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I read this as an example in Swan's book. It looks a bit strange as I'd expect a singular noun especially if the sentence begins with no.

Compare -

No computers can work without being programmed.
No computer can work without being programmed.

Is putting plural noun change the meaning? To me, it should be a singular noun as we are talking about not even one computer can work without being programmed.

It's obvious that not even one bird can play chess, why plural then? Shouldn't it be ...

No bird can play chess

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    This is a good question, but person(s) and people(s) are a bit of a special case when it comes to pluralization. You might want to pick a more regular example to contrast with.
    – user230
    Commented Mar 11, 2014 at 22:04

2 Answers 2

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It's a very interesting question. And there is no meaning difference between "no + singular noun" and "no + plural noun".

Example -

  1. No beggars were allowed in the King's court premises.
  2. No beggar was allowed in the King's court premises.

There is no difference in meaning between these two sentences, but notice how the main verb (here "allow") changes depending on the noun after "no", in this case "beggar".

With countable noun, "no + plural noun" is much more common than "no + singular noun". Though both form is correct and well accepted.

Example -

  1. Come winter, and you will find no leaves in trees.
  2. Come winter, and you will find no leaf in trees.

Sentence no. 1 is more widely used than sentence no. 2. Though both are correct and used, and bear no difference in meaning.

So, it's basically a call of style, and one's personal choice, but in some cases it depends on contexts and in those cases one is correct over the other.

Example -

  1. He was left with no wife and no children. (see after "no" both a singular noun ("wife") and a plural noun ("children") is used. As normally a man has only one wife, so considering this it's advisable to use "no wife" here)
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    When using the singular, there's another possible construction: Come winter, and you will not find a leaf in the trees.
    – J.R. ♦
    Commented Mar 26, 2014 at 15:46
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Lets see the examples below-

“No persons are more frequently wrong than those who will not admit they are wrong.”

and

“No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow.”

First example uses No persons which indicates multiple persons whereas the latter on that uses No person indicates a single person.

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  • Can we rephrase No persons are more frequently wrong than those who will not admit they are wrong. to indicate single person?
    – जलजनक
    Commented Mar 11, 2014 at 8:27
  • Sorry, the question is no birds can play chess. I'm quite clear with the usage of person and persons. In my question, it was just an example to support my question.
    – Maulik V
    Commented Mar 15, 2014 at 12:27

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