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It's Time to End the 'Data Is' vs 'Data Are' Debate (vice.com)
dmoberhaus writes: After receiving too many irate emails about using "data" in the singular, a reporter spoke to two lexicographers about how the language changes over time and why it's perfectly acceptable and perhaps even "standard" to use data as a singular noun, rather than a plural noun in an attempt to settle an old debate. Peter Sokolowski, a lexicographer for the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, told the reporter that data's transition between its historical roots and contemporary use is related to a lexical phenomenon called "semantic bleaching," where a word's original meaning is lost or diminished over time. An example of semantic bleaching include the contemporary use of the word "literally," whose Latin root, littera, means "letter." In the case of "data," it has transitioned from "things given" to mean something like "a collection of information in aggregate" when used in everyday speech.
Are we sure it is?
I hate when people pronounce gif as gif instead of gif. Everyone knows it's gif!
How is this a debate? Look in a dictionary. The word has a literal dictionary definition. :-)
The two dictionaries I just checked say data is the plural of datum.
People who use it differently either knowingly choose to (which is fine with me) or they are ignorant.
Was too busy programming my data-are-base.
Now can we debate whether email should be pluralized?
"Data are an Android." No sir, I don't like it.
They participate in inane meaningless debates like "is data plural or singular"?, while the rest of the world just laughs at them and keeps on.
Data is the plural of datum. Should we allow "datum are" also?
Just blowhards in armchairs that want the world to follow their rules rather than actual usage.
Until I read this article, I would have had no idea that according to some dated ruleset, you're "supposed" to say "data are", which sounds incredibly wrong to my native english speaker ears.
It's what's called a non-count noun (like "courage"); something you can have a little of, or more of. If you want "data" to be the plural of a count noun, you'd need to have "datum" appear as the singular fairly frequently, which it just doesn't.
i don't see why it matters, this kind of dumb argument happens every few years when words see different usage, a never ending cycle of complaining. unless you can physically force the population to speak a certain way, the definitions and usage for words will vary over time.
Nothing to add.
No it aren't.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
kinda like "deer" is both the singular of "deer", and also the plural of "deer".
Plural in Latin, singular mass noun in English, does it need to be any more complicated? Strictly speaking, if you mean to write the latin word in English prose then you should italicize it.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
I still want to know why in the UK they say "in hospital" instead of "in the hospital". What's up with that? And don't get me started with "math" vs "maths".
...my data is/are gender-flex and plural-flex. Deal with.
Table-ized A.I.
so is "datas" the plural now ? How long before the plural becomes datases ?
Nullius in verba
It's not "very unique". It's either one of a kind, or not. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know "unusual" has been added as one possible meaning of unique in Websters, but that was more recent, and frankly, I think the definition should revert back to being without a like or equal. It was such a fantastic word for that purpose.
As it stands now, you might as well just say, "that's unusual." It means the same thing in our modern lexicon.
Data is the plural of datum. Should we allow "datum are" also?
It sounds ok if somebody says "I have one datum." Would it sound right if somebody said "I have two data."?
If you're writing for a lay audience, no one cares. If you're writing for an academic audience, you need to use plural verbs (think: data = numbers) as this rule is deeply entrenched in academia. I don't see this changing any time soon.
...but then I read the summary and was too bored to figure out what the opposite case is supposed to be.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Data are as data does
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
it is "I is the Borg" not "We are the Borg".
is opinion on the English language doesn't mean anything as Merriam-Webster is an American dictionary. Get someone from Oxford and then I'll listen.
Spoken like a true provincial. Let me guess, you voted Leave too. Should be amusing to hear you whinge when the food shortages kick in post-Brexit.
Data was never assimilated by the Borg, and therefore has always been singular, not plural. Case closed.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
You is right!
#DeleteChrome
Why? English pronunciation sucks, where's that extra "i" you keep pronouncing in Aluminum? There ain't no "i" between the "n" and the "u".
And if you shuddered on the word "ain't" then my post did what it was intended to do.
