Q 1. Is the subject "5 bottles of milk" countable or uncountable?
Q 2. What kind of verb should I use for "5 bottles of milk", singular or plural?
Many thanks!
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7Well, five bottles of milk is a lot to drink at once, but five bottles of milk are in the fridge. Is the concept you’re trying to get across mass or countable? – Dan Bron Oct 19 '19 at 02:41
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Possible duplicate of Plural/singular verb agreement with units. I must admit, however, that the question of whether a "bottle' is a unit [of measure], in the same sense that, say, a "quart" is gives this question a slightly different wrinkle. – Sven Yargs Oct 19 '19 at 02:50
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@DanBron So you mean if the concept is regarded as one, it will be singular, but if I talk about it separately as 5 individual bottles, it will be plural, right? – Kate Ng Oct 19 '19 at 04:09
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@KateNg Yep! You got it. – Dan Bron Oct 19 '19 at 04:09
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Thank you @DanBron – Kate Ng Oct 19 '19 at 04:16
1 Answers
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Grammatically, '5 bottles...' is a plural noun, and should be followed by 'are'. But, considered a phrase, 'five bottles of milk' is singular, just like I started my comment here, '5 bottles of milk' is a plural noun.
Other similarly confusing usages are, say, a lot of examples....are/is. According to grammar rules, it should be 'is', but it is for sure plural. Still confusing is another example, 'A number of opportunities'....is/ are...
May be, others have better answers
Ram Pillai
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