Here in the UK there is a weekly BBC radio broadcast of a programme titled 'More or Less' that seeks to unpick the numbers used by commentators for example politicians, and clarify what truth there may be in such numbers. Some numbers are of course exposed as lies but often the truth in the figures is more subtle and qualified.
Listeners apparently write in regularly either asking questions or expressing opinions. It seems that the mailbag swelled recently when someone used the word 'data' in the singular ie. "the data is correct". To those sticklers for Latin, the term 'data' is of course the plural of the singular 'datum'. Technically this is correct, though may not be the way that the terms are used in the real world. They spoke to a researcher versed in corpus linguistics to provide hard numbers on how people actually use the terms. It seems from a large dataset that about 80 percent use 'data' in the singular, with about 20 percent using it correctly. However when they looked at academic usage of the terms it seems that over 90 percent use 'data' as plural ie. "the data are correct".
Language is of course a work in progress and people are free to use words as they wish - and often do. Over my lifetime many cherished words have been given new meanings quite unlike the original. If the new meaning is helpful I may use it, though I sometimes regret the diminishing precision of words.
Though I have long insisted that my PhD students use the terms technically correctly, I am also acutely aware from what I hear and read that the real world usage is quite different. Do we feel strongly about this? Supervisors: what should we advise our students? Students: does any of this matter, and should we just go with the flow?
David
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