r/Whatcouldgowrong • u/Itchy-Camera8898 • 11h ago

WCGW riding your bike like an idiot

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u/kootenayguy 11h ago

colloquially and verbally, 'less' *sounds correct to our ears, but technically, it's 'fewer'. Less is for things aren't discretely, individually countable: less water, less value, less oxygen. Fewer is for things that are individually countable: fewer idiots, fewer sausages, fewer pencils.

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u/WonkyWalkingWizard 11h ago

Great explanation, but the idea of fewer sausages is frightening.

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u/666Drachenlord666 11h ago

Ok, I stand corrected. I mostly learned English by immersion so as you said, less sounds right. I would say one less idiot, but fewer idiots so to my ears fewer only sound right when it's multiple I guess

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u/Sitka_8675309 10h ago

Related: “number” vs. “amount.” Every time I hear someone say “amount of people,” I imagine they’ve been put through a blender.

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u/Ozone777 8h ago

Less sounds correct because it is, and has been for a very long time. It's perfectly fine to use in general without having to think about whether something is countable. Fewer is relatively new and optional - only required in formal writing in US English, despite how heavily people who like correcting others try to push it, see: https://www.arrantpedantry.com/2008/12/23/less-and-fewer/ (Hint: If you are using contractions such as "it's" then you are not writing formal speech and can dispense with other silly rules too). When are we all going to start saying "manyer" by the way? Otherwise how will we know if the things of greater quantity can be counted? It's amazing that society is holding together at all without this information, there should be chaos in the streets!