Meiner unqualifizierten Meinung nach müsste es streng genommen doesn't heissen, weil sich das Verb auf "one", nicht auf "you" bezieht. "You" ist hier meiner Ansicht nach 2. Person Plural - das würde dann wieder don't rechtfertigen - dann stimmt aber der Bezug nicht. Aber: Muttersprachler her! :-)

My first thought was that of course it must be doesn't. And that's what I'd say. But there's a case to be made for saying 'one of you' is 2nd person, i.e. don't. Room for genuine disagreement, I'd say.

Vielleicht stehe ich gerade auf dem Schlauch, aber ich sehe hier die Uneindeutigkeit nicht. Das Verb bezieht sich grammatikalisch doch ganz eindeutig auf "one" als Subjekt - also 3. Person => "doesn't".

Was anderes wäre es, wenn da stünde "If you don’t agree..."

Ob das "you" dabei Singular oder Plural ist (#2), wäre für die Verbform im übrigen belanglos.

Im Deutschen würden wir gar nicht erst in Versuchung kommen, diesen Fehler zu machen: "Wenn einer von euch nicht zustimmt..." - da verhindert schon der offensichtliche Dativ "euch", dass wir das Verb darauf beziehen.

Ob das "you" dabei Singular oder Plural ist (#2),

Darum um geht es in #2 ja auch nicht. Da steht nur, dass man, wenn man 'one of you' mit 'you' gleichsetzt, es die zweite Person wäre und ergo 'don't'. Singular und plural you kommt gar nicht vor (eben weil es egal ist).

#14 >>'one of us' seems to me to be first person and 'one of you' to be second.

'One of us *am'?

Aber nicht doch, hm --us. Escoville meint doch offensichtlich "first person plural". ;-)

Also 'One of us *are'.

(scnr)

Escoville, verbeiß Dich lieber nicht zu sehr da rein... :-)

Die deutsche Konstruktion "Einer von uns" ist doch in diesem Fall exakt parallel, außer dass man im Englischen nicht von "Dativ" spricht. Und ich sehe nicht, wie ein Dativ-Pronomen - ob man es nun so nennt oder nicht - hier die Form des Verbs bestimmen dürfte.

I'm generally pretty liberal in accepting language forms that deviate from prescriptive standards, but escoville's suggested "one of us are..." or "one of you are..." seem distinctly wrong to me.

I'm with hm--us on this: "one of us is..." and "one of you is..." is what I hear, read, say, and write.

-------------------------

PS: However, in situations where the phrase "one of..." is separated by a lengthy prepositional object, English speakers often tend to forget what the original subject is, especially where the noun phrase immediately adjacent to the verb is plural. In such cases, "one" may be followed by the plural form of the verb. Here is a quickly contrived (and rather artificial) example:

This is a case where one of the many people who are professional engaged with the written language, who labor to improve their writing skills, and who lend their critical eye to analyzing linguistic structures choose a different means of expressing this construction.

Seeing "one...choose" in the above sentence does not strike me as wrong. But (back to the OP), "one of you don't agree" is clearly wrong to my ears.

"I'm not disputing the formal grammar. But semantically and intuitively, 'one of us' seems to me to be first person and 'one of you' to be second"

Ich verstehe escoville so, dass er mit formal grammar die Syntax meint (--> Verbkongruenz). Allerdings argumentiert er ja von der Bedeutung her, wie es zu solchen Phänomenen kommen kann: Die erste Person (ich/ wir/einer von uns) ist der Sprecher (nicht Erzähler), auch im Plural, und die zweite Person der/die Angesprochene/n (du/ihr/einer von euch).

I shall return to 'one of us' below.

But let us look first at 'one of you'. 'one of you' is among the group addressed, and is hence a subset of 'you'. If 'you' is semantically second person, then 'one of you' must also be. People feel this intuitively, and consequently sometimes (as in the OP) attach 'one of you' to the second-person verb form (which is the same, singular or plural), which is only logical. Of course grammar does not obey ordinary logic, as we all know, and I am not maintaining that 'one of you are' follows the rules of English grammar, merely that it is explicable in terms of ordinary logic, and not uncommonly heard.

First persons are more complicated. For a start, singular and plural have different verb forms in the case of 'be'. So while 'one of us' is a subset of 'we', it is clearly singular and with are/am/is this muddies the issue.

Another problem is that 'we/us' has a variety of meanings. It may mean 'I + I + I...' but this is very rare, and applies only to people speaking in chorus (or singing a hymn etc.). But the other meanings are common, and in many languages are distinguished grammatically. We have either 'I + you (+ you ...)' or 'I + you + he/she/they' or 'I + he/she/they'. The first two are 'inclusive we' and the last is 'exclusive we'.

As a result, 'one of us' also has a variety of interpretations. But I think one meaning it never explicitly has is 'I' (although I am 'one of us'), and hence hm-us's *one of us am is a red herring. (Of course 'one of us' may refer to 'I', but if so, the speaker is trying to avoid saying so: 'One of us is mistaken'. If he said 'One of us am mistaken' it does rather give the game away.)

