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Minuted t1_j6m4qxp wrote

Reply to comment by corsicanguppy in ELI5: Why does the order of adjectives matter? by AbleReporter565

Why would e-mails be wrong?

Unless you're talking about a single e-mail. I guess the plural of mail isn't mails but e-mail would be a different word. For example we say "I got an e-mail" rather than "I got a piece of e-mail", like we would for physical mail.

Weird discrepancy I suppose, but considering every other way we use the word e-mail, "e-mails" makes the most sense.

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alexllew t1_j6m9hff wrote

I think it depends. I received a ton of e-mail sounds find to me, but I'm going to write 3 e-mail is definitely wrong. Something about whether you're using it as a discrete or bulk noun I guess.

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sirreldar t1_j6maz26 wrote

I think the technical term is countable vs uncountable.

Same way we say "I drank so much (uncountable) water" but "I drank so many (countable) cups/bottles of water".

Or "I lift less (uncountable) weight. I lift fewer (countable) weights"

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the1ine t1_j6ogvj1 wrote

I think there's just a word gap. When sending old school paper mail you can say all of the following;

there's a lot of mail today

has the mail arrived

mail me the details

--BUT you would typically not say

i sent two mails

--INSTEAD you'd likely say

i sent two letters

When we replace mail with e-mail we have also replaced letter with e-mail. So when I say:

i sent two e-mails

Anyone trying to reverse engineer the obvious rule would see that as synonymous with;

i sent two mails

Thus because there's not a 1-to-1 relationship between the 'old' and the 'new' many who are applying the old grammar will not accept the new method, which when you fill in the gaps (ie with e-mail=letter) is perfectly fine

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