Here are a few more pairs of commonly confused words. You will make fewer, lesser mistakes if you learn them well.
Enormousness vs. Enormity
Enormousness always refers to something that is a huge size.
The enormousness of the elephant amazed him.
The enormousness of the portions she served made it impossible for him to eat everything on his plate.
Enormity is another matter. Some people use it to describe something huge, but in reality the word is meant to carry a value judgment: It refers to something big and bad.
After he detonated the bomb, he was overwhelmed by the enormity of what he had done.
When American troops entered the concentration camps, they were stunned by the enormity of what they saw.
Some enormously relaxed writing mavens claim that since enormity has the same root as enormousness, well what the heck, let’s just make them synonymous. But no! Let us fight the good fight against sloppy definition. If we do not, we may look back ruefully someday on the enormity of what we have done to the language
Amount vs. Number
In general, amount refers to items or quantities that cannot be counted and number refers to items that can be counted. Amount is always used to refer to sums of money.
A huge amount of water flooded their living room.
He inherited a large amount of property from his parents.
A large number of things are wrong with the presentation.
A small number of people can have a large impact on the success of the project.
Fewer vs. Less
I wrote about this distinction in a Writamin a few years ago; you can find it at Writamins. In brief, fewer refers to items that can be counted and less refers to things that cannot be counted. The word lesser means “smaller, of less importance.”
Fewer people attended the recital this year than last year.
There were fewer mistakes in the presentation after he revised it.
Less water covered the floor after we turned off the outside water valve.
He earned less money this year than last year.
We need to admit that this course is the lesser of two evils.
Appearing on television game shows is a way for lesser stars to bring in some money.
What other word pairs perplex you? Write to me at lizd@worktalk.com and I will cover them in future posts.
Check out Writamins writing tips at Writamins. You will learn something new!