Grammar Moses: You're 20 times less likely to enjoy this column

Tuesday is Election Day.

Or, I should say, Election Month begins today.

This will be a month of math the likes of which we've never seen.

You might even hear a candidate claim something along the lines of "My opponent has three times less votes than I do. There is no way he is going to catch up with early voting and provisional ballots, so let's just stop counting now."

You would be right to screech, "Hey, Moses, it's 'fewer than,' not 'less than.'"

And I would respond: "Sure, but that is not going to save that nonsensical sentence."

You've probably read me rail before about the problem with advertisers who claim "My paper towel is three times MORE absorbent than the other guy's" more than you care to. That sentence means mine meets his standard of absorbency PLUS three times more. And last time I checked, 1+3=4 times as absorbent.

Now for a math problem I haven't talked about: A well-respected daily newspaper this week published a story that read "The likelihood of becoming infected at an outside gathering is 20 times less likely than becoming infected indoors."

What your brain tells you is that if someone stands an 80% chance of becoming infected at an indoor gathering, he or she stands a 4% chance of becoming infected at an outdoor gathering.

Perhaps that's because you've heard this terrible construction so many times that you have been conditioned to make that deduction. But the sentence is nonsensical.

The correct way to state that thought is "The likelihood of becoming infected at an outside gathering is ONE-TWENTIETH AS LIKELY AS becoming infected indoors."

Why? It's all about fractions.

"Times" suggests a multiplier, and "smaller than" suggests subtraction and in some cases fractions.

Here's an example: "My mechanic charges $10 an hour less than your mechanic."

Good for me. I got a bargain.

"My mechanic charges half of what your mechanic does."

Again, the sentence is logical. I just hope at that rate he didn't fill my wiper fluid reservoir with 5W30.

But "My mechanic charges three times less than your mechanic."?

That's just goofy.

That means if my mechanic charges $80 an hour, your mechanic charges three times $80 less than my guy. Or 80 - 3(80) = NEGATIVE $160.

My paying your mechanic NEGATIVE $160 an hour in reality means HE PAYS ME $160 an hour to work on my car. I'm going to be rich while having the best maintained car in the world.

In real life, you can't have less than zero of a physical thing.

However, you can add to or multiply that physical thing to your heart's content.

Just make sure you use "as much as" rather than "more than" when describing it.

Till we meet again

Reader Al Benson emailed me with a question about a book title.

" 'Occupy Till I Come, the origins of Aurora University in Mendota Illinois 1893-1912' is a book being released by Susan L. Palmer of Aurora, a retired Aurora University professor. Shouldn't it be spelled "til" since it's a contraction of "until?"

I used to think so, Al, and I corrected other writers on it - till I got curious and researched it.

First, the AP Stylebook says "till" or "until," but not "'til."

(Yes, that was an apostrophe before "til.")

Second, "till" is defined just as "until" is. It's not an abbreviation of "until" because it's been in circulation longer than "until."

I did a little Google Ngram comparison of "Till I," "Til I" and "'Til I" to illustrate how those combinations have appeared in books for the last two centuries.

On the resultant graph, "Till I" has always been the runaway favorite, while "Til I" is almost nonexistent and "'Til I" is a flatline.

Al, if you're concerned that Professor Palmer will be piqued by your question, you can point out that you managed to get her some ink in a widely distributed newspaper column.

Write carefully!

• Jim Baumann is vice president/managing editor of the Daily Herald. Write him at jbaumann@dailyherald.com. Put Grammar Moses in the subject line. You also can friend or follow Jim at facebook.com/baumannjim.