Should anyone care about split infinitives?

Because I can't help it. Ever since I found out it was something 'you're not supposed to do', seeing or even hearing one has made me cringe and want to change it.

If you're reading this, you probably know what a split infinitive is, but just in case you don't, it's what happens when you break up the infinitive form (e.g. 'to stop') of a verb by inserting one or more words (usually an adverb) directly after the word 'to' (e.g. 'to finally stop').

The grammatical justification for a prohibition on split infinitives has been widely debated and is tenuous at best. Similarly, their use has become more widespread in modern writing. In some cases, though, they really can make a sentence hard to understand. For example, few people would defend the following sentence: 'He was determined to, with every fibre of his being and every ounce of strength he had left, stop this from happening.' In other cases, they do nothing to hinder understanding. For example: 'He was unable to properly construct a sentence.'

Yet, for many people, they still sound so wrong; they grate like an out-of-tune violin because for years it was drilled into children at school that split infinitives are bad English.

And surely that is the point. Language (especially the English language) is a democratic institution. Surely, 'correct' English is the form of the language used by the millions of native speakers and writers all over the world? This is how the language develops and how formerly rigid rules at first become relaxed, then obsolete. It's why we don't use constructions such as 'thou art' any more.

But, by the same token, who's to say that new, more rigid, rules can't develop in the same way?

A rule against split infinitives doesn't need some kind of ancient grammatical pedigree for it to be valid. It just needs most people to agree with it and, just possibly, for it to make some kind of sense.

And there is a kind of logic behind it if you consider how hard it is to devise an abstract rule that would draw the line between split infinitives that make sentences harder to understand and those that don't. Perhaps that's what's caused educators over a couple of generations to impose a blanket ban.

But now, of course it's far from clear that most people do agree with the 'rule' (if there ever really was one). It is almost certainly on its way out: a grammatical oddity that survived for a century or so, but destined to be forgotten...

So I'll try to control my instinctive reaction to split infinitives in future, and be a little more understanding. Maybe I'll even include them in my own writing – but only if I think the reader won't mind...