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You said

> A related example is the word 'none' (= 'not one'). Technically it should govern a singular verb

And I'm questioning why you think "none" should technically govern a singular verb when "none" is normally a non-singular subject.

I'm sure both are being used, and at the end of the day what is correct is determined by how a significant amount of people are using the language. But I just don't understand why you think a singular verb would be more "technically correct"

Did you mean that because you could replace none with "not one" then it should be singular? But that only works because the 'not' applies to the whole sentence, so the remainder is about 'one', i.e. "not (one of the team was prepared)". But that doesn't work for the word none because you can't read it as the 'not' applying to a singular part-sentence.


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