So 'one of us' may mean 'one of the group including me and you' or 'one of the group including me and you and them' or 'one of the group including me and them'. Here, the same logical considerations apply as to 'one of you'. But there is a pragmatic difference. 'you' could be a subject form, 'us' cannot. It is for this reason, rather than for any grammatical one, that you'll rarely hear 'one of us are'.

'one of you' is among the group addressed, and is hence a subset of 'you'. If 'you' is semantically second person, then 'one of you' must also be.

What makes you think that 'one of you' is 'semantically second person' (#13) simply because 'you' is a second person pronoun? And what makes you think that if a certain set is first person plural or second person plural or any form of plural, then any subset of that set must also be plural?

When I say one of you has not been telling us the truth I am explicitly not addressing a group. Rather, I'm excluding everybody in that group minus one from the proposition I have made.

... while 'one of us' is a subset of 'we', it is clearly singular and with are/am/is this muddies the issue.

Clearly singlular? While one of you is clearly second person plural, as you just said?

Oh, and exclusive we or inclusive we are neither here nor there because, as you correctly say, English doesn't make that distinction.

And please don't forget that us or them are specific semantic roles assigned to the persons we and they. Grammar follows from that. It is for this reason, rather than for any grammatical one, that you'll rarely hear 'one of us are'. No. And you call 'this reason' pragmatic, when, on the contrary, the fact (mentioned earlier) that the expression 'one of us' does not mean I, although I is part of 'us', is a pragmatic phenomenon, that is, derived from communicational necessities.

The 'ordinary logic' that you claim is behind your 'intuition' is apparently not ordinary enough for me.

PS.: Could it be that you had something else in mind? Your line of thought makes more sense, in my view, when applied to "one out of ten people believe ...", where one semantically refers to an unspecified number (plural) of people.

#19 But there is a pragmatic difference. 'you' could be a subject form, 'us' cannot.

Meine Rede. Sobald die Sprache offensichtlich zwischen Nominativ und Dativ unterscheidet (egal ob man es nun so nennt oder nicht), macht man diesen Fehler ganz automatisch nicht mehr.

Bei "we/us" macht auch das Englische einen Unterschied, bei "you" nicht. Bei "one of us" ist es also auch im Englischen offensichtlich, dass diese Konstruktion kein 1.-Person-Subjekt fürs Verb sein kann.

Bei "one of you" wäre man im Englischen vermutlich eher in der Versuchung, das Subjekt als 2. Person anzusehen und das Verb danach auszurichten. Das macht es aber grammatikalisch nicht richtiger.

Das ist im Deutschen offensichtlicher, denn bei "einer von uns" und "einer von euch" ist gleichermaßen deutlich, dass das Dativ-Pronomen nicht das Verb bestimmen kann.

Ich sehe in diesem Fall keinen grammatikalischen Unterschied zum Englischen.

@ 20 SebastianW

You seem to have misunderstood most of what I said.

'One of you' is what it says: 'one of YOU': 'one of you' is among those addressed, and is clearly therefore a subset of all of those addressed and and thus by definition (semantically) second person.

"When I say one of you has not been telling us the truth I am explicitly not addressing a group. Rather, I'm excluding everybody in that group minus one from the proposition I have made."

But the subject of the sentence is still a person you are addressing (a semantic second person). And I think you are addressing a group, anyway. Certainly you are not only addressing the person you nbelieve to be a liar.

The difference between inclusive and exclusive 'we' is not grammatically relevant in English, but it is obviously semantically relevant. I brought it up to illustrate the fact that while 'you' (plural) means 'you + you...' or 'you + they', 'we/us' does not (usually) mean 'I/me + I/me...' and therefore the interpretation of 'one of us' is more complicated.

"And what makes you think that if a certain set is first person plural or second person plural or any form of plural, then any subset of that set must also be plural?"

Nothing makes me think that, nor did I assert it.

"While one of you is clearly second person plural, as you just said?"

I never said that either, and it would clearly be nonsense to say so. 'One of you' is (obviously) singular. I would say it was (semantically) second person. The (modern) second person singular verb form is identical (as it happens) with the second person plural. My argument was that if you identify 'one of you' as a second person, which is logical, then it is logical (though not grammatical) to use a second person verb. And people do (see OP).

Perhaps there is a certain similarity with "Our father, who art in heaven ...".

#6

'One' is clearly singular, so 'doesn't' is the only possible verb form. 'Of you' is a prepositional phrase, not the subject.

I wonder if this is the crux of the matter.

"The subject is IMO "one of you" and refers to the person addressed by the speaker, which would make it semantically "second person".

The head of the phrase (which normally governs grammatical agreement), is one, which is normally treated as third person. 

Support #23 hm- -us:

“ …escoville, I'm sorry, but I can't follow a thing you're saying. …”

#24 MikeE

“Perhaps there is a certain similarity with "Our father, who art in heaven ..."

No, that’s not a good example.

German:

Vater unser, der DU bist im Himmel.

