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Is that sentence correct, or would "future" and "present" need to become plural ("futures" and "presents")?

Those as plurals sound weird to me.

If my original sentence isn't grammatically correct, what would be an acceptable way of saying what I'm trying to say?

I also want to avoid clunky phrases such as "his or her".

Ryan
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    It sounds fine to my ear the way you wrote it -- cf. http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/192/is-it-correct-to-use-their-instead-of-his-or-her – aparente001 Jul 24 '15 at 23:59
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    I personally like the way you wrote it in the title. I don't have a problem with the word futures, but presents sounds very strange, and similar to presence. I think it's especially fine considering you're using those and their for the sake of gender neutrality (I'm assuming). – Dumpcats Jul 25 '15 at 00:13
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    presents makes me think of gifts. – Avon Jul 25 '15 at 15:22
  • I would just put a comma after future because without one I read future waste as a noun phrase meaning “waste that will be encountered in the future” and then the rest of the sentence falls apart and must be reparsed from the beginning. – Jim Jul 28 '15 at 01:53

2 Answers2

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I don't like a revision that has "futures" and "presents." While I don't like to fall back on the comment that "it doesn't sound right," here it really doesn't.

What about this:

"May those hoping to enjoy the future waste none of the present."

What do you think?

ewormuth
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    Sorry, that was a moment of confusion -- I don't know why I got the word wrong. I've corrected it. – ewormuth Jul 25 '15 at 15:18
  • That's a pretty good suggestion (definitely worth considering). I do like the personal aspect of my original version though. – Ryan Jul 26 '15 at 01:48
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According to this page (New York’s and Chicago’s transportation systems), the correct sentence would be:

May those hoping to enjoy their futures waste none of their presents.

Futures and presents are indeed words. It may be debatable whether or not to use the plural versions, especially if the people in the sentence share a present and a future.

Quick and dirty tip about it here.

Tyler Kropp
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    Could you say what on that linked page leads you to that conclusion? – Avon Jul 25 '15 at 15:24
  • That page is specifically talking about two nouns, or more specifically, several separate possessors coordinated by and. In the question here, we’ve got “those”, which is a single possessor, albeit a plural one, which is an entirely different situation. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 26 '15 at 18:30
  • Those is plural. Therefore, there are multiple nouns that control their own futures – Tyler Kropp Jul 26 '15 at 18:37
  • Ignore the formatting issue. Mobile. :/ – Tyler Kropp Jul 26 '15 at 18:39
  • I fail to see how saying "Bob's and Sarah's..." is different than "Our..." or "Their..." – Tyler Kropp Jul 26 '15 at 18:53
  • Well, they are different, for whatever reason. When you have two nouns with just one possessive clitic and a singular possessee, it is unambiguous (in most cases) that the two nouns own the possessee in unison. With a pronoun, that is not the case. It is not possible to tell whether plural pronominal possessor + singular possessee denotes that all members of the possessor own just one possessee in unison, or that each of them owns one possessee. Similarly, a plural possessee may indicate individual (or plural) singular possessees or plural, unitedly owned possessees. It’s inherently ambiguous. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 26 '15 at 19:04
  • That's why we would say singular future if they owned it in unison. Plural presents has to be owned individually. My friend and I cannot have multiple presents; it's illogical. You are correct about the ambiguity in a general sense, but in this case, it is not ambiguous. – Tyler Kropp Jul 26 '15 at 19:08
  • Thus: “Bob and John’s wife” = B&J are both married to the same woman. “B&J’s wives” = B&J are unitedly married to several women or separately married to one or more women. “B’s & J’s wife” = B&J are separately married to the same woman or one woman each. “B’s & J’s wives” = B&J are both married to several women. “Some men see their wife as…” = these men are unitedly married to one woman or separately to one woman each. “Some men see their wives as…” = they are unitedly married to the same women or separately to one woman each or separately to several women each. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 26 '15 at 19:09
  • your "B's&J's wife" and "B&J's wives" examples are wrong. the former defies logic (see answer's given example). the latter would rather be B&J unitedly marrying multiple women. – Tyler Kropp Jul 26 '15 at 19:17