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I love little cases/stories like this. I think many of us have some things that we will doggedly pursue, which in the greater scheme of things may be small...

I love little cases/stories like this. I think many of us have some things that we will doggedly pursue, which in the greater scheme of things may be small... but it becomes a matter of principal mixed with amusement. In London our transport network is managed by TFL. Their website lets you search for routes, and in the route options you can go for the fastest route, or choose this option: "Routes with the least changes". Every year on the same date, I would contact them and ask them to change that to "Routes with the fewest changes" and they would respond with something to the effect of "thanks for the feedback, passed it on, go away now". I think I did this for over 10 years until one day it did get changed on their site. They did accompany it with a greater set of changes, that made the results more convoluted with pointless waypoints that clutter the results, but that's a new matter to pursue.

dt123 4y ago
> but it becomes a matter of principal mixed ... principle
dahart 4y ago
> They did accompany it with a greater set of changes Doesn’t your wording here clarify why using ‘fewer’ might actually be incorrect from their point of view? You’re referring to changes that are qualitatively larger, just like TFL may have been trying to communicate changes that are qualitatively smaller, routes with less noticeable changes to a smaller number of riders, or even a smaller number of rider-trips, without having to include an explanatory paragraph. The number of changes might be irrelevant to most people, and it’s a good thing if TFL is trying to tell you whether statistically you should expect to notice changes based on your usage, and not whether the potentially somewhat meaningless total number of changes is lower. ‘Least’ is a word that allows subjective interpretation, while ‘fewer’ is not. Saying ‘fewer changes’ implies something more specific than saying ‘least changes’, and in making it more specific it may literally communicate the wrong thing.
- riverdweller 4y ago
  Fewest is the correct word. There is no subjectivity about it. They could have said (albeit hideously): "The routes with the least change". In this case, change is an uncountable noun. But they didn't. They said "The routes with the least changeS", which uses the plural of the countable noun "change". So quantifier "fewest" is correct. The quantifier "least" is not.
  - IanCal 4y ago
    Also "the least change" wouldn't really make sense. A change is changing trains, this is a discrete thing.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - dahart 4y ago
    You’re right. If you read the crappy first reply I deleted, please accept my apologies. That said, there are still two separate reasons why “least” might be acceptable, the first reason that I used above is weaker, while the second reason is stronger IMO. 1- not all changes are equivalent. The main factor most people care about, I assume, is total trip time. It’s definitely possible to have two routes to a destination where one route has more transfers but the shortest trip time. In that specific case, “least changes” can mean something different than “fewest changes”. I’m stretching a little, and I have no idea if any pair of TFL routes does this, but purely from a language perspective, it might not be as black and white as you say. 2- Use of “least” to compare countable quantities has existed for a long time. Yes there’s a rule of thumb for fewest vs least, but this is by no means absolute. “This rule is simple enough and looks easy enough to follow, but it's not accurate for all usage. The fact is that less is also sometimes used to refer to number among things that are counted. “Origins of The Fewer vs Less Rule “This isn't an example of how modern English is going to the dogs. Less has been used this way for well over a thousand years—nearly as long as there's been a written English language. But for more than 200 years almost every usage writer and English teacher has declared such use to be wrong. The received rule seems to have originated with the critic Robert Baker, who expressed it not as a law but as a matter of personal preference. Somewhere along the way—it's not clear how—his preference was generalized and elevated to an absolute, inviolable rule.” https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/fewer-vs-less https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/fewer-vs-less
- IanCal 4y ago
  > You’re referring to changes that are qualitatively larger, No, a change in this context (TFL messaging on result) very explicitly means getting off the train and onto another one, possibly at a different station. The GPs use of "changes" later just refers to changes in the UI. > The number of changes might be irrelevant to most people The number of changes is a key bit of information to everyone as it's vital to how you actually get to your destination.
  - dahart 4y ago
    Ah thank you, I misinterpreted. I assumed it was talking about changes to the routes themselves over time. I don’t know why, but train-to-train transfers makes more sense. Okay, in that case, I agree fewer is the better word. ;) There could still be reasons to use ‘least’ subjectively - for example the locations, time of day, traffic, and wait time between transfers may matter.
Silverback_VII 4y ago
I don’t think great minds engage in such small battles. It's a matter of time to not fight over some negligible matter of principle. time is limited for us all and is way too valuable to be wasted for such petty pursuits.
