC is located near the Pacific Ocean.   
      
                  I have an eraser on my desk.   
      
                  Love makes the world go 'round.   
      
                  The city council wants to install more bike lanes.   
      
                  Our folk music festival takes place annually at Jericho Park.   
      
      
      
              As a native speaker, you may not have heard the terms "countable" &   
   "uncountable" in school.  I think I probably learned them from Alexander.  But   
   you may recall being taught about stuff which is usually measured by weight or   
   by volume... e.g. various liquids, meat/fish/poultry, cheese, and salt because   
   it's okay to say "less" whereas with countable objects one should say "fewer".   
      
              People, places, and concrete objects such as erasers are countable.   
   When I specify my friend Mary I do it because I'm aware that a number of other   
   folks have the same name.  When I specify Vancouver, BC I do it because I know   
   there's a city in Washington State with the same name.  WRT erasers.... I have   
   two, actually, but I would direct others to the one which is easier to find if   
   they don't care whether they are using a Pink Pearl or an artist's gum eraser.   
      
              I reckon where some of the confusion lies is that we treat abstract   
   nouns as singular.  Your teachers & mine may not have gone into detail re such   
   concepts because... while the average student in junior high is experiencing a   
   phase of rapid brain growth which is the ideal time to introduce them... other   
   students will claim loudly & adamantly that abstract nouns don't exist because   
   Miss Grinch in grade three never mentioned them.  OTOH, the common parlance is   
   rife with examples many native speakers will have seen or heard before:   
      
      
                  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.   
      
                  Handsome is as handsome does.   
      
                  Happiness is a warm puppy.   
      
                  Home is where the heart is.   
      
                  Honesty is the best policy.   
      
                  Many a mickle makes a muckle (Scottish proverb).   
      
                  Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.   
      
                  The square on the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of   
                    the squares on the other two sides.   
      
      
   If we cast our minds back a century or so, many people from Ireland decided to   
   relocate in the USA because the Potato Blight meant they didn't have enough to   
   eat.  Not long afterward some of my ancestors from England decided to relocate   
   in Canada... perhaps at least in part, as I discovered recently, because there   
   was an economic recession in certain areas which made it difficult for them to   
   find paid employment.  When I run examples through my head, using synonyms for   
   "lack", I keep coming up with the same answers.  Whether these people suffered   
   from a lack of food, an insufficiency of funds, or what have you they chose to   
   "seek their fortune" in a developing country which eagerly adopted & sometimes   
   even actively recruited farmers & other skilled workers of all sorts....  :-))   
      
      
      
      
   --- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+   
    * Origin: Wits' End, Vancouver CANADA (1:153/716)   
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