Why do you keep putting the "e" after the "r" in Theater, that blows the pronunciation to bits, but after the "aluminum" debacle, I guess I should just expect incorrect pronunciation for plain English words.
Glad nobody corrected me. Last time somebody told me the right way to say GIF I wanted to hurt them.
Those who prefer a singular “data” should learn to say “data set” or "data point”, and be done with it.
Welcome to Mount Mole Hill.
Error: NSE - No Signature Error
The real distinction is between a 'mass noun' and a 'count noun.' When your server asks you "would you like french fries or mashed potato?", french fries is a count noun and mashed potato is a mass noun. We usually use water as a mass noun, but biblically, waters meant multiple (countable) bodies of water.
So the question about 'data' is whether it has transitioned from something countable to something measured in bulk ( e.g. ounces of rice versus grains of rice). The claim here is that more people are using data as a mass noun, and I tend to agree.
Full disclosure: decades ago I was a C student in highschool Latin.
I'll stop saying "data are" when the rest of you stop using plural verbs with collective nouns. The team "IS" winning, not the team "are" winning. Sure, they may say it like that across the pond (the UK), but here (the US) collective nouns are singular and take a singular verb (most of the time - there are a few exceptions).
data to me is like water. If you are talking about lots of water, you dont say "water are wet" you say "water IS wet" (debate on the factuality of this statement reserved for another time).
Yes, it's plural, but it's treated like a singular blob, not number of discrete entities (at least in language).
Those who prefer a plural data should learn to say "data is" like everyone else.
Side topic, but I'm not a against a split. In my frank opinion, the red states are conspiratorial troglodytes who are increasingly dragging us down and poisoning the land.
Um, I'd like to see the math on that. Screwing blindfold produces pregnancy even. And, there's always immigrants to supplement population.
Table-ized A.I.
So I'll just leave that here.
Is also the most popular show on US TV.
It's not you, it's I.
That's nice that you knew some Latin and are also familiar with the mass/count distinction, but I question whether you're a native English speaker, when you claim that a server asks if you want "mashed potato". It's always always always mashed potatoes.
> where's that extra "i" you keep pronouncing in Aluminum? There ain't no "i" between the "n" and the "u".
Because Noah Webster wrote it down wrong when the version with two "i"s was already in common usage in the States. I don't hold much faith in a dictionary when its founder can't spell.
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
That's nice that you knew some Latin and are also familiar with the mass/count distinction, but I question whether you're a native English speaker, when you claim that a server asks if you want "mashed potato". It's always always always mashed potatoes.
The big question is if the chef literally only mashed a single potato and served it to you, would it still be mashed potatoes?
Oh come on, they will have all the spam they want!
Please tell me you're not so stupid you actually believe that.
IS.
The Brits actually pronounce things the same way they spell them, unlike us Americans. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
> We usually use water as a mass noun, but biblically, waters meant multiple (countable) bodies of water.
Yeah. About that: ".. and the Spirit of God moved across the face of the waters..." (Genesis) when there supposedly wasn't *any* water yet, let alone multiple globs of it. Which is presumably why in some translations "waters" becomes "the deep" to avoid linguistic arguments like this one...
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
The employer of Mr. Sokolowski, Merriam-Webster contradicts him. "Data" is the plural of "datum". Get over it.
The plural of "criteria" is "criterion", and many people misuse the former to mean the latter.
I'm an American, so I am accustomed to American English. Maths makes perfect sense to me.
The symbols "cue" can mean completely different things in different languages. The arrow symbol means completely different, unrelated, things in different algebras. I literally do relational algebra in my sleep, and barely remember linear algebra at all. Relational algebra and linear algebra have pretty much nothing at all to do one one another, yet both are algebras. Much like Japanese and German and both spoken languages.
Number theory and geometry are pretty much unrelated topics. Just as chemistry and geography are sciences, number theory and geometry are maths.
To me, "maths" is just as logical as "sciences". It makes little sense to act like astronomy and biology are the same thing. They are different sciences. Ternary logic is a very different math than trigonometry, though both study a triad.
