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Singular "They"


R_1

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Calligraphette_Coe

Deer.

Sheep.

Moose.

Aircraft.

Enough said?

Fish

Pants

Shorts

Scissors

Pliers

Bison

Salmon

Offspring

.....precedents. :)

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I finally can copy and paste within sandboxed browser. Finally! Almighty Jesus Christ, I had to take 6 hours dedicated to solving it.

For the "they is so good at this" example, I'd like to point out that when using they as a plural or singular pronoun, it would still be "they are so good at this", in the same way "you are so good at this" doesn't become "you is so good at this" when being used as a singular you. I personally think if we can use "you are" for singular and plural purposes, we can also use "they are" in exactly the same way.

He is, she is, they is....

They are, he are, she are.

You see what's odd here? They is, and he are, she are sounds way out of place.

For plural you, and single you, I always see you as something that involves the you yourself. Not seeing a issue there.

NOTE: I can't copy and paste on Sandboxie. :/

I am perfectly aware that "they is" sounds out of place. My point is that I feel this is irrelevant, as when using they as a singular pronoun, we would still use plural verb forms in the same way we use plural forms of verbs when using the singular you. Therefore it would be:

Singular- I am, you are, he is, she is, they are

Plural- We are, you are, they are

What I'm trying to say is that they as a singular third person pronoun works in exactly the same was as you does as a singular second person pronoun. Even if, despite this, you still find singular they weird and hard to get used to, it's hardly the most irregular thing in the English language, as Dodecahedron has pointed out.

I think I forgot to mention that I do notice a decreasing use of "you are" in plural form, and "they are" in singular form, but that could be just me, but literally looking back at my memory, it really does seem to me that way. But, yeah irregularity just might be my pet peeves, and ambiguity is also another one of my pet peeves since in a ideal world, there should be universal language which attempts to address all of those at once, and one that is close to my preferred language which is English. Mathematics is great, but it's not for communication like this, but at least mathematics is actually somewhat consistent. I still can't be arsed to try to learn another language when it takes me over 20 years just to learn one at a proficient level, and neither I see a incentive to.

Oh, and as for gendered language (whoever mentioned it), that's a good complaint about Spanish, and other languages which is so heavily gendered.

I haven't noticed a decrease in plural you are, I'll have to keep an eye out for that. Also I think Esperanto was intended to be a universal language but it didn't really get anywhere (at least I assume so since It was apparently created in 1887 and isn't exactly all that mainstream yet). Supposedly it's easier to learn than English.
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