Snow

[Mark Mandel]

I asked Jonathan:

> So, would you say "There are a lot of soup in my bowl / our bowls"?

He replied (Tue, Mar 3, 2009 at 11:19 AM):

> In reply to Mark, "lot" is singular when it refers to soup. In other words,
> when applied to non-count rather than count nouns.

I assume it's the same with "lots", which is a plural noun in form:

  There    is / *are    a lot / lots    of soup in my bowl.
  There    *is / are    a lot / lots    of carrots on my plate.

In other words, neither "a lot of" nor "lots of" affects the number of
the verb, which is determined instead by the NP that follows. How is
this different from the behavior of a determiner like "my"?:

  My soup        is / *are    cold.
  My carrots    *is / are    mushy.

Which is in line with Arnold's analysis:

> i don't think it's agreement with the nearest that's the dominant
> factor here. Â instead, the agreement is "notional", and some N1s in "a
> N1 of N2" have been reinterpreted as determiners rather than heads,
> with the result that N1 is "transparent  to" the number (and count/
> mass status) of N2. Â "a lot" and "a number" are now transparent in
> standard english, and some other N1s are variably transparent.

m a m

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