Plural of virus

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In the English language, the standard plural of virus is viruses. This is the most frequently occurring form of the plural, and refers to both a biological virus and a computer virus.

The less frequent variations viri and virii are virtually unknown in edited prose, and no major dictionary recognizes them as alternative forms. Their occurrence can be variously attributed to hypercorrection formed by analogy to Latin plurals such as radii; idiosyncratic use as jargon among a group, such as computer hackers; and deliberate word play, such as on BBSs (see, e.g.: leet).

To complicate matters further, viri is already used in Latin as the plural of vir, meaning "man" (thus making viri mean "men")^[1].

Plural of virus in Latin

The word virus has no classically attested plural form in Latin. In antiquity the word had not yet acquired its current meaning. It denoted something like toxicity; venom; a poisonous, deleterious, or unpleasant agent or principle; or poison in the abstract or general sense^[2]. Nouns denoting countable entities (such as book) pluralize; noncountable entities (such as air, mood, valor) pluralize only under special circumstances. The term virus in antiquity appears to have belonged to the latter category, hence the nonexistence of plural forms. [June 1999 issue of ASM News by the American Society for Microbiology]

It is unclear how a plural might have been formed had the word acquired a meaning requiring a plural form^[3]. Possibilities include vira, following the pattern for neuter nouns in -um or virus with a long [u], following the example of status. However, none of these are attested^[4]. The virii form would not have been a correct plural, since the -ii ending only occurs in the plural of words ending in -ius. For instance, take radius, plural radii: the root is radi-, with the singular ending -us and the plural -i. Thus the plural virii is that of the nonexistent word virius. The viri form might also be incorrect in Latin, although this might possibly still be the most correct one. The ending -i is normally used for masculine nouns, not neuter ones such as virus, although there are exceptions such as humus -"soil" which is feminine and vulgus -"crowd" which is neuter; moreover, viri (albeit with a short i in the first syllable) is the plural of vir, and means "men."

Etymology

Virus comes to English from Latin. The Latin word virūs means "poison; venom", denoting the venom of a snake. This Latin word is probably related to the Greek ios -"to rust" and the Sanskrit word visha -"toxic, poison".

Use of the virii form

While the word viruses is more often used in medical and professional literature, the virii form remains popular in some Internet communities. There may be several reasons for the use of this word even when it is known to be unusual.

Leet-speak is the name given to variations on languages where frequent intentional misspellings are common, even using numbers and symbols to replace the letters of a word. These languages developed in an environment where plaintext occurrences of certain words were bound to attract unwanted attention; the tradition of intentional, sometimes flashy, misspellings originated as a way of communicating semi-steganographically on bulletin boards.

The creation of plural forms by tongue-in-cheek stretching of English plural 'rules' is popular among hackers, sometimes as a way of marking a term as community jargon. See boxen and mouses for the most visible examples. Other examples, whether widely used or not, are easily recognized and deciphered, and it is well understood that these irregular (or hyper-regular) plurals are not errors but examples of geek humor.

Usage of the virii form within Internet communities has met with some resistance, most notably by Tom Christiansen, a figure in the Perl community, who researched the issue and wrote what eventually became referred to in various online discussions as the authoritative essay on the subject, favoring viruses instead of virii. The impetus of this discussion was the potential irony that the use of virii could be construed as a claim of superior knowledge of language when in fact more detailed research finds the naive viruses is actually more appropriate.

Notes

References

• Tom Christiansen. The definitive treatise on the plural of “Virus” (mirror). Retrieved on 2 January 2005.
• Rob Rosenberger. Computer Viruses and False Authority Syndrome. Virus Myths. Retrieved on 28 September 2006.
• virus. Free On-line Dictionary of Computing. Retrieved on 2 January 2005.
• virus. The On-line Medical Dictionary. Retrieved on 2 January 2005.
• Tom Christiansen. Discussion regarding the plural of virus. Retrieved on 2 January 2005.
• What is the plural of virus?. reference.com FAQ. Retrieved on 2 January 2005.
• Jonathan de Boyne Pollard. "The plural of 'virus' is 'viruses'". Frequently Given Answers. Retrieved on 2 January 2005.
• Eric S. Raymond. Jargon Construction: Overgeneralization. The Jargon File. Retrieved on 2 January 2005. — a discussion of the playful use of grammar among hackers

See also

• virus entry in Wiktionary