Such as?

Question

I’ve heard people use all of the above expressions. But is any one of them is better than the others? Personally, the first one sounds most natural.

There is no such thing as...

There is no such a thing as...

There are no such things as...

Anonymous · Accepted Answer

teacherJapanThere is no such thing as...

This is usual and unremarkable.

teacherJapanThere is no such a thing as...

This is wrong. If you wanted an "a", you could change it to "There is not such a thing as …", but that would require some special context.

teacherJapanThere are no such things as...

This is possible as a reply to a comment that used the plural, but I can't think of a context where the singular construction would not be just as good or better. The plural sounds forced to me, but it is not at all wrong.

Billy: Mom, there are ghosts in my closet.

Mom: There are no such things as ghosts.

or

Mom: There is no such thing as a ghost.

Cool Breeze · Answer

teacherJapanI’ve heard people use all of the above expressions.

You mean you've heard people use all of the expressions below.

teacherJapanBut is any one of them is better than the others?

One 'is' too many!

teacherJapanPersonally, I think the first one sounds (the) most natural.

So do I. The second one is ungrammatical since you cannot say no a thing. The third is grammatical, but people may not use it very often, which means it may sound unnatural.

Adding the article (the) before most natural makes it unmistakably a superlative. Without the article the meaning could be understood to be 'very/extremely natural'.

Cf. You were most kind to reply so soon.

CB

Such as?

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