[Grammar] ''...have you had to drink?''

[aksamgunesi]

How much have you had to drink?
In this sentence why did 'to' used? If I say ''How much have you had drink?'', then will it give a different meaning?

 

[emsr2d2]

If you remove "to", you will have an ungrammatical sentence.

 

[Phaedrus]

If you remove "to", you will have an ungrammatical sentence.

If you have trouble seeing that it's ungrammatical, Aksamgunesi, I recommend looking at a related yes-no question:

Have you had a lot to drink?

Omitting the "to" would yield this: *[strike]Have you had a lot drink?[/strike] I hope that strikes you as ungrammatical.

If you want to omit the "to," you need to use an altogether different structure: "How much have you drunk?"

 

[teechar]

At the root of all of this is a pattern which is quite common in English.
It's basic form is: noun phrase + infinitive.

http://www.grammaring.com/noun-phrase-to-infinitive
http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/learnit/learnitv227.shtml

He showed no willingness to assist.
There is nothing to do here.
We had no work to do.

And similarly,
He has had plenty to drink. ["Plenty" here is a noun.]
You can easily see that we can make a question out of that:
How much has he had to drink?

Therefore, removing the "to" (part of the infinitive) would break that pattern and would be incorrect.

 

[jutfrank]

Although very natural, I can understand why the following verb patterns may seem strange to a learner:

to have a drink
to have something to drink

And although both of the above have basically the same uses, only the second can be used in questions that ask 'how much?'.

Whereas to drink focuses simply on the action of drinking, these structures focus on the experience. That's why have is used. Very often, alcohol is implied. If I ask you How much has he had to drink?, I'm probably asking about the quantity of alcohol.

 

[Roman55]

If you want omit the "to,"

What, like you just did?

 

[Phaedrus]

What, like you just did?

How wonderfully kind of you to point that out. And you've received so many likes for doing so. I've edited the typo.