Is or are with collective nouns from the word box to express the same

Which of the sentences are correct regarding the use of «data + verb»?

a1. «Data about similar projects is useful for estimating project duration».
a2. «Data about similar projects are useful for estimating project duration».

b1. «Personal data is required.»
b2. «Personal data are required.»

I think I should use «are», but I’m really not sure.

Thanks.

marget said:

«Data» plural. Therefore, data are is correct. It sounds odd to us, so we mistakenly use the verb in the singular

fairly often

99.9 percent of the time, but the correct usage is plural.

Hardly anybody says «data are», therefore it is *not* correct.

Hardly anybody in america thinks «data» is a plural. «Data» is a mass noun like «sand» or «water». The opposite view is pedantic clinging to the word’s etymology.

DaleC said:

Hardly anybody says «data are», therefore it is *not* correct.
Hardly anybody in america thinks «data» is a plural.

These are very personal judgements.
Don’t tempt me to come to terms with the ‘rightness’ of what «hardly anybody in America thinks».
Going by what «hardly anyone» does is never a good way to decide on correctness.

The majority of the users of the term, «data» are IT professionals, and to us it is part of our professional jargon. This makes it immune to the rules of grammar, but it doesn’t make it «English.» The other major users of the term are the scientists. Their use of the word probably comes closer to the more standard English usage, and I would venture to guess they know that the word is plural. (Bear in mind, after all, that it is our profession that is responsible for «verbifying» such «nounifications» as «setup» and «logoff,» so that I may be seen setupping my hard drive before logoffing from my computer.)

(But then again, I guess I have «an agenda.» )

maxiogee said:

Going by what «hardly anyone» does is never a good way to decide on correctness.

I am making the point that it *is* usually the correct way in matters of good usage in some language. Most questions of usage are internal to language. Only when a word is rare and/or borrowed from another language or from a technical subvocabulary are we justified in appealing to an «objective» test (As a hypothetical example, if there is a garment worn only by ethnic Japanese and English speakers use the word only when discussing what Japanese do, then the only correct way for English speakers to use the name of the garment would be the Japanese way.) But as I noted, even the objective criterion of word history is not properly a compelling one in usage disputes — it does not properly take precedence over mass practice. As you yourself have noted in the last two days (in a different thread), meanings evolve.

The proper use of «chair» is «piece of furniture designed for one person to sit on that has a back». The sole reason this is the proper use of «chair» is that this is how the native speakers use it.

The use of «data» as a mass noun instead of a count noun is not a youth innovation or a jargon phenomenon. Rather, it is old hat, having established itself in the 1950s or 1960s, if not generations earlier. Therefore, I can be confident my judgement on this one word is not highly personal, but eminently mainstream.

Even if British Isles people like yourself disagree on «data», the member I was responding to is an American who was making a claim about AE.

For those for whom «data» is plural, its singular must be «datum». But the term «datum» is quite rarely.

From Panjandrum’s exposition, it’s clear that only small intellectual cliques make a point of using «data» as a plural. I would remind everybody that the real point of this thread is not the merits of this principle, but how to advise learners of English. It is wrong to tell a learner that some way is «the correct way» when it is followed only in highly demarcated fields of academia (Panjandrum has noted how some information technology fields are on the bandwagon and others not), and is not adopted by other scientists and technicians, not to mention by the general public.

In Google:

«how much data is»: 162,000 hits;
«how many data are»: 9220 hits;
«datum bits»: 218 hits

Hi everyone,

Which is correct:
a) There is no data…..
or
b) There are no data…..

I think technically b is correct as data is the plural of datum but a sounds better (and I think is the norm now)

What do you think?

Andy1

Andy1 said:

Hi everyone,

Which is correct:
a) There is no data…..
or
b) There are no data…..

I think technically b is correct as data is the plural of datum but a sounds better (and I think is the norm now)

What do you think?

Andy1

Hi Andy 1,

Google shows equal hits for «is» and «are» — 898,000,000.

It sounds more natural to me to say, «There is no data.» I never use the singular «datum».

LRV

panjandrum said:

I think you have left out the » » around «data is» and «data are».

Results 1 — 10 of about 211,000,000 for «data is».
Results 1 — 10 of about 95,100,000 for «data are».

So I did. Thanks Panj.

LRV

According to one style guide, «data is rarely treated as a singular when it begins a clause and is not preceded by the definite article.»

