On Tuesday, 12 May 2015, Martin Koppenhoefer <[email protected]> wrote:
> > 2015-05-12 7:05 GMT+02:00 Andrew Errington <[email protected] > <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','[email protected]');>>: > >> "Is there any good reason to avoid changing existing surface=brick to >> surface=bricks?" >> >> Yes. In English, brick can be an adjective as well as a noun. As an >> adjective, as it is here, it should have no "s". > > > > why do we use an adjective for bricks when we use nouns for the other > surface values describing materials, like asphalt, gravel, ground, dirt, > grass, concrete, paving_stones...? > > Cheers, > Martin > It's a good question, but most likely it's due to countable and uncountable nouns. Bricks are countable, but your other examples (except for paving stones) are not (therefore they can't be pluralised and we don't add an s). Having said that, "a paving stone surface" is correct, but we would probably say "a paved surface". To use a plural we might say "a surface of paving stones". Unfortunately, English doesn't restrict itself to rigid grammar rules, so I can't give you one for this. Best wishes, Andrews
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