Thread: here is ten dollars & here are two beers. почему??

у Пимслера нашел:
here is ten dollars
но в то же время:
here are two beers

почему не here are ten dollars?

Originally Posted by Pon4ik

у Пимслера нашел:
here is ten dollars
но в то же время:
here are two beers

почему не here are ten dollars?

Because it is 1 (one) ten-dollar bill.

а почему тогда
here is sixteen dollars

Because Its money. Its an uncountable thingy so i guess we count it as "one".

There is 16 dollars on the table... That sure is a lot of money on the table!


*EDIT* money IS countable, obviously, but its infinite... I don't know, that's my best guess. *EDIT*

Here is three dollars - "three dollars" is a mass/ uncountable noun phrase. You are talking about an amount of money.

Here are three dollar bills - "dollar bills" is a countable noun phrase. You are talking about a quantity of bills.

There's no good explanation. It's just one of the mysteries of English. If we didn't put in things like that it would be TOO easy.

Thank you very much. By the way, do you know other mysteries of English?

Originally Posted by Pon4ik

Thank you very much. By the way, do you know other mysteries of English?

Sure:

1 I'm going to school.
2 I'm going to the bank.
3 I'm going to the store.
4 I'm going to church.

Why do we use "the" in 2 and 3, but not 1 and 4? Nobody knows.

Originally Posted by paulb

Originally Posted by Pon4ik

Thank you very much. By the way, do you know other mysteries of English?

Sure:

1 I'm going to school.
2 I'm going to the bank.
3 I'm going to the store.
4 I'm going to church.

Why do we use "the" in 2 and 3, but not 1 and 4? Nobody knows.

And without "to":
I'm going home
I'm going downtown.

Originally Posted by paulb

Originally Posted by Pon4ik

Thank you very much. By the way, do you know other mysteries of English?

Sure:

1 I'm going to school.
2 I'm going to the bank.
3 I'm going to the store.
4 I'm going to church.

Why do we use "the" in 2 and 3, but not 1 and 4? Nobody knows.

Well, there are some rules, anyway.

Originally Posted by scotcher

Here is three dollars - "three dollars" is a mass/ uncountable noun phrase. You are talking about an amount of money.

Here are three dollar bills - "dollar bills" is a countable noun phrase. You are talking about a quantity of bills.

Would it be an error to say "Here are five (six, seven, eight) dollars" or do I have to use "is"?

It would not be an error but most people would be expecting to see 5 individual dollar bills. Most people just say "Here's five dollars" even if it is in small change.
Personally I don't think that it is a very important concept.

Originally Posted by paulb

Originally Posted by Pon4ik

Thank you very much. By the way, do you know other mysteries of English?

Sure:

1 I'm going to school.
2 I'm going to the bank.
3 I'm going to the store.
4 I'm going to church.

Why do we use "the" in 2 and 3, but not 1 and 4? Nobody knows.

In British English, the distinction is that we use 'the' when we are talking about a specific building, and don't use it when we are talking about an activity associated with a building.

For example:

If someone is ill and needs hospital treatment, we would say "he is going to hospital", without an article. If, on the other hand, you are talking about a doctor going to work, we would say "he is going to the hospital".

A child "goes to school", but a parent "goes to the school" for a parent-teacher conference.

"Going to church" implies attending a service for worship etc, wheras "going to the church" implies some other business there, such as visting the priest or delivering something.

Originally Posted by Ramil

Originally Posted by scotcher

Here is three dollars - "three dollars" is a mass/ uncountable noun phrase. You are talking about an amount of money.

Here are three dollar bills - "dollar bills" is a countable noun phrase. You are talking about a quantity of bills.

Would it be an error to say "Here are five (six, seven, eight) dollars" or do I have to use "is"?

It would be a really tiny error that no-one would notice or care about even if they did, but it would probably contribute to the overall impression of foreignness, along with all the other really tiny errors people make when speaking a foreign langauge.

а что еще, имеющее множественное окончание, кроме ten (nine, eight) dollars/cents/euros/rubles употребляется с here is?

By the way I want to ask a related question:

Which is correct:

1) Two thousand dollar
2) Two thousands dollar
3) Two thousand dollars
4) Two thousands dollars

The same with million(s) ?

I often use 1) sometimes use 3) but never knew it for sure

Originally Posted by Ramil

By the way I want to ask a related question:

Which is correct:

1) Two thousand dollar
2) Two thousands dollar
3) Two thousand dollars
4) Two thousands dollars

The same with million(s) ?

I often use 1) sometimes use 3) but never knew it for sure

3) is the only correct one, and yes, same goes for millions.

That's assuming that the noun takes a regular plural, as is the case with dollar. If it has an irregular plural, then all bets are off.

And why thousands and millions doesn't take 's' ? In Russian we say
одна тысяча (тысяча is in singular), but
две тысячи (тысячи is in plural).

Or the answer is "it's just the way it is"

I dunno. Probably some buried English genetive declension equivalent.

Numerals do have regular plurals in the nominative (at least, what anyone who speaks a declined language would understand to be nominative case). You'd say 'millions of dollars' or 'thousands of bottles'. In these examples, it would be incorrect to omit the 's'.

Originally Posted by scotcher

Originally Posted by paulb

Originally Posted by Pon4ik

Thank you very much. By the way, do you know other mysteries of English?

Sure:

1 I'm going to school.
2 I'm going to the bank.
3 I'm going to the store.
4 I'm going to church.

Why do we use "the" in 2 and 3, but not 1 and 4? Nobody knows.

In British English, the distinction is that we use 'the' when we are talking about a specific building, and don't use it when we are talking about an activity associated with a building.

For example:

If someone is ill and needs hospital treatment, we would say "he is going to hospital", without an article. If, on the other hand, you are talking about a doctor going to work, we would say "he is going to the hospital".

A child "goes to school", but a parent "goes to the school" for a parent-teacher conference.

"Going to church" implies attending a service for worship etc, wheras "going to the church" implies some other business there, such as visting the priest or delivering something.

This is correct while still leaving the mystery intact. Why can't you say "I'm going to bank" when clearly you are going there for the purpose of conducting your banking? Same for the store.

Also note: you can say "I'm going to work" but not "I'm going to the work." "Work" here denotes a place, since it can be an answer to the question, "where are you?"