- the_jeremy 4y ago
  Like obliquely insulting people on Hacker News?
  - Silverback_VII 4y ago
    After reading such things I have to make a statement so as to not get infected by such thinking. it's more for myself.
yumraj 4y ago
> but it becomes a matter of principal mixed with amusement. I'll say it's more likely to be amusement or entertainment value, something to distract us from our mundane lives, and perhaps some PR value as well. If I were a lawyer, I wouldn't mind doing this, provided the cost, including time spent, is not too much.
nine_k 4y ago
I see "least charges" as a correct way to say "the smallest sum of charges". "Fewest charges" would mean to me "being charged as few times as possible". In London subway it's normally two times. So, "least charges", but "fewest transfers" or "fewest stops".
shawabawa3 4y ago
There's no reason to use fewest instead of least here (or fewer instead of less more generally) A few people have decided to start a strange grammatical crusade on the usage of less and fewer, despite the fact that for all recorded history with the usage of these words up and including modern day, less is used for both countable and uncountable nouns. Some people have a preference for using fewer instead but that doesn't make the usage of less incorrect
- dahart 4y ago
  I’d argue there could be a reason to use ‘least’ over ‘fewer’: they may be intending to emphasize the lesser impact of some changes over others, and not simply be referring to the number of changes that were made. It is possible to have a larger number of changes to a route and still end up with a lower impact to riders than another route than technically has fewer changes. Completely agree on the language crusade, we have these fads and memes all the time where some people decide there’s only one way and try to forcefully correct others without understanding the history of these words. I have even been guilty of doing this on occasion in the past but have learned over time that language policing is almost never correct. It is not wrong to say “myriad of”. The word “literally” has been used for figurative emphasis for hundreds of years by some of our greatest writers. Responding to a ‘how are you?’ with “I’m good” or “I’m doing good” rather than “well” is not incorrect and does not communicate that you’re an angel. People, all of us I think, are just prone to getting notions about what’s right and wanting to demonstrate our found knowledge, but it’s easy to not be aware of alternatives.
- alecst 4y ago
  I’m a descriptivist as much as the next guy, but fewer to me sounds better with countables. Like I still use things like “less cars” to sound casual but it does sound wrong to my ear.
- verisimilitudes 4y ago
  This is a disgusting perspective. The same people who champion descriptivism conveniently tend also to champion prescriptivism selectively, such as with the transexual madness over pronouns. No, I'm a prescriptivist, and I feel so strongly about it that I'd kill. Languages have rules, damn it, and damn those who disagree with this. Tell me, do either of us see people championing this for other languages? I don't. I think, if a white man learned Chinese and butchered it, and a Chinese man corrected him, that would be fine. Why is it different for English? Without prescriptivism, we'll see "Me love you long time" be considered to be as acceptable as "I will love you for a long time" and the very thought sickens me.
dxuh 4y ago
My story is not nearly as cool, but one day I could not visit my bank's website via "<bank-name>.tld" and I thought something was broken. After a few days I called and they said that it works fine for them and there was no recent problem and they told me to just type "www.<bank-name>.tld" into my browser, which.. worked. The person on the other end of the phone call clearly thought I did not know how to use a computer (arguably I actually don't, because I did not try out prepending "www." myself). I explained to them that it worked without "www." in the past and this likely was a mistake and they should inform someone, if possible. For a while I called them every couple of months and after about 2 years I finally got someone on the phone that did not think I am being an idiot and calling for something silly and a few days later it was fixed :)
- petesergeant 4y ago
  I bitched and whined about Google Flight service being useless for searching for long business class flights with a change in them, because it would assume you were fine with the shorter leg being in economy -- even if the shorter leg ended up being 7 hours long. I did eventually get one of their PMs on LinkedIn to apparently take it seriously, but I note it's still very broken on their site putting in a Vancouver to Bangkok flight (10hr in J YVR-NRT, 7hr in Y NRT-BKK)
  - april_22 4y ago
    Agree that Google Flights isn't perfect, though I do find it better than any other flight search engine. Especially the 'explore' option is so good for finding very cheap flights across Europe.
  - saghm 4y ago
    > I did eventually get one of their PMs on LinkedIn to apparently take it seriously, but I note it's still very broken on their site putting in a Vancouver to Bangkok flight (10hr in J YVR-NRT, 7hr in Y NRT-BKK) How long did his LinkedIn say he was still at Google afterwards? I have to imagine that sometimes being reasonable in the face of infallible bureaucracy would either drive you crazy enough to leave or drive your coworkers crazy enough to get someone to make you leave.

