Prepositions are weird

[rivka]

That doesn't work -- you can pluck an individual hair, what would be the equivalent for a milk (or water)?

A drop.

[Porter]

Beeves?  Like at Quiznos they have all different kinds of beeves to choose from?

Beeves (or beefs) is the plural of this definition:

2 a: an ox, cow, or bull in a full-grown or nearly full-grown state; especially : a steer or cow fattened for food <quality Texas beeves> <a herd of good beef> b: a dressed carcass of a beef animal

[Farmgirl]

I live in the heart of cattle country, and I've never heard "beeves"

Beef has always been the plural of beef around here.

(like deer and deer)


 

[dkw]

That doesn't work -- you can pluck an individual hair, what would be the equivalent for a milk (or water)?

A drop.

Right, but neither "milk" or water" is the plural of "drop."

Fish confuses the issue because the plural of fish is spelled the same way as the singular.  That doesn't mean you're refering to the substance when talking about a school of fish.  

And German also uses the plural when discussing haircolor -- Tracy's hairs are red.  My hairs are brown.

[Farmgirl]

Tracy's hairs are red and white.        

[Porter]

Right, but neither "milk" or water" is the plural of "drop."

I don't see how that really makes much of a difference, besides confusing the issue.

Or rather, it's the fact that hair (substance) and hair (individual element) look and sound the same that confuses the issue.

Let's suppose that we spoke a dialect where the individual elements of hair were always called strands and never of hairs[/i].  In that case hair would be exactly analogous to milk.

drop : drops : milk :: strand : strands : hair

You can see in this situation what I meant by "Hair is singular for the same reason that milk is."

I don't think that changing the word for the analogy to drop from strand to hair changes the fact that milk and hair, when used as substance nouns are both singular for the same reason.  Because they're both substance nouns.

[dkw]

Nope, I still don't see it.

Because when you have all the hairs together, you still see the individual hairs (or strands) and when you pull them apart the hairs are the same as they were before.  They never lose their individual identity.  But if you put a bunch of drops of milk together they lose their individualness and you can't pull out the same drop(s) that you put in.  

[Porter]

grain of salt : grains of salt : salt :: strand of hair : strands of hair : hair

There could be a dialect where a grain of salt could also be called a salt, just like a strand of hair can also be called a hair.

It wouldn't make it odd that salt (substance) is singular at all, except that it's a funny coincidence that the singular individual noun is identical to the substance noun, which is singular because substance nouns are always singular.


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Is that actually true? There's the old puzzle "Which weighs more, a ton of bricks or a ton of feathers?"  Are bricks and [/i]feathers[/i] plural substance nouns?  I don't think so -- I think they're plural individual nouns, but I'm not positive.

[Jonathon]

Mass nouns do not take the plural inflection, so those would have to be plural count nouns.

link

[Porter]

I live in the heart of cattle country, and I've never heard "beeves"

Beef has always been the plural of beef around here.

(like deer and deer)

I read it just the other day in a book by Joe Salatin, a Virginian.

[theCrowsWife]

I think there's a good chance that Salatin coined that term. I think I've pretty much only seen it used in pasture-farming circles. It's a useful word, though.

--Mel

[Porter]

Um, it was in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary entry for beef which I quoted above:

2 a: an ox, cow, or bull in a full-grown or nearly full-grown state; especially : a steer or cow fattened for food <quality Texas beeves> <a herd of good beef> b: a dressed carcass of a beef animal

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stone : stones : stone

[Jonathon]

Ooh! Good one.

[theCrowsWife]

I stand corrected.

--Mel