Look at all the other metals. Titanium, lithium, etc. "Aluminum" was a typo in a single dictionary which then spread that misspelling across America, and it became established as a result. Silly, really, but goes to show how changes can spread for really no reason at all other than acceptance of what's in a book must be correct, and going with it.
Indeed. Now I'm off to meet my friend Lieutenant Maurice in Leominster. I met him at Magdalen College, where I worked as a clerk.
I'm happy when language evolves -- when that evolution is intentional. But when that evolution is the result of really very stupid people, or just plain error and mistake, well then those evolutions are to be resisted.
AN example of semantic bleaching INCLUDES
EXAMPLES of semantic bleaching INCLUDE
You don't get to label your own errors as evolution when you don't even realize that you're making them.
As for "literally", well, I've spent twenty years saying "I'm using the word 'literally' figuratively." -- which is, of course, completely valid since any word can be used figuratively. See? Intentional.
So there.
Translations with 'the deep' also include 'waters' later in the same sentence. The Bible doesn't say that the waters were created later, just that they were separated later.
Two men claimed to have walked into a bar. Only one had the bruises to prove it.
You are all morons. Datum is singular. Data is plural unless it's the proper name of an android. The 'person' is; the 'people' are. The set name takes on the properties of the group. Only libtards say 'the people is'. Case closed.
That typo claim factually incorrect.
Once you invoke the stupid "language evolves!" clause, anything goes. There are no rules, because the rules always change!
As in " One million dollars was spent . . ." instead of "were spent".
Oh, I'm sorry, sir. I'm anaspeptic, phrasmotic, even compunctuous to have caused you such pericombobulation.
"Panini" is italian plural of panino and so it means "sandwiches". In English speaking world it is used as a singular noun with "paninis" as plural. Nothing to stress over, languages are malleable.
I to tech support for desktop software. It seems every newby and many old-timers simply don't know what "upload" means (or "download, for that matter). They seem to think it can mean any of: save, load, import, export, rip, burn, copy, transfer, install, launch, forward, update, upgrade, and probably others. Here, i've taken my best stab and providing the original meaning: i hope i've got it, feel free to update my map:
Upload:
To transfer a file over a network (usually over the internet) or other connection, from the computer you are controlling (typically your local machine) to a different computer, server or device (typically remote server). You are "pushing" the file to "up" to the "cloud", to it's destination, like when you "upload" a photo to Facebook or a video to YouTube.
Note that this is NOT the same as Ripping, Copying, Burning, Importing, Loading, Updating, or Downloading, these words are NOT interchangeable.
You typically "control" the computer that is physically sitting in front of you, but this distinction is subtle. You may instead do a screen share where you control a computer down the street, and, controlling it's screen, cause a connection from that remote computer back to the computer that is physically in front of you. Then from the "down the street" computer, you transfer a file TO the computer sitting in front of you. This is still an "Upload", and NOT a "Download", even though the file is traveling FROM the remote computer TO the one in front of you.
An historic event!
One data, please!
TO BUY A NEW CAR WOULD MAKE YOU SEXUALLY ATTRACTIVE.
I first learned to program in high school in 1972 on an old retired-in-place IBM 1440, using FORTRAN IV or punched cards.
Along with our program deck, we also had our "data deck", which was composed of multiple "datum cards".
We even used the term "datum processing" when we processed each card as it was read, and "data processing" when we read everything into an array then processed that. For example, to keep the data array "clean", input verification was done as "datum processing", then the resulting known-good array was done as "data processing".
We'd lose points on exams for missing the distinction and getting it wrong.
It's singular. Consider:
"Data are the android on the Enterprise" vs.
"Data is the android on the Enterprise".
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
It was named aluminum by the discoverer and renamed because it didn't sound like those other metals.
At this time, both are accepted.
Exactly! The reason most Americans can't spell properly traces back to the spelling mistakes in Noah Webster's dictionary.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
Now, we can get on to Oxford comma.
