Quantifiers
The word “SOME”
– By Anish Passi
We use quantifiers many times in our day to day language. Often, we might not even realize that we are using them.
While some of you “technically” might not know what quantifiers mean, I am sure all of you use them regularly in your regular spoken and written language.
What are quantifiers? Words or phrases that give us an idea about quantities.
A few examples: all, many, most, some, few.
Quantifiers may be specific or approximate. While some are fairly straightforward, many are nuanced.
Let’s dive into a few commonly seen quantifiers on the GMAT!
All is fairly straight forward. Say, a company has 100 employees.
“All employees came to the party.”
= All 100 came to the party.
Some is perhaps one of the most versatile quantifiers. It encompasses a wide range.
“Some employees came to the party.”
= At least one employee came to the party.
It is also possible that all came to party in case we are told that ‘some’ came. By saying ‘some’ we do not necessarily exclude ‘all’.
Basically, wherever you see “some” you can replace it with “at least one”.
Most has a very specific meaning: more than half.
“Most employees came to the party.”
= At least 51 employees came.
‘Most’ also does not exclude ‘all’.
Many is not as clearly defined as ‘most’. Many is defined as a ‘large number’. The large number, however, is not mathematically defined. For a group of 5, ‘many’ might mean 3 or more. For a group of 5,000, ‘many’ might even mean 2,000.
Few: This is quite nuanced. The definitions are vague, and not mathematically defined. Let’s understand with examples.
“A few employees came to the party.”
= Some, but not a lot, employees came to the party.
The emphasis is not that number is very small.
“Few employees came to the party.”
= Only a very small number of employees came to the party.
Here the emphasis is on the fact that the number of employees who came to the party is very small.
“Quite a few employees came to the party.”
= Many employees, a (surprisingly) large number, came to the party.
An example shared by a student Sagar below:
Sam & Pam are conducting a seminar and they are expecting at least 100 people to attend it.
After seminar is conducted:
Scenario 1:
Sam (with a sad face): Few people attended the seminar!
Pam: Yes Sam. We were expecting a 100 and only 5 showed up!
Scenario 2:
Sam (with a mixed expression): A few people attended the seminar!
Pam: Yes Sam. Though we were expecting 100, 40 showed up.
Scenario 3:
Sam (happy face): Quite a few people attended the seminar!
Pam: Yes Sam. Our efforts proved fruitful. 200 people – Just wow!! It exceeded our expectation!
—
All: 100
Some: 1 to 100
Most: 51 to 100
Many: Not mathematically defined. Context-dependent. Signifies a large number.
Few: Not mathematically defined. Context-dependent. Signifies a small number.