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When people use plural nouns after the word "there's", for example:

There's too many numbers.

it makes me a bit frustrated. I try to correct it by using "There are," but it still happens sometimes to me (the "there's" situation). Do you think that there are is the correct usage option? People usually use there's, as I said.

SometimesAReliableMathBoy
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If you want always to write, "There are too many damn fools on the Internet", then no one is stopping you. FWIW you have my blessing. But if you want to mount a crusade against what Marius calls the informal & casual "There's too many damn fools", then I think you have a job for life.

David Pugh
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  • John Lawler argues that 'there doesn't need to be any number agreement for the existential construction'. Which doesn't sound like a crusade against the 'informal and casual'. – Edwin Ashworth Apr 26 '15 at 13:58
  • @Edwin: Interesting. I don't know Lawler. Would you describe what is meant by the "dummy there", please? – David Pugh Apr 26 '15 at 14:01
  • Check the links; the one I give contains an extended treatment by JL. I advise you to read various of his posts here, and his available articles. And I only argue – erm, discuss – with him when I feel he's forgetting that Brits had the language first. Though their McCawley seems hard to better. – Edwin Ashworth Apr 26 '15 at 14:05
  • OK, done that., thanks. My own position in this and other matters is that I will agree not to correct a given practice when done by others, but nor all Lawler's horses nor all Lawler's men will persuade me to write it myself. PS I never connected him with any crusade. – David Pugh Apr 26 '15 at 14:21
  • It should have read 'Which, however, doesn't sound like a crusade for the "informed and casual" '. When to adopt new practices hitherto regarded by most 'authorities' (Professors of Linguistics, perhaps?) as unacceptable, but now accepted by many of them, is always a dodgy decision to make. But I bet you use 'It's us'. Probably not 'singular they' (on BBC the other night). – Edwin Ashworth Apr 26 '15 at 14:31
  • @Edwin: I only use "It's us" as the punchline to "I've just discovered the Missing Link between the apes and intelligent creatures!" As for what you really meant, I don't feel the need to ask anyone's permission to persist in a practice from which the SMS generation has deviated. If I don't give them a hard time unasked-for, they should return the compliment. I'll write for other fossils. – David Pugh Apr 26 '15 at 14:38
  • Fine. But we must avoid the 'This is the way to do it. Strunk & Chicago say so' sort of approach. It's also good to put forward opposing practices; it's then fine to indicate a personal preference, especially if there's a logical reason. – Edwin Ashworth Apr 26 '15 at 15:27
  • And I'm dealing with speech exclusively. I.e, real language, which is what professors of linguistics deem acceptable. You can write, spell, and punc'tuate any way you damn please, and you can talk that way, too. I'm on about not confusing language (aural, evolved, natural) with orthography (written, arbitrary, technological). Linguistics is about real language, though there are some specialists who work on writing systems and their peculiarities. It's a very narrow field, though, and rather low-status. – John Lawler Apr 26 '15 at 15:34
  • @Edwin: I like what you say there. I am perhaps paradoxical in that I have been a working translator for nigh 30 years without ever reading this authority stuff. As a result of good reading, a classical background, and even Oxford philosophy, I think I have a good instinct or judgment, so I was much in demand for explaining nuances of semantics in my two languages (I have a lousy ear and don't give a cuss about phonetics), but I can't and don't tell people to look it up in Professor Teufelsdrockh. I never labelled myself a "linguist" either. – David Pugh Apr 26 '15 at 16:33
  • @Edwin (continued) I suffered much from a hick colleague who thought she knew it all from a community college degree in journalism and devoutly believed in Google hit-counting. Just the numbers! I got as far as persuading her to look at native/non-native speakers, but never got anywhere with promoting the Educated User Standard. Because she was not and never would be one, so the EUS had to be bullshit. – David Pugh Apr 26 '15 at 16:33