Re: Official German spelling update

Antonio Marques <no_email@invalid.invalid> wrote or quoted:

It still sounds odd to me. Christian says Dank is to be read as a mass
noun, but I can't quite make that work.

  So, I guess this, er . . . I wasn't initially aware that this
  case needed more attention than your usual combo of two words!

  Behind "vielen" ("many") usually stands a countable noun,
  like in, "Bei vielen Adjektiven ist eine Steigerung . . ."
  ("In the case of many adjectives, a gradation . . .").

  When we want to express a high degree of something with an
  uncountable masculine noun, we say "viel". For example, "Viel
  Erfolg!" ("Much success!"), or "Viel Spaß!" ("Much fun!"). (From,
  "Ich wünsche Ihnen viel Erfolg!" ["I wish you every success!"] and,
  "Ich wünsche Ihnen viel Spaß! ["I wish you lots of fun!"].)

  So, it should be "Viel Dank!" ("Much thank!") - this isn't a wish,
  but it should also be in the accusative, as it would probably be
  shortened from "Ich sage Ihnen viel Dank!" ("I'm expressing to you
  much thank!"), where it would need to be in the accusative.

  If "Dank" was countable, we'd probably say *"Ich sagen Ihnen viele
  Danke!" ("I'm giving you many thanks."), so not "vielen" either.
  (Nowadays, "thanks" is considered a noun with no plural.)

  Nobody knows why the formula "Vielen Dank!" got stuck and
  is used instead of "Viel Dank!". And since we don't really
  understand the expression "Vielen Dank!" we can't analyze
  it further. It's opaque to us.

  Anywho, my initial response was way off base - I clearly
  underestimated the complexity of your query. My bad on that one!