dt123 4y ago

> but it becomes a matter of principal mixed ... principle

dahart 4y ago

> They did accompany it with a greater set of changes Doesn’t your wording here clarify why using ‘fewer’ might actually be incorrect from their point of view? You’re referring to changes that are qualitatively larger, just like TFL may have been trying to communicate changes that are qualitatively smaller, routes with less noticeable changes to a smaller number of riders, or even a smaller number of rider-trips, without having to include an explanatory paragraph. The number of changes might be irrelevant to most people, and it’s a good thing if TFL is trying to tell you whether statistically you should expect to notice changes based on your usage, and not whether the potentially somewhat meaningless total number of changes is lower. ‘Least’ is a word that allows subjective interpretation, while ‘fewer’ is not. Saying ‘fewer changes’ implies something more specific than saying ‘least changes’, and in making it more specific it may literally communicate the wrong thing.

riverdweller 4y ago
Fewest is the correct word. There is no subjectivity about it. They could have said (albeit hideously): "The routes with the least change". In this case, change is an uncountable noun. But they didn't. They said "The routes with the least changeS", which uses the plural of the countable noun "change". So quantifier "fewest" is correct. The quantifier "least" is not.
- IanCal 4y ago
  Also "the least change" wouldn't really make sense. A change is changing trains, this is a discrete thing.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- dahart 4y ago
  You’re right. If you read the crappy first reply I deleted, please accept my apologies. That said, there are still two separate reasons why “least” might be acceptable, the first reason that I used above is weaker, while the second reason is stronger IMO. 1- not all changes are equivalent. The main factor most people care about, I assume, is total trip time. It’s definitely possible to have two routes to a destination where one route has more transfers but the shortest trip time. In that specific case, “least changes” can mean something different than “fewest changes”. I’m stretching a little, and I have no idea if any pair of TFL routes does this, but purely from a language perspective, it might not be as black and white as you say. 2- Use of “least” to compare countable quantities has existed for a long time. Yes there’s a rule of thumb for fewest vs least, but this is by no means absolute. “This rule is simple enough and looks easy enough to follow, but it's not accurate for all usage. The fact is that less is also sometimes used to refer to number among things that are counted. “Origins of The Fewer vs Less Rule “This isn't an example of how modern English is going to the dogs. Less has been used this way for well over a thousand years—nearly as long as there's been a written English language. But for more than 200 years almost every usage writer and English teacher has declared such use to be wrong. The received rule seems to have originated with the critic Robert Baker, who expressed it not as a law but as a matter of personal preference. Somewhere along the way—it's not clear how—his preference was generalized and elevated to an absolute, inviolable rule.” https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/fewer-vs-less https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/fewer-vs-less
IanCal 4y ago
> You’re referring to changes that are qualitatively larger, No, a change in this context (TFL messaging on result) very explicitly means getting off the train and onto another one, possibly at a different station. The GPs use of "changes" later just refers to changes in the UI. > The number of changes might be irrelevant to most people The number of changes is a key bit of information to everyone as it's vital to how you actually get to your destination.
- dahart 4y ago
  Ah thank you, I misinterpreted. I assumed it was talking about changes to the routes themselves over time. I don’t know why, but train-to-train transfers makes more sense. Okay, in that case, I agree fewer is the better word. ;) There could still be reasons to use ‘least’ subjectively - for example the locations, time of day, traffic, and wait time between transfers may matter.

