NicholasW asserts: There is a big difference between a real rule, learnt in infancy, such as plurality agreement or past tense formation, and a fictitious "rule" the existence of which surprises fluent adult speakers. Throwing out the fetishes doesn't change any of the real grammar of English.

Not so fast with the "fetish" tag, please. My usage of less and fewer was learned from infancy. No teacher I had during my early schooling would have known enough to try imposing such a formation on an unsuspecting pupil population.

My parents probably had their fetishes and ju-jus, but I don't think the usage of less and fewer would have crossed their minds as being one of them!


The idiot also known as Capfka ...