Me speek inglush good!
I thought it was an intentional attempt to make the language more phonetic.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
> It's always always always mashed potatoes.
Except it's definitely not.
It's always mashed potato.
You may want to speak to some people outside of your village. You'll discover that English isn't a single language. It's many mutually comprehensible languages. It's not American vs British English, or even American vs, British, vs Australia, vs New Zealand vs South African English.
It's hundreds and hundreds of languages with different (but overlapping) vocabularies and even grammars.
So declaring "Always", and "Wrong" or "Correct" about English (and any language with more than four speakers) is Always Wrong.
That's why "Standard" is the terminology that people use. And standard itself implies "standard within a certain context".
How's that?
From the Grammarist: Data is or data are? | The singular vs plural debate
Datum is the correct singular version of data.
But didn't they just make it a plural because mayim is a plural? As in, too literal translation?
Data is singular when it's an abbreviation of the collective noun 'dataset'. The only people that I know that insist 'data' is plural are 60+ year old scientists who speak Latin.
For those of you who insist that 'data' is plural, then by that same logic, 'agenda' (a collection of agendum) is also plural.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Yeah, datum is singular, but any collection of 2 or more bits is plural "data." Since we already have the word "bit," datum is superfluous; the word data is appropriate for essentially all cases.
And we measure data in bulk like 3 gigs of data, 3 gallons of water. It's the gallons & gigs that are plural, not the water, not the data.
"Datum" has become the kind of pedantry up with which I will not put!
Should be amusing to hear you whinge when the food shortages kick in post-Brexit.
whinge???
That's nice that you knew some Latin and are also familiar with the mass/count distinction, but I question whether you're a native English speaker, when you claim that a server asks if you want "mashed potato". It's always always always mashed potatoes.
As a native English speaker myself, I have never until now encountered or even heard of someone referring to mashed potato as "mashed potatoes". It might be a quirk of your region. Regardless, it's certainly not universal.
What do you know. You blocks call chips by the wrong name!
How about we let the people who actually work in a field develop jargon and mannerisms and nomenclatures and speaking patterns relating to that field? Reporters, English majors, etc - their job is to, well they don't do much - but their job isn't to dictate how we speak, they're allowed to catalog in non-binding ways at best.
>_ is related to a lexical phenomenon called "semantic bleaching," where a word's original meaning is lost or diminished over time. An example of semantic bleaching include the contemporary use of the word "literally," whose Latin root, littera, means "letter."
Where's the "semantic bleaching", whatever that might be?
What does he think "letter" means?
Unless he means that "letter" as a message is the semantic bleaching he wants to show us.
Because my language has no such derivation, a letter==message is a "carta"; and a letter==symbol is a "letra" -- from "littera"... almost literally... heh!
You see, literally (AFAIU) means something said is so equal to an original phrase, that is identical even at the symbol level. I don't see any "semantic whatever" that needs to be used.
With that out of the way, let me address the "data" issue itself.
To me, the root of the problem is that the word came from another language and applying English rules to it creates a plethora of problems.
I know it's in your nature to be nosy but you should stay out of things that don't concern you, American. They are too complex for your kind to understand. Perhaps you should focus on your own issues, education (or lack thereof) and what little culture you actually have.
blocks? lmao. Almost fell off my chair.
Is that a roll of dimes in your pocket or are you happy to see me?
With no difference between singular and plural in the verb. In Danish we have the the word "er" for all the presence cases of "is/are/am". Much simpler to learn.
I don't know why we ended up with a much simpler grammar than German, from where we are influenced a lot.
Google Ngrams currently puts it close to 50:50 for British English, but with "potatoes" winning historically. It's about 90:10 in favour of "potatoes" for American English.
Sounds terrific.
When used as 'data is', it's used in the same way as when you say 'food is'. You don't say 'food are'. Mr. Sokolowski has his head so far up his ass that he doesn't realize that this has nothing to do with semantic bleaching. The language has been expanded, not mutated.
