If's Or Ifs...

[sandyRoe]

If I wanted to write, 'there are a few if's here...' do I use the apostrophe or not?

[EcclesCake]

I wouldn't

[Baldric]

Not.

[2sp_]

I would write ifs.

[sandyRoe]

All in agreement. If it's OK with the others I'll award best answer to Eccles Cake. First up, best dressed. :-)

[dannyk13]

Not

[EcclesCake]

Thank you Sandy :-)

[maggiebee]

Not - ifs is plural so doesn't need an apostrophe

[Quizmonster]

Actually, tyhere is one situation in which the apostrophe is used to indicate a plural iand that is when referring to the plural forms of individual letters. For example, one should write, "How many i's are there in the word Mississippi?" and not "How many is are there in the word Mississippi?"
The same applies in such situations as, "Dot your i's and cross your t's" and "Mind your p's and q's."

[sandyRoe]

Complications, complications. :-)
I'll just rephrase 'there are a few ifs here...'.

[aelmpvw]

glad eccles put an apostrophe in his answer

[factor-fiction]

Another area of doubt is Dos and Don'ts.
I think I've written it correctly but it is more often written as Do's and Don'ts, although there is an inconsistency there.

[jno]

the thing is, an if isn't the same as a house. When we talk about a house we're talking about a thing. When we talk about an if, we're just talking about the word; and people think words need slightly different treatment.

We might ask "How many houses are in this streeet?" But if we were doing a search and replace exercise on a page of type, replacing house with dwelling perhaps, we might ask "How many 'houses' are on this page?"

In this particular instance I don't think there's any ambiguity, so probably no need for any punctuation... but if there was it should really be quote marks not just a single apostrophe.

[Wharton]

It's all a bit iffy.

[Buenchico]

Like Jno, I'd use quotation marks, as George Orwell did in this line from 'The Spanish Gypsy' (1868):
[i]'Tis but a mirror, shows one image forth, And leaves the future dark with endless ‘ifs’.[i]

However the OED does recognise the use of 'if' as a noun (which is what Sandy is seeking to do), defining it thus: "The conditional conjunction used as a name for itself; hence, a condition, a supposition." So the use of quotation marks isn't strictly required. However I do agree that the use of an apostrophe is most definitely incorrect.

[jno]

I think that might have been George Orwell's older sister George Eliot, in fact.

[sandyRoe]

It wasn't his brother, George Barrow, the one who ran away with the gypsies and later wrote Lavengro?

[Buenchico]

>>>I think that might have been George Orwell's older sister George Eliot, in fact.

Orwell? Eliot? Didn't they co-write The Mill on the Animal Farm?
;-)

Thanks, Jno. I'll have to take more water with it!