Johanna:

    My gut feeling is that this sentence is "Neither...., nor....,nor that I
am hungry makes a difference.

Bill
----- Original Message -----
From: Johanna Rubba <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, November 22, 1999 6:58 PM
Subject: An interesting case


> I was sent a query today. Here it is:
>
> >''That I am late, that I
> > am cold, that I am hungry MAKES/MAKE no difference.''  Is this a
compound
> > subject requiring a plural verb, or is this essentially three separate
> > single subjects, each requiring a singlular verb with two of them
> > ''understood''?
>
> I know from my gut intuitions about English that 'makes' is the correct
> verb form, but that seems illogical. Can anyone tell me what's going on
> with this sentence? Even doing some twists doesn't change the agreement:
>
> 'That I am late, and that I am cold, and that I am hungry MAKES no
> difference.' ('make' sounds bad to me here)
> 'The fact that I am late, the fact that I am cold, and the fact that I
> am hungry MAKES no difference ..'
>
> 'All of _this_ makes no difference.' seems the suitable paraphrase, not
> 'All of these make no difference'
>
> But: 'These three facts MAKE no difference.'
>
> ?
>
> Johanna
>
> p.s. Re: the long grammar discussion ... I'm listening. Can you doubt
> that, sooner or later, I will put my two cents (or, as usual, two
> dollars) in?  :)
>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Johanna Rubba   Assistant Professor, Linguistics
> English Department, California Polytechnic State University
> One Grand Avenue  . San Luis Obispo, CA 93407
> Tel. (805)-756-2184  .  Fax: (805)-756-6374 . Dept. Phone.  756-259
> . E-mail: [log in to unmask] .  Home page: http://www.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
>                                        **
> "Understanding is a lot like sex; it's got a practical purpose,
> but that's not why people do it normally"  -            Frank  Oppenheimer
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>