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.

Comments

At least we've still got the gif debate

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate when people pronounce gif as gif instead of gif. Everyone knows it's gif!

Data are an Android

[Anonymous Coward]

"Data are an Android." No sir, I don't like it.

No

[wonkey_monkey]

No it aren't.

like deer and fish, but the other way around

[XXongo]

"data" is the plural of "datum", but it's also the singular of "data".

kinda like "deer" is both the singular of "deer", and also the plural of "deer".

Re:like deer and fish, but the other way around

[fibonacci8]

The plural of "pope" is "the Western Schism".

Plural in Latin, singular in English

[Tough Love]

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.

What about hospital?

[110010001000]

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".

Re:What about hospital?

[JoeDuncan]

That one's easy. When you say "in the hospital", the use of the definitive article "the" implies that it is a *specific* hospital they are in (usually with some understanding that the reader/listener is already aware of which *specific* hospital is under discussion).

When you say someone is "in hospital" it is a more general statement, saying that they are in a hospital somewhere receiving medical treatment, but does not imply that the *specific* hospital in question is already shared knowledge with the listener.

USians tend to use "in the hospital" for the most part because their health care system sucks balls and in most places there is only ONE local hospital which you could be referring to.

In other countries with proper healthcare, there are multiple possible hospitals, and the specific hospital can't be assumed by context.

Re:What about hospital?

[JoeDuncan]

Spoken like a true and proper douche who has never left their own town. Is it really any wonder why there's a strong anti-europe sentiment in the US when there's people as condescending as yourself?

Wow. You really are an idiot.

I'm Canadian, moron. Also, the only douches here are the ones posting AC LOL...

Realistically, I can take any socialized health care system and point out to a way that it's inferior to the US system.

No, you can't, because they aren't. The US has the worst health care in the developed world; Mexico and Cuba are better.

The thing people as naive as yourself don't realize is every system has its positives and every system has its negatives.

Nope. The thing USians don't realize - because they've deliberately lobotomized their educational system, and therefore have a hopelessly parochial and myopic view of the world - is that health care is better just about ANYWHERE in the world that isn't a third-world banana republic, and even some of THOSE have better health care!

Honestly, I don't know what else to expect from a degenerate culture that uses their own children for target practice though...

Just came here to argue the opposite case

[SuperKendall]

...but then I read the summary and was too bored to figure out what the opposite case is supposed to be.

Re:Is it?

[Waffle Iron]

Are we sure it is?

We're pretty sure, but we need to wait until more data is available before we officially close the debate.

We're pretty sure, but we need to wait until more data are available before we officially close the debate.

Well, that settles it: The second form just feels weird and stilted, like a grammar rule from a musty out-of-date dictionary. Debate closed.

Re:What debate?

[dgatwood]

The problem is that the word is more commonly used now as a synonym for "information". You would never say "informations". At this point, it is mostly treated as plural in scientific contexts, and even there, it has often been superseded by the compound word "data point", which is obviously and trivially pluralizable.

BTW, Oxford weighed in a while back.

Re:How do you tell if someone is an idiot?

[cybersquid]

Thank you for your participation. ;-)

Let's compromise

[reboot246]

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).

Re:What debate?

[dgatwood]

For example, you never say: "I found a data" just like you never say "I found a stuff".

I agree. However, the reason you would never say that is because "stuff" is uncountable. Using the article "a" is nonsensical, because that implies that there can be exactly one of something, and thus it must be countable. Just as you can't have exactly one, you can't have more than one, hence it is neither singular nor plural, per se. If "data" can't be used in that way for the same reason, then it, too, is an uncountable mass noun.

So no... the word "data" cannot be singular.

Except uncountable nouns in English always take a singular verb, e.g. "This stuff is gross," not "This stuff are gross". "The flour is in the cupboard," not "The flour are in the cupboard," and so on.

The only way "data" can be plural is if you treat it as the plural of datum, which only makes sense if you are talking about a specific, countable set of data points. The result of an experiment produces data that is a collection of datum, hence ostensibly countable, so using it in the plural form is acceptable. When we start talking about the flow of data across a network, that's not really countable in any meaningful sense, because it varies from moment to moment, so it is uncountable, and must take a singular verb.

Re: Is it?

[Austerity Empowers]

This is why Dr. Pulaski lasted only one season, she was an inhuman monster.

It's worse with dollars

[slickwillie]

As in " One million dollars was spent . . ." instead of "were spent".

Re:Is it?

[CanadianMacFan]

We're pretty sure but we need to wait until we have more data before we officially close the debate.

When in doubt change the sentence so that you get around the tricky bit.

Re:Is it?

[Hallux-F-Sinister]

You've (perhaps deliberately) misunderstood the argument. In your example, is you/are you, the choice of conjugation of the verb "to be" is based on "you" not "data". This is like people arguing about the difference between rope and line (on a boat or a ship) and you come along and say "a line is the shortest distance between two points, and that rope you're all arguing about is coiled up, so..." which has nothing to do with what they're talking about.

Incidentally, is it my family IS or my family ARE? Data can be multiple pieces of information even about multiple things, and as a single umbrella name for that information, it would be appropriate to say "the data is..." just like "my family is". Data is information, and we don't say "the information are missing". We say "the information IS missing"...

The data is all in, and my family entirely agrees with me on this point. (See, data here, multiple pieces of information is treated as a singular noun, just like family.)
You could also say "The data are ..." Hmm... actually I don't like that one. I came here to make ONE point and ended up taking a side instead. DAMNIT!

Okay, put me down as "Data IS". NOW... is it DAY-tuh, (first syllable rhymes with LAY) or DAA-tuh? (first syllable rhymes with CAT)?

I'm in the "rhymes with LAY" camp. So "The DAY-tuh IS..."

Damnit. I was going to make ONE comment and leave. ONE lousy stupid comment and get on with my fucking life... DON'T get drawn into this stupid arguement, I said to myself...

(Wanders off muttering to self)