Silverback_VII 4y ago

I don’t think great minds engage in such small battles. It's a matter of time to not fight over some negligible matter of principle. time is limited for us all and is way too valuable to be wasted for such petty pursuits.

the_jeremy 4y ago
Like obliquely insulting people on Hacker News?
- Silverback_VII 4y ago
  After reading such things I have to make a statement so as to not get infected by such thinking. it's more for myself.

yumraj 4y ago

> but it becomes a matter of principal mixed with amusement. I'll say it's more likely to be amusement or entertainment value, something to distract us from our mundane lives, and perhaps some PR value as well. If I were a lawyer, I wouldn't mind doing this, provided the cost, including time spent, is not too much.

nine_k 4y ago

I see "least charges" as a correct way to say "the smallest sum of charges". "Fewest charges" would mean to me "being charged as few times as possible". In London subway it's normally two times. So, "least charges", but "fewest transfers" or "fewest stops".

shawabawa3 4y ago

There's no reason to use fewest instead of least here (or fewer instead of less more generally) A few people have decided to start a strange grammatical crusade on the usage of less and fewer, despite the fact that for all recorded history with the usage of these words up and including modern day, less is used for both countable and uncountable nouns. Some people have a preference for using fewer instead but that doesn't make the usage of less incorrect

dahart 4y ago
I’d argue there could be a reason to use ‘least’ over ‘fewer’: they may be intending to emphasize the lesser impact of some changes over others, and not simply be referring to the number of changes that were made. It is possible to have a larger number of changes to a route and still end up with a lower impact to riders than another route than technically has fewer changes. Completely agree on the language crusade, we have these fads and memes all the time where some people decide there’s only one way and try to forcefully correct others without understanding the history of these words. I have even been guilty of doing this on occasion in the past but have learned over time that language policing is almost never correct. It is not wrong to say “myriad of”. The word “literally” has been used for figurative emphasis for hundreds of years by some of our greatest writers. Responding to a ‘how are you?’ with “I’m good” or “I’m doing good” rather than “well” is not incorrect and does not communicate that you’re an angel. People, all of us I think, are just prone to getting notions about what’s right and wanting to demonstrate our found knowledge, but it’s easy to not be aware of alternatives.
alecst 4y ago
I’m a descriptivist as much as the next guy, but fewer to me sounds better with countables. Like I still use things like “less cars” to sound casual but it does sound wrong to my ear.
verisimilitudes 4y ago
This is a disgusting perspective. The same people who champion descriptivism conveniently tend also to champion prescriptivism selectively, such as with the transexual madness over pronouns. No, I'm a prescriptivist, and I feel so strongly about it that I'd kill. Languages have rules, damn it, and damn those who disagree with this. Tell me, do either of us see people championing this for other languages? I don't. I think, if a white man learned Chinese and butchered it, and a Chinese man corrected him, that would be fine. Why is it different for English? Without prescriptivism, we'll see "Me love you long time" be considered to be as acceptable as "I will love you for a long time" and the very thought sickens me.

dxuh 4y ago

My story is not nearly as cool, but one day I could not visit my bank's website via "<bank-name>.tld" and I thought something was broken. After a few days I called and they said that it works fine for them and there was no recent problem and they told me to just type "www.<bank-name>.tld" into my browser, which.. worked. The person on the other end of the phone call clearly thought I did not know how to use a computer (arguably I actually don't, because I did not try out prepending "www." myself). I explained to them that it worked without "www." in the past and this likely was a mistake and they should inform someone, if possible. For a while I called them every couple of months and after about 2 years I finally got someone on the phone that did not think I am being an idiot and calling for something silly and a few days later it was fixed :)

petesergeant 4y ago
I bitched and whined about Google Flight service being useless for searching for long business class flights with a change in them, because it would assume you were fine with the shorter leg being in economy -- even if the shorter leg ended up being 7 hours long. I did eventually get one of their PMs on LinkedIn to apparently take it seriously, but I note it's still very broken on their site putting in a Vancouver to Bangkok flight (10hr in J YVR-NRT, 7hr in Y NRT-BKK)
- april_22 4y ago
  Agree that Google Flights isn't perfect, though I do find it better than any other flight search engine. Especially the 'explore' option is so good for finding very cheap flights across Europe.
- saghm 4y ago
  > I did eventually get one of their PMs on LinkedIn to apparently take it seriously, but I note it's still very broken on their site putting in a Vancouver to Bangkok flight (10hr in J YVR-NRT, 7hr in Y NRT-BKK) How long did his LinkedIn say he was still at Google afterwards? I have to imagine that sometimes being reasonable in the face of infallible bureaucracy would either drive you crazy enough to leave or drive your coworkers crazy enough to get someone to make you leave.