Similarly in English. An older version of the Lord’s Prayer:

Our father, which (thou) art in heaven.

#25

Our father, which (thou) art in heaven.

Are you saying that the original version of the King James' Bible had the word "thou" before "art" (like the German) or that "which" is not the subject of the relative clause and that "thou" is somehow understood as the subject and which is the complement?

PS:

If you are saying that "which" is the formal subject, and in contemporary English is formally treated as third person, but notionally implies "thou" (i.e. second person), then that is basically what I was saying.

PPS:

#23, #25

I really don't see the problem in following what escoville is saying.

As I understand it, he is saying the the whole subject refers to the single person who is being addressed, which is, sort of, how the second person singular is defined. So notionally we are talking about the second person singular. And some people might argue for notional agreement.

... the whole subject refers to the single person who is being addressed

There is no single person being addressed. There is a single person referred to.

What I did obviously misunderstand in #19 is the fact that one remains singular, while you is second person plural. One of you are follows the rationale, if I get it correct this time, that one is a subset of you, which in turn is second person, which then makes one second person, too, which is why one takes a second person verb, but because it is 'clearly' (? I wonder if that can be so clear if one is claimed to be part of a first person plural subject, see #19, but let's accept it for now) singular, is the singular form (although in this case identical with the plural).

By the same token: one of them are would be wrong, and one of us are would have to be one of us am (see hm--us's #14).

What we call first, second, or third person (in grammatical terms) is semantically a reference (by noun or pronoun) to the person talking, the person talked to, and the person talked about, respectively. One remains the person being talked about, whether it's on its own )in the role of a pronoun: I have three brothers, one is deaf, the second is dumb ...) or part of a complex expression (one neighbour, one out of ten, one of us).

My point is that only the immediate neighbourhood of a plural pronoun can explain the mistake of one of you are. You don't need voodoo arguments.

#28 So maybe there's a BE/AE difference?

I don't think so. As a BE speaker I too think that "one of you are" or "... don't" is wrong or at best sloppy.

Yes, one can see how this kind of usage might come about -- no one would suggest that it arises from sheer perversity -- but that doesn't make it advisable to say these things.

It's interesting how different people "analyse" this and apparently perceive others' opinions.

,#29

I don't think anyone has said that it is advisable to say these things.

#27

"My point is that only the immediate neighbourhood of a plural pronoun can explain the mistake of one of you are. "

I think this is where we differ -- to be precise: the word "only".

Personally. if I received an email like this I would guess that it was an editing error, For instance, the author might have written something like "if you don't agree ... ", meaning the individual recipient, and then realized (possibly after some other changes) that it was ambiguous and he needed to indicate that the intended meaning was "if any one of you disagrees, we will not do it", so added "one of" and forgot to change the verb.

In this case, though, the text was actually written by Noranius and the issue seems to be whether the second or third person is correct, not whether to use a single or a plural verb (where proximity, or attraction, can indeed be an issue, alongside grammatical and notional concord).

So, perhaps the choice is between "voodoo arguments" and "Themaverfehlung!" (:-)

"There is no single person being addressed. There is a single person referred to."

I should probably have been clearer and said that "one of you" is singular and the referent belongs to the set of those addressed, making it "notionally" second person.

I wonder if this could be compared to the imperative with an (optional) subject and a tag question, e.g.

"Somebody shut the door, will you?"

Or is it "Somebody shut the door, will he?"? (;-)

...

Or "One of you shut the door, will you?"

...the issue seems to be whether the second or third person is correct, not whether to use a single or a plural verb (where proximity, or attraction, can indeed be an issue,

But there is not one second or third person, because both can be either singular or plural. Verb form follows person.

BTW, Noranius's question was not dictated by 'notional' or grammatical concord. It was explicitly the proximity of a second person plural that triggered the question.

I should probably have been clearer and said that "one of you" is singular and the referent belongs to the set of those addressed, making it "notionally" second person.

Is that clearer? The referent (the person called 'one') belongs to the set of those addressed (the referents of all persons called 'you'!), but how does that make 'it' (what is 'it'? the referent? the expression? the word 'one'?) second person? And notionally?(*) How the **** can 'one who flew over the cuckoo's nest' become second person when he/she becomes 'one of you who flew over the cuckoo's nest'??

((*) Do you use notionally in the sense of semantically as used in earlier contributions? And is 'referent' the same as the 'signified' (which it is for all practical purposes) or do you make a distinction I'm not aware of?)

The referent is a person, not a grammatical person, and can't be made into such by being included in a group of people you address. The persons signified by the word 'you' are the persons addressed. The person signified by the word 'one' is a person about whom a specific proposition is made as part of this address. The identity of the person called 'one' is qualified by means of his/her being allocated to the group of people ('of you') who are being addressed.

It seems to me that in this discussion the arcana of higher grammar and semantics are employed (including by me) for the purpose of explaining, if not justifying, or refuting a very simple mistake.

If you come to the conclusion that this prolonged to-and-fro is not going to lead anywhere, we can leave it at that and sink back into the hardened beliefs of our respective preconceptions. (joke, ok?).