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Helping others makes me happy

or

To help others makes me happy?

To help others makes me happy is taken from a middle school textbook in China. And local English teachers insisted that gerund as the subject be used for one-time action for a short duration. Thus infinitive as the subject is the only correct option.

While I would prefer using gerund as the subject. What's wrong with it in the sentence?

fev
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Guoyi Zh
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    The non-native speaker may not hear how bookish it sounds, "to help others." Or a translation. – Yosef Baskin Sep 21 '22 at 03:31
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    Being, or not being, that is the question: Whether ’tis nobler in the mind suffering The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or taking arms against a sea of troubles And by opposing end them. Dying—sleeping, No more; and by a sleep saying we end The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to: ’tis a consummation Devoutly being wish’d. Dying, sleeping; Sleeping, perchance dreaming—ay, there’s the rub: For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause—there’s the respect That makes calamity of so long life. – tchrist Sep 21 '22 at 03:57

2 Answers2

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It seems that there is some confusion over whether or not the gerund or infinitive form of the verb "to help" should be used as the subject of the sentence. While I personally would prefer the use of the infinitive form in this instance, it seems that the local English teachers in China are insistent on the use of the gerund form. There is nothing inherently wrong with using the infinitive form of the verb as the subject of the sentence, but the gerund form is also a perfectly acceptable option.

If I were to rewrite the sentence in question, I would simply use the infinitive form of the verb "to help" as the subject, as follows: "Helping others makes me happy."

Boris Jakovljevic
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Both variants are correct, there is simply difference in tone, not in meaning:

Both gerunds and infinitives can be used as the subject or the complement of a sentence. However, as subjects or complements, gerunds usually sound more like normal, spoken English, whereas infinitives sound more abstract. In the following sentences, gerunds sound more natural and would be more common in everyday English.

Infinitives emphasize the possibility or potential for something and sound more philosophical [another site says more formal and literary]. As a rule of thumb a gerund is best most of the time.

  • Normal subject: Learning is important.
  • Abstract subject: To learn is important. (EnglishLgeCenters)

SageJournals has an article that denies what the local English teachers claim:

This corpus-based study shows that the distinction between the gerund and the infinitive cannot be accounted for in terms of the previously proposed oppositions between particularity and generality.

I wish we had access to the whole article. Here you will find some tips for using gerunds and infinitives. That gerunds are more common than infinitives is backed up by this Ngram.

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