Return to Answer

Now, there are some people do object to the adjective senses of whose being used of inanimate antecedents, based on the mistaken belief that it comes solely from who, when it comes from whos which comes from hwæs which was the genitive of both hwa (who) and hwæt(what). Still, these objections do not seem to arise often when it comes the relative pronoun use, so we probably need not survey the arguments for and against that use, for this case.

Now, there are some people do object to the adjective senses of whose being used of inanimate antecedents, based on the mistaken belief that it comes solely from who, when it comes from whos which comes from hwæs which was the genitive of both hwa (who) and hwæt(what). The objection flies in the face of much eloquent usage, and is also rarer now.

Now, there some people do object to the adjective senses of whose being used of inanimate antecedents, based on the mistaken belief that it comes solely from who, when it comes from whos which comes from hwæs which was the genitive of both hwa (who) and hwæt(what). Still, these objections do not seem to arise often when it comes the relative pronoun use, so we probably need not survey the arguments for and against that use, for this case.

In all, the form is not just grammatical, and reasonably common in the domain it is used in, but a good choice.

Now, there are some people do object to the adjective senses of whose being used of inanimate antecedents, based on the mistaken belief that it comes solely from who, when it comes from whos which comes from hwæs which was the genitive of both hwa (who) and hwæt(what). Still, these objections do not seem to arise often when it comes the relative pronoun use, so we probably need not survey the arguments for and against that use, for this case.

In all, the form is not just grammatical, and reasonably common in the domain it is used in, but a good choice.

[Taking a look at the question on ELL, it seems that the problem was that it wasn't ambiguous enough, as what they meant was "set whose each pair of elements", which is neither of the readings I suggest are possible with the form, but that's a separate issue].

1. It would generally be clear from context; ambiguous forms are only a problem if they result in ambiguous reading, otherwise we can object to just about every bare expression as leaving out some information and hence being ambiguous.
2. It would lean heavily toward our interpreting it as saying that it is the [Noun]₂s that have the [Noun]₃s (in the example, the elements that have the pairs). Only if that reading was both incorrect, and it being incorrect was not clear from context, do we have a problem.
3. In this case we have the form "The set of [Noun]₂s whose [Noun]₃s..." since it's extremely common to define sets in terms of the properties of its elements, we're led very strongly to the understanding that it is elements that have pairs.
4. Unless we have another context to explain some special meaning of set, then the reading of the set having the pairs makes no meaning, and so will be instantly dismissed, leaving us with no ambiguity.

1. It would generally be clear from context; ambiguous forms are only a problem if they result in ambiguous reading, otherwise we can object to just about every bare expression as leaving out some information and hence being ambiguous.
2. It would lean heavily toward our interpreting it as saying that it is the [Noun]₂s that have the [Noun]₃s (in the example, the elements that have the pairs). Only if that reading was both incorrect, and it being incorrect was not clear from context, do we have a problem.
3. In this case we have the form "The set of [Noun]₂s whose [Noun]₃s..." since it's extremely common to define sets in terms of the properties of its elements, we're led very strongly to the understanding that it is elements that have pairs. All the more so since the word used for the elements is element (now if that was element in another sense, that would be ambiguous, but in a totally different way).
4. Unless we have another context to explain some special meaning of set, then the reading of the set having the pairs makes no meaning, and so will be instantly dismissed, leaving us with no ambiguity.