Ah, an old pet peeve resurfaces! English is complicated and "data" is by now an English word.
To use a somewhat strained analogy, at the quantum level, the word has a singular and a plural form, and at the classical-mechanics level, the word is a mass noun. Most crystallographers use the word "data" as a mass noun - that is, the syntax of "data" follows that of "gravel" or "mud", not that of "pebble/pebbles". People who pounce on the phrase "data is" routinely say "data collection" and "data processing". But note that the proper way to construct compound nouns such as those is to use the singular form - one would never say "rocks collection" or "apples picking". So if we have to say "data are" then we should be discussing how (not) to fabricate a "datum set". Also note that when people come back from the synchrotron, we ask "how much data did you collect" not "how many". "Much" is generally used with mass nouns. That doesn't mean we can't ALSO use the word as one with discrete singular and plural forms, especially when we have a few, individual observations rather than a huge pile that blurs into an aggregate. In that case, I see nothing incorrect about discussing an individual datum and using "data" as the plural form. Sometimes it is the artificial, over-simplified rule that is stupid, not the native speakers of a language. ===================================== Phoebe A. Rice Dept. of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology The University of Chicago phone 773 834 1723 http://bmb.bsd.uchicago.edu/Faculty_and_Research/01_Faculty/01_Faculty_Alp habetically.php?faculty_id=123 http://www.rsc.org/shop/books/2008/9780854042722.asp ---- Original message ---- >Date: Sun, 1 Apr 2012 13:05:10 +0100 >From: CCP4 bulletin board <CCP4BB@JISCMAIL.AC.UK> (on behalf of Paul Emsley <paul.ems...@bioch.ox.ac.uk>) >Subject: [ccp4bb] one datum many data? [was Re: [ccp4bb] very informative - Trends in Data Fabrication] >To: CCP4BB@JISCMAIL.AC.UK > >The PDBe page for 3k78 says: > >"The experimental data has been deposited" > >the data cif file says: > >"data is under question" > >Grump. > >Is it to late to refer to data as if there were more than one of them? > >Anyway, the data mtz file is here if you want to refine with it: > >http://lmb.bioch.ox.ac.uk/emsley/data/r3k78sf.mtz > >Paul.
