0
Eipjoo Posted 14 years ago
Grammar
Why does he use plural form?
In the video, I think that ‘them’ needs to be changed into a singular form, for there’s singular form of ‘person.’ Is there something wrong of my guessing?
[My dictation]
Imagine you’ve got a train and it’s hurtling down a track. In its path 5 people are trapped on the line and cannot escape. Fortunately you can flick a switch which diverts the train down a fork in that track away from those 5 people, but at a price. There is another person trapped down that fork, and the train will kill them instead. Question: Should you flick the switch?
http://blog.naver.com/eyeflamesn/70152302815
[My dictation]
Imagine you’ve got a train and it’s hurtling down a track. In its path 5 people are trapped on the line and cannot escape. Fortunately you can flick a switch which diverts the train down a fork in that track away from those 5 people, but at a price. There is another person trapped down that fork, and the train will kill them instead. Question: Should you flick the switch?
http://blog.naver.com/eyeflamesn/70152302815
Top answer
’ Is there something wrong of my guessing? So which singular form would you change it to?
- ’ Is there something wrong of my guessing?
- So which singular form would you change it to?
Get the Weekly English Kit 📬
New words, one handy idiom, and a 2-minute quiz — delivered to your inbox to keep your streak alive.
4 Answers
0
eipjooIn the video, I think that ‘them’ needs to be changed into a singular form, for there’s singular form of ‘person.’ Is there something wrong of my guessing?So which singular form would you change it to?
00
0
eipjooHas it not got to be changed into 'him' or 'her'?Yes, that's the issue. If you use "her" that might change the decision, mightn't it?
Since there is no gender-neutral singular pronoun in English (we don't refer to people as "it"), you will frequently see that the plural form is used instead.
This has become much more accepted in the past 20 year
00
YES.. great discovery for me. If there were no explanation of this, I may be thinking he was not correct picking up a word. Thank you.
0
Related Questions