You don’t have to be rocket scientist to know that data, like phenomena is plural and that not everyone accepts data as a collective.

So, a2 «Data about similar projects are useful. . . b could go either way, but in formal contexts, data is plural.

the Data are — or — the data is
Hi,

usually I wrote: the data are …

But in a specification, I found: the data is …

The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary says:

Data is plural or a collective singular.

In which case do you use the plural and in which the singular?

I would be very glad, if somebody could help me to clarify the difference.

Could I use generally the plural form?

Best regards
Bernd

«Data» used to be the plural form of «datum» but in modern usage it has become rather detached from its origins.

When we see this word data in familiar contexts, its behaviour does NOT follow the rules associated with plural nouns.

For example:

When used as an adjectival modifier, the singular or uncountable (mass) form is normally used:
The ten-man team won the race.
The Prison Service ( not the Prisons Service )
The horse ranch. ( not the horses ranch )
The EU wine subsidies.
Tobacco taxes.

Similarly:
The Data Protection Act.
She works as a data analyst.
Data validation and data verification are important aspects of any data processing system.

Data, in my opinion, clearly does not behave as a countable noun plural. You can say «some data» (cf some rice) but not «three data» and if you said «three rices» or «three wines» it would mean three types of rice or three types of wine.

It is useful to think of data as a mass or uncountable noun — like rice.

Nevertheless, «the data is» and «the data are» are both common forms and neither should be regarded as an error.

Usually scientists prefer to say «data are» — the rest of the population says «data is».

My biology professor gets really mad at anyone who says «The data is inconclusive», because he is very picky about grammar and insists that «data are inconclusive» is the right way — probably because data (like you said) is the plural of datum, a set of multiple pieces of info. However, I have seen in newspapers «data is» and I think it is considered acceptable because they think of all the information as a single set of data. So, «the set of data is inconclusive», but also, «the data are inconclusive». Newspapers just omit the word «set».

I think «the data are inconclusive» is wrong. «Data» works as an uncountable. Another example is money.

«This money are false.»

This is obviously wrong. Either make it

«These data are inconclusive.» or

«The datas are inconclusive.»

In my opinion, it’s always grammatically incorrect to treat a noun as both countable and uncountable in a sentence. I also think it’s wrong to treat data as a countable, but that’s maybe just my opinion.

Garner’s Modern American Usage notes that «data is rarely treated as a singular when it begins a clause and is not preceded by the definite article.» Data over the last three years suggest that obesity is on the rise.

Garner also notes that data is a «skunked term»: whether you write data is or data are, some will disapprove.

Garner’s Modern American Usage notes that «data is rarely treated as a singular when it begins a clause and is not preceded by the definite article.» Data over the last three years suggest that obesity is on the rise.

Garner also notes that data is a «skunked term»: whether you write data is or data are, some will disapprove.

Well, this supports my idea of not changing the «countability» of the word within the sentence. However, seeing this example, I must also agree that you can change the countability depending on the situation.

Hmm, you make a good point, although I’m not sure I would treat money in the same way as data because people don’t ever say «the moneys» unless they are lawyers ie, «monies»…

A very reliable college professor (an entomologist, actually) told me that «data are» is correct, but you never know… everyone’s wrong once in a while, some more than others…especially those who are not English majors!

I don’t think «The datas are inconclusive» would be correct … it would be like trying to pluralize something that is already plural, so it would be redundant. «These data are inconclusive» sounds much better. That’s just my personal preference though…

But «money» may be an uncountable noun whereas «data» is a plural form.

Perhaps, but we still treat data as an uncountable. Such as in «a set of data».

Of course you can’t say «the moneys». That was my point. Data can be uncountable (a piece of data), but also countable (these data). However, money is always uncountable (except to the accountant… bada-bing!).

Strictly speaking, Data is plural and its singular form is datum.

Data has become acceptable also as an uncountable noun.

«Data is…» and «Data are…» are both generally accepted forms.

I have never come across the use of the word «data» as a singular — i.e. you never hear in english «a data» or «one data». You do however hear «a piece of data» etc.

The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary labels data as «noun plural but singular or plural in construction,» but there’s another way of looking at it. Under the entry «singular» in The Oxford Companion to the English Language, Tom McArthur writes:

«In English, the term is often used to include uncountable noun usages like love and wine because they take singular verb concord, even though in other ways such nouns are different from singular countable nouns like horse and stone.»

That is how I see it: Data is both singular and plural.