English is a tricky language. There are a multitude of word pairs that are similar in spelling but don’t have quite the same meaning. There are also cases where two words are spelled differently, but one is often used when the other word is the one that conveys the appropriate meaning. We’ll look at three commonly confused word pairs in this essay, two of the former type and one of the latter.

Consider the following sentence: In speaking to his troops, the general inferred that if he had the right amount of soldiers, he could go further down the road toward the besieged village.

Although the meaning of this sentence is reasonably clear, it contains three misused words. In speaking to his troops, the general inferred... The general didn’t infer; that’s what his listening troops might have done, but he implied, meaning he subtly suggested that with more soldiers he could make progress toward ending the siege. A key thing to remember here is this — a speaker or writer implies; a listener or reader infers from what the speaker or writer says.

Let’s replace inferred with implied and continue with this flawed sentence: In speaking to his troops, the general implied that if he had the right amount of soldiers… The word “amount” is used when something cannot be counted or otherwise quantified. The word “number” is used when something can be counted. Since soldiers can be counted, “number” should replace “amount of.” This rule applies to collective nouns, too. So, if the general referred to brigades or divisions, “number” would still be the correct choice. On the other hand, if he referred to something that couldn’t be counted, then “amount” would be appropriate. For example, suppose he referred to “firepower” instead of soldiers. Saying “the right number of firepower” wouldn’t make sense, but “the right amount of firepower” would. The same holds true if the general spoke of “ammunition,” although “number” would be used if “ammunition” were changed to “bullets.”

Let’s change “amount of” to “number” and move to the last incorrect word. In speaking to his troops, the general implied that if he had the right number of soldiers, he could go further down the road toward the besieged village. When speaking about a move that changes the physical or geographic location of something, “farther” should be used. That is the case in the sample sentence. The general is talking about physically moving his troops from where they are, down a road, to a new location closer to a village that needs their help. “Further” is used to indicate an addition, increase, or advance that does not involve a change in physical location. Further tension resulted when the football team lost a game it was expected to win. I received further information about my history project from the Internet. To be sure, “further” is used so often to mean a change in physical location that no confusion would likely result from keeping it in our sample sentence. To be accurate, however, our fully corrected sample sentence should read as follows: In speaking to his troops, the general implied that if he had the right number of soldiers, he could go farther down the road toward the besieged village.

One might ask, would leaving the sentence the way it was do any harm? As mentioned earlier, the meaning of the sentence could probably be understood by anyone reading or hearing it. However, if it was part of an essay that was heading toward publication, the three incorrect words should definitely be replaced. And don’t infer from this post that the number of mistakes in your writing makes no difference. Nothing could be further from the truth.