Conjunction reduction and singular/plural ambiguity

Asked Jan 19 '22 at 09:05

Active Jan 19 '22 at 13:09

Viewed 37 times

There is one XYZ formulation and one ABC formulation.

The original statement is:
[…] that allows for a comparison between the XYZ formulation and the ABC formulation.

Which of the following mean the same/are also correct?

edited Jan 19 '22 at 13:09

KillingTime

asked Jan 19 '22 at 09:05

hveng

1

(2) needs formulations, but (3) uses conjunction reduction in a standard fashion. – Edwin Ashworth Jan 19 '22 at 12:30
2

Does this answer your question? Singular or plural usage for ellipsis in direct object etc. – Edwin Ashworth Jan 19 '22 at 12:33
@EdwinAshworth, thanks so far but (3) make it sound like there are several XYZ formulations and several ABC formulations which is not the case. There is only one of each. – hveng Jan 19 '22 at 13:03
1

@hveng, Actually the XYZ and ABC are the two that make the plural of formulations even though there is one of each. – Elliot Jan 19 '22 at 14:11
I'm going with a comparison between the two formulations—XYZ and ABC. – Yosef Baskin Jan 19 '22 at 14:16
1

English has built-in ambiguities. 'I saw red and blue birds in the garden' doesn't tell you how many (other than 1 or more of each). Deletions (including conjunction deletions) can add ambiguity. (2) here is ungrammatical, needing the plural. If not precise enough, you must avoid the deletion. – Edwin Ashworth Jan 19 '22 at 17:19
For the same reason, I'd also pluralize "formulation" in (1). Making it singular implies that there is only formulation, which can be described as both "XYZ" and "ABC". – MarcInManhattan Jan 19 '22 at 22:15
thank you all for your effort – hveng Jan 20 '22 at 08:42

0 Answers0