{"id":22989,"date":"2014-07-20T13:26:15","date_gmt":"2014-07-20T18:26:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/?p=22989"},"modified":"2014-07-20T13:26:15","modified_gmt":"2014-07-20T18:26:15","slug":"commonly-confused-words-a-couple-a-few-some-several-or-many","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2014\/07\/commonly-confused-words-a-couple-a-few-some-several-or-many\/","title":{"rendered":"Commonly Confused Words: A Couple, A Few, Some, Several, or Many?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In three previous posts (<a href=\"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2014\/03\/21\/commonly-confused-words-knowing-when-to-choose-the-right-one\/\">here<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2014\/04\/03\/more-commonly-confused-words\/\">here<\/a>, and <a href=\"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2014\/04\/17\/even-more-commonly-confused-words\/\">here<\/a>), I\u2019ve addressed some commonly confused words and how to choose the one that expresses what you really mean. Talking about those posts with some friends prompted this one: what\u2019s the difference between a couple, few, some, several, or many? For example, if someone tells you have a few options, how many do you have? Three? Four? More?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>A couple:<\/strong> Everyone seems to agree that \u201ca couple\u201d means two. If you have a couple of options, you can safely assume that you will have to choose between <em>A <\/em>and <em>B<\/em>, and only <em>A <\/em>and <em>B.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>A Few:<\/strong> Here\u2019s where things tend to get confusing. <!--more-->I\u2019ve asked different people how many they thought the words \u201ca few\u201d referred to. Their answers varied. Some insisted \u201ca few\u201d meant three and only three. Some said it meant three or four. Or maybe more. The answer is that there is no hard-and-fast answer. What \u201ca few\u201d means to me might be different than what \u201ca few\u201d means to you. So, if you tell someone you\u2019ll be there \u201cin a few minutes,\u201d the two of you might understand that to mean, say, less than five minutes, but one of you might mean something slightly longer. And someone who wants to borrow \u201ca few dollars\u201d from you may really only want three or four bucks. But maybe not.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>As well, depending on the context, \u201cfew\u201d (without the \u201ca\u201d preceding it) could mean little to none. For example, maybe you have few options.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Some\/Several:<\/strong> Again, there is no hard-and-fast rule here. \u201cSome\u201d might be the same as \u201ca few\u201d or it might be more, inching up to \u201cseveral.\u201d You might have \u201cseveral dollars\u201d in your pocket, or you might have \u201csome cash\u201d in your wallet, and those amounts could vary considerably in both your mind and your listener\u2019s\/reader\u2019s minds.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Many:<\/strong> It seems generally accepted, though, that \u201cmany,\u201d while having no precise number attached to it, is the greatest in quantity in this list. You might many choices, and that suggests far more than choosing between solely <em>A<\/em>, <em>B, <\/em>and <em>C<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>So, the bottom line seems to be this: \u201ca couple\u201d is typically interpreted with some precision to mean \u201ctwo.\u201d \u201cMany\u201d is the most, but an indeterminate amount. If you\u2019re striving for precision, you might want to specifically list a number. For example, there are five reasons why the trial court decision must be overturned. That\u2019s pretty clear. However, if you want some wiggle room, you can use \u201ca few,\u201d \u201csome,\u201d or \u201cseveral,\u201d but realize you and your listener or reader may have different understandings of what those terms mean.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>For more on this topic, see <a href=\"http:\/\/www.writerightwords.com\/write-right-couple-few-some-several-many\/\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In three previous posts (here, here, and here), I\u2019ve addressed some commonly confused words and how to choose the one that expresses what you really mean. Talking about those posts with some friends prompted this one: what\u2019s the difference between a couple, few, some, several, or many? For example, if someone tells you have a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[42,122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-legal-writing","category-public","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22989"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22989\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}