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“Less” vs. “fewer”

I am quite pedantic when using 'less' versus 'fewer' but don't really understand how the situation works when it comes to temporal phrases. For example 'you must complete the task in less than thirty minutes'. Minutes are countable so on that basis it should be fewer but they are also dividable, you might complete it in twenty and a half minutes so 'less' seems more suitable and sounds better to my ear.

Any thoughts on which is 'correct'?

I have searched the archive but can't find this specific question. If you are going to close the question as a duplicate please give me a pointer to the original version and let me know how you found it.

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Joe Fawcett
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    Your premise is flawed. "Minutes are countable so on that basis it should be fewer" is not a rule of English grammar. "Less than thirty minutes" seems more suitable and sounds better to your ear precisely because it is perfectly grammatical, and has always been. – RegDwigнt May 23 '12 at 10:58
  • @Joe: a search for less fewer yields some results which may be useful. – Andrew Leach May 23 '12 at 11:01
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    You are flawed that the premise is flawed :S. Countable/Non-countable is generally the distinction between 'fewer' and 'less'. Personally, 'fewer' sounds better to me. – nicodemus13 May 23 '12 at 11:02
  • And 'dividable'?? What's wrong with 'divisable'? – nicodemus13 May 23 '12 at 11:02
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    @nicodemus13: please read the linked question. The distinction you refer to was invented by one man, and not as a rule, but as a style recommendation. We know his name (Robert Baker), and we know the exact year in which he invented it (1770). If you want to follow his recommendation, be my guest — you are free to follow any style guide you wish, or even come up with one of your own. But don't pass off your personal style choices as grammar rules. – RegDwigнt May 23 '12 at 11:07
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    I did read that, but the finality of your statement seemed rather much, after all, one could just as well argue that there are no rules in English, we have no equivalent of the Academie Francaise. How does one make a distinction between a 'grammar rule' and 'one man's choice'. Seems rather like the difference between religions and cults. I shall take a look for such a question ;) – nicodemus13 May 23 '12 at 11:24
  • The distinction countable/non-countable isn't directly applicable to units, like hours. Those follow slightly different rules than either countable or non-countable nouns. – Peter Shor May 23 '12 at 13:10
  • @Andrew Leach Thanks, I did that search, and a few other similar ones, but couldn't find anything that referred to this instance which contradicts the countable/uncountable 'rule'. As usual RegDwight has closed the question without bothering to help find the answer. Given that happens most times I ask anything I will find some more helpful forum to ask in future. Regards Joe – Joe Fawcett May 23 '12 at 14:14
  • @Peter Shor Thanks, that's what I was looking for, do you have anything to expand on this? – Joe Fawcett May 23 '12 at 14:15
  • @Joe: it'd take some for me to figure out what's going on with units well enough to give a good answer; hopefully they're a website somewhere that explains it (although it doesn't seem likely; many of the ESL websites seem very similar, which means that if one doesn't explain something properly, none of them will). One way in which they're different came up in a recent question here: you say thirty minutes has gone by and not thirty minutes have gone by. – Peter Shor May 23 '12 at 16:01
  • The Merriam-Webster Dictionary of English Usage has a long discussion of this: http://books.google.com/books?id=2yJusP0vrdgC&pg=PA592 – nohat May 23 '12 at 18:29

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