Data

 
Data: Facts, statistics, and the like. In medicine and the health sciences, people often speak of "the data" erroneously in the singular. "Data" is a plural noun and takes a plural verb, as in "the data are very convincing." It comes from the Latin "datum", meaning "a thing given."

For the Romans data were surely plural but we fear that, for lack of Latinists, data now is often sadly singular.

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