Re: Missing Singulars

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:

>
> On 2008-12-19 09:13, Brian M. Scott wrote:
>
> > Unlike 'sand', 'milk', etc., it takes a plural verb: 'the
> > cattle are in the barn'.
>
> It's a collective plural sensu stricto, the clearest example of one in
> English. Many group nouns (<family, police, committee, audience, crew>
> etc.) optionally behave in a similar way, especially in British

English,

> but their status is slightly different. For example, we say <these
> cattle/people>, but never <these committee>. <These/those police>

sounds

> perfectly acceptable to me (I wonder how the native speakers of English
> feel about it), but then <police> functions like a count plural rather
> than a collective (it can be used with numerals, while <cattle> can't).
>
> Piotr
>

Yes, <these/those police> is probably acceptable, although I seldom
hear anything other than <the police>. More likely one would say
<these/those policemen> (or <police officers>, especially if women are
included). But I disagree: I don't think one can say "ten police" or
"I counted seven police", at least I wouldn't say those. One would
more likely say "ten police officers" or "I counted seven policemen".
So I think <police> behaves more like <cattle> (takes a plural verb)
except it's usually prefixed by <the> and whereas one might say <some
cattle> one wouldn't say <some police>.

Andrew