My teacher told me a story about this.
A rich guy died and left $1,000,000 for his three sons, Bob, John, and Frank. In his will, it said something to the extent of "the 1 million dollars I own is to be distributed between Bob, John and Frank". They distributed the money so that each got $333k. But Bob claimed this was not what the will said. They took the case to court and the court ruled in Bob's favor. Distributing $333k to the three sons was NOT what the will said. So how it was distributed was that Bob got 500k, and John got 250k, and Frank got 250k.
The reason was the comma was between Bob and Frank but there was no comma between Frank and John. Thus, the comma separates Bob from John-and-Frank and so John-and-Frank was counted as one unit. The money gets distributed 50-50; half goes to Bob and half goes to John and Frank. IF there was a comma between John and Frank, then it would've been 333k each.
After that story, I use always use commas even when I have "and" lol.
A rich guy died and left $1,000,000 for his three sons, Bob, John, and Frank. In his will, it said something to the extent of "the 1 million dollars I own is to be distributed between Bob, John and Frank". They distributed the money so that each got $333k. But Bob claimed this was not what the will said. They took the case to court and the court ruled in Bob's favor. Distributing $333k to the three sons was NOT what the will said. So how it was distributed was that Bob got 500k, and John got 250k, and Frank got 250k.
The reason was the comma was between Bob and Frank but there was no comma between Frank and John. Thus, the comma separates Bob from John-and-Frank and so John-and-Frank was counted as one unit. The money gets distributed 50-50; half goes to Bob and half goes to John and Frank. IF there was a comma between John and Frank, then it would've been 333k each.
After that story, I use always use commas even when I have "and" lol.