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Subject:Re: IS or ARE From:Phil03 <philstokes03 -at- googlemail -dot- com> To:Tony Chung <tonyc -at- tonychung -dot- ca> Date:Wed, 25 Jul 2012 13:21:26 +0700
> But are we just picking at hairs
I like picking at hairs (it's what I was trained to do!). :p
> You see: "months of free service" is the object in this specific form of the statement
No, that's not possible to determine from syntax alone. You have to consider the semantic intent.
Whether 'two' is modifying 'months of free service' or whether 'two months' is modifying 'free service' depends what question the statement is implicitly answering:
'How many months of free service do you give?' versus 'How much free service do you give?'
That kind of context is normally understood and not made explicit in most communicative channels (eg., speech).
When you are writing fossilised documents to an imagined audience, the writer has to choose a context and a form that fits it.
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