Tony
Dis ¡¯n vreeslike interessante vraag. Mag ek die vraag op PEG vra? Ek sal jou naam uithaal as jy wil?
Groete
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On 23 May 2025, at 11:22, Tony Moen via groups.io <transed@...> wrote:
Was the outlet pipe loosened and the impeller inspected?
Or
Were the outlet pipe loosened and the impeller inspected?
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My gut initially voted for the second, my brain wants to know why.
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So what should my brain tell my gut?
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1???????????? If the above question is turned into a statement, it becomes (obviously):
The outlet pipe was loosened and the impeller inspected.
The argument here is that the verb is left out in the second clause because it¡¯s the same as in the first and we¡¯re simple avoiding a repetition.
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If the same principle applies to the question as to the statement, then we would say ¡°Was the outlet pipe loosened and [was] the impeller inspected?¡±
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2???????????? And of course one could say ¡°were the outlet pipe¡¡± simply sounds wrong and what I would call the ¡°proximity rule¡± applies, as in the case of ¡°neither the girls nor the boy was at fault¡± (verb agrees with nearest subject).
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Somehow I could be convinced more readily by argument 1 than by argument 2, but it comes to the same thing.?
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