Re: "To run is good exercise"?!

Peter T. Daniels wrote: 
martinphipps2@xxxxxxxxx wrote:

It seems that non-native speakers of English in Taiwan do not realize
that "To run is good exercise" is not a good English sentence.  A
collegue today even said it was grammatically correct.  I don't think
it is: I would never start a sentence with an infinitive.  The one
counterexample I can think of would be the song lyric "To know him is
to love him" except here the sentence is in the form verb phrase = verb
phrase and not the awkward verb phrase = noun phrase as in the previous
example.


To provide a counterexample, I have composed this sentence.

Foul!
It is clear from context that martinphipps was talking about main clauses, not subordinate clauses, though I admit he did not say so.

I think that there are plenty of counterexamples on his own terms, but they tend towards a literary register:
To err is human, to forgive divine
To lose one parent might be regarded as a misfortune: to lose both looks like carelessness. (probably misquoted)

Colin
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: "To run is good exercise"?!
    ... > that "To run is good exercise" is not a good English sentence. ... > to love him" except here the sentence is in the form verb phrase = verb ... To provide a counterexample, ...
    (sci.lang)
  • Re: "To run is good exercise"?!
    ... A collegue today even said it was grammatically correct. ... The one counterexample I can think of would be the song lyric "To know him is to love him" except here the sentence is in the form verb phrase = verb phrase and not the awkward verb phrase = noun phrase as in the previous example. ... To provide a counterexample, ...
    (sci.lang)