No-one is going to object, are they?
No, Bearsy, none of us are going to complain.
Sipu’s impassioned assertions and Araminta’s joshing inspired me to perform some further research. It’s quite amazing what you can find if you look for it assiduously. I fear that the results of my work may not be palatable to our prescriptive Charioteers, but there we are; that’s life, Esther.
Let’s start with ‘none’
Sipu asserts, “It clearly means ‘not one’ and should, therefore, take the singular”. Sounds reasonable, doesn’t it?
Nope! Wrong!
Yes, none and not one are both derived from the same source [OE ne an (not one) formed nean (none): Merriam Webster Dictionary of English Usage], but even if they had remained semantically identical, they wouldn’t necessarily have to use the same grammar. There are, I understand, many semantically equivalent constructions in English that do not employ the same grammar. Etymology does not drive grammar.
But hang about, these two are not quite semantically equivalent: none can take a reciprocal anaphor, whereas not one cannot.
(a) Not one of the blind mice can see each other. [Feels wrong – replace each by the and it sounds OK]
(b) None of the blind mice can see each other. [Feels right]
It turns out that when none quantifies a singular or mass (non-countable) noun, the verb must be singular, but in all other cases either singular or plural is allowed. When I say, “must be” and “is allowed”, remember that we’re talking descriptive grammar, so what I actually mean is “what is used by English speakers, as evidenced by data collection”.
If none quantifies a plural noun, some grammarians feel that a plural verb usually, but not always, feels more natural. This aligns with the natural tendency of English speakers to make the verb agree with the root noun in a phrase, particularly when it is adjacent.
References – Link 1, link 2, link 3, link 4, link 5
Now a quick look at ‘no-one’
I’ve never been quite sure of the correct spelling, and it appears that I am not alone in this.
Most authorities declare that no one is correct, but that no-one is acceptable; they all castigate noone and advise strongly against its use.
However, some modern grammarians are beginning to favour the hyphenated version for the usual meaning on the reasonable grounds that no one can be used in a different semantic context.
No one answer was completely correct.
No-one would certainly not work here, would it?
And finally, ‘they’
A few decades ago, when Boadicea and I were teenagers, my opening sentence would have been wrong. It would have been correctly stated as –
No-one is going to object, is he?
At that time, it was perfectly acceptable for the masculine to include the feminine, and the two verbs would have had to have been of the same number: both singular.
But, as feminism reared its head, use of gender specific pronouns became a social no-no. English could have responded to this pressure by using it, or it could have extended the scope of the (high social register) one. Instead, English elected to use the plural, non-gender specific they. It has become so much a part of the language now that nobody turns a hair at the use of a plural to denote a singular.
However, our speech centres baulk at the idea of allowing a singular verb to be associated with they, so we end up with my opening sentence mixing singular with plural. Once appalling grammar, it is now fully acceptable, because of social pressure. Strange thing, language. 😀
Boadicea's Chariot 
I cannot tell you how much it pains me to admit defeat. I congratulate you and thank you for your explicit and in-depth research into this subject. I must of course use this opportunity to apologise to Araminta, Brendano and anybody else whom I have had the audacity to try and correct.
That being said, I am still likely to continue use of the singular out of personal preference.
Likewise, my chauvinistic credentials are well established here on the Chariot so nobody will be surprised to lean that I will continue to use the masculine singular as the default when the gender of the subject or object is unknown.
I am not sure that I get the hang of this whole prescriptive/descriptive thing. Are you saying it is wrong to tell people how grammar should be used? Far too many, as far as I am concerned, young English people, use ‘me’ as the subject, as in, ‘me and Harry are going to the pub’. Am I wrong to tell them it should be, ‘Harry and I are going to the pub’? Surprisingly, perhaps, South African youths do not speak like that.
E and OE.
🙂
Thanks Sipu, most gentlemanly of you.
No problems with your continued usage, there are plenty of dialects which continue to use their own grammar, b’ain’t there?
No, I’m not saying it’s wrong to correct youngsters’ ill-formed English. All I’m saying is that it’s not a function of descriptive linguistics to do so. There is still a need for style guides – some are extremely good – but they should be based on grammar as it is, not on the grammar that the author would like to impose, particularly when it’s wrong!
But the Cambridge book says it far better than I can, so I implore you to read at least the first few pages of the first chapter, which cover this dimension. Here is the link, again.
😀
English as She is Wrote, Bearsy. 🙂
On the subject of hyphenated words, why do I find thank-you irritating? I would probably write a thank-you letter but would not hyphenate it normally.
Thank you for the apology, Sipu. 🙂
This is no reason for hyphenating ‘thank you’ that I can think of – in fact, I’ve never seen it before, and would object if I did! 🙂
I dislike the ubiquitous ‘they’, nowadays with the overuse by conspiratorial nutters on the internet it appears so paranoid.
One has retreated to ‘one’, it has become less neurotic by implication.