In Britain it's "mashed potato"; the plural just sounds wrong to my ears.
And who doesn't use the thoughtless use of "literally" as a positive example.
Can we use bleach to prevent the semantic apocalypse?
Well I assume you mean the plural of criterion is criteria.
But yeah you see that all the time!
There was also a story about some aspie who instead of getting a life, set out to correct the world about using "comprising of".
I wish I (non-native-english) hadn't read about it, because now I see that a lot too.
Also, people talk about "a visa", which I found suspect but actually is correct.
In my country (NL), the singular is "visum" and plural "visa".
(In case other crosslanguage-wannabe-grammarnazis were hoping to use that as their anger generator.)
Peter Sokolowski is only one datum.
300 million americans call them mashed potatoes. How many brits?
Where english is not primary language.
Like butter, singular.
Data about one person IS STILL DATA.
name: ananon, pnone number: xxx-xxxxxx
1 piece of data about one person.
In Britain it's "mashed potato"; the plural just sounds wrong to my ears.
So, if you're serving twenty people the same dish, each one only gets a thimbleful of mashed potato?
Now we know how the Irish starved to death.
Mash ALL of them, Bobby!
It depends where you are. A British server is likely to ask you if you want "some mash."
What debate? To my knowledge there has never been a debate over data "is" vs. data "are."
Data are. That is all there is to it. Anyone who says "data is" is making a mockery of both science and language.
The audience for this debate are British.
Or, the audience for this debate is American.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Maybe we should worry about this once we've dealt with functional illiteracy. We could also solve the problem of poor grammar in the lyrics of all forms of music, develop a cure for the common cold, and genetically engineer pigs to have wings.
The English language uses plural words for singular objects, like 'trousers' or 'pants', 'scissors', 'stairs', 'guts' and 'brains'.
In such cases the verb follows the noun:, as is 'his trousers are dirty' instead of 'his trousers is dirty'.
"We're pretty sure, but we must wait until we we receive a data from Cowboy Neal before we finalise this discussions."
From the UK here. Origin of the English language. It's mashed potato. Although you might call it mashed potatoes across the pond.
I generally order potato purée
"Lo spaghetto più lungo del mondo ha una lunghezza di 455 m ed è stato realizzato da Ranieri Borgnolo, il 10 settembre 2005 a Ober-Ramstadt (Germania)."
[https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spaghetti]
You are all morons. Datum is singular. Data is plural unless it's the proper name of an android. The 'person' is; the 'people' are. The set name takes on the properties of the group. Only libtards say 'the people is'. Case closed.
People can also be singular. People (plural) is the same as personas ("persons") in Spanish. People (singular) is the the same as pueblo (race or group) in Spanish. Hawaii has many peoples (there are a lot of different races that live in Hawaii).
Technically, stairs doesn't count there. Stair means step. Stairs is usually shorthand for stairway. But there's also staircase which is similar to book case in that it's a collective noun.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stair
Yes. These weren't typos, they were choices made about which spelling would be accepted in the dictionary. In most cases there were varying spellings in use Webster just tended to see on the side of phonetic consistency for English rather than preserving word origins and the larger number of spelling rules that required.
The Brits are just jealous because we had some success with spelling reform whereas theirs remains an even bigger mess.
A quarter IS a coin. Multiple quarters ARE things.
A roll of quarters IS a thing.
Data IS a collection of things, it IS the collection, much like a roll of quarters.
Points of data are multiple things. But data, as a collection, IS one collection.
I refuse to sign
What about datas? :/
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Are you truly sure that 300 million americans speak the same way you do?
People from different towns in the same _state_ speak differently.
Another very common mistake is talking about "criteria" when the singular "criterion" is called for.
#1429: Data.
[whinge] To complain persistently and in a peevish or irritating way.
I guess I am more of a native speaker than you! :P
Slashdot Valentines Beta Massacre: iT WORKED! The boycotts killed Beta!!
English != Latin. Quod Erat Demonstrandum.