Today a co-worker asked me whether you ran something “past” someone, or ran it “passed” someone. After a google search and a minor debate, we decided that we “ran something by” someone. Avoidance of grammar rules is always the easiest route.
Tonight I thought I’d delve into that question a little. To all of you grammar buffs, forgive my ignorance. There has to be at least one of you out there as confused as me (confused as I?). Help us, Grammar Gurus!
I consulted my friend the Grammar Girl:
Grammar Girl touches on these words very briefly. She says that “past” is a noun meaning long ago, as in that was in the past. Whereas “passed” is a verb, like when you passed by things.
I remained confused as to our specific use so I tried another internet search and came up with Grammar-Monster.com (www.grammar-monster.com – see link here). Grammar Monster says: “Passed is the past tense of to pass. For everything else, use past.”
Okay. So is it “ran it passed someone” or “ran it past someone”?
One of the examples Grammar Monster provides is: The operator has already passed the note to the typist. In this case, to pass means to hand over. Well, in our scenario, we were handing over something to someone, so shouldn’t it too be “ran it passed someone”? That just looks wrong.
To make matters more confusing, the “Hot Tip” on Grammar Monster suggests substituting passed with went past. If the sentence still makes sense, then passed is the correct version. For example, “He passed the shop” substitutes to “He went past the shop.” Therefore, since the sentence still makes sense, passed is correct.
Back to our fragment: “ran it went past someone” does not make sense. So passed is wrong and the phrase should be “ran it past someone.”
Right?
RIGHT?
Luckily Yahoo Answers to the rescue! It says that both are right; however, in “run something _____ you,” the p-word chosen will have the function of an adverb modifying “how the run is performed.” Past is properly used as an adverb.
I’m so confused! In the end, I think “ran something past someone” simply looks better, but I’ll be running things “by” someone for now.
Have a nice night.
Waiting on a Word 
It’s just got to be ‘past’. I think you made the smart choice. Verbally, they both sound the same but, in writing, the dodge (‘by’) just seems right.
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I was just wondering about this, guess I have to edit my las post lol
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As soon as I saw the first line of this my brain was screaming “past, past, past!!!” I almost wanted to say I wish I could have been there at work to settle this dispute, but then I realized there’s no way I’d rather be there than where I am currently, even to be a part of a lively grammar dispute.
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I pass on the question, as it’s past my intelligence level!
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Oh my goodness! Had exaactly the same conversation with a colleague the other week. I was stumped, and annoyed that something I used to find so easy to resolve was suddenly foreign to me – I sat there for ages trying to work out the correct spelling in context. When I did find out, it all seemed obvious.
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A sentence needs a verb, and one verb is sufficient for a simple sentence.
Passed is a verb form. Past is an adjective or an adverb.
so:
I passed by this discussion.. (Passed is the verb)
I quickly ran past it. (Ran is the verb; the word “past” describes where I ran.)
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I have a headache lol
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Reblogged this on citraayumsari.
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And this is why publishing houses have on staff editors!
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‘Passed’ is a past form of verb and we know that verb is an action word. We can use verb ‘pass’ in the form of base, past, past participle and present participle according to tense of the sentence.
We can use the word- ‘Past’ as an adjective, adverb, noun and preposition. So, there should not be confusion between passed and past.
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I was just using this phrase in an email myself, and suddenly wondered if I should use “passed” rather than “past”! Did an internet search and ran across your post on this. I also did a dictionary search on “past” and “passed,” and “past” is also a preposition (as well as a noun, adverb, and adjective), which is what I think “past” is functioning as in the phrase “run something past her” (with “past her” being the prepositional phrase, and “her” being the object of the preposition. You could substitute the preposition “by” in the phrase, as someone else above mentioned, and the prepositional phrase would mean the same thing, so that is what made me ultimately decide the proper word would be “past.”)
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