I have lost count of the number of posts that I have written about the standard usage of the verbs lie and lay.
To refresh your memory on the rules, here are examples of the standard distinctions between the verbs lie (to recline) and lay (to place).
How to use LIE and LAY
Lie (to recline) is intransitive. It does not take an object. (Note: the word down is an adverb. It tells where.)
Present: I lie down. He lies down.
Present continuous: I am lying down. He is lying down.
Past: Yesterday, I lay down. He lay down.
Past perfect: All week, I have lain down for a nap at two.
Imperative: Lie down, Fido!
Lay (to place) is transitive. (It takes an object.)
Present: I lay the book on the table. He lays the book on the bench.
Present continuous: I am laying the book on the table. He is laying the book on the bench.
Past: I laid the book on the table. He laid the book on the bench.
Past perfect: I have laid the book on the table. He has laid the book on the table.
Imperative: Lay down your weapon!
What the authorities say
Merriam-Webster points out that lay “has been used intransitively in the sense of lie since the 14th century and that many modern speakers do the same. Nevertheless, the American lexicographer warns that “others will judge you unfavorably if you do.”
Likewise, Brian A. Garner, Modern English Usage, acknowledges that the error of using lay for lie is very common in speech—”from the illiterate to the highly educated.” He says that some commentators claim the error is “no longer a mistake,” but declares that “using the verbs correctly is a mark of refinement.”
Time was, people in the public eye valued refinement in speech above vulgarity. Even Senator Joe McCarthy minded his grammar and quoted Shakespeare.
But today?
Judging by the flights of verbal vulgarity in the hallowed halls of Congress lately, lapses in refinement trigger no blips on today’s political radar.
What about with the regular public?
When in doubt, google it
I searched the question, “Do English teachers still teach the difference between lay and lie?” According to the web, the answer is a resounding “Yes.”
And yet . . .
Here is a published Netflix blurb about the movie Awakenings:
Based on the true story, medical researcher Dr. Malcolm Sayer (Robin Williams) attempts to treat a group of patients who’ve laid comatose in a Bronx hospital for 30 years.
And here is a description in the pages of a beloved mystery writer:
“You got him,’ said Tinker, lying the [chess] piece down.
What to do about lay and lie
What is a speaker who shudders to hear someone tell a dog to “lay down,” or say that so-and-so “laid in bed all day” to do?
It depends.
The English language is not inert. It has been growing and changing for a thousand years. The verbs lay and lie are extremely similar in their forms. It is perfectly understandble that people would mix them up.
According to Merriam-Webster, the forms were used interchangeably until about 1770, when grammarians set out to enforce the transitive/intransitive rule.
The thing to do is to use lay and lie according to the rules—if you understand the rules—and bite your tongue when another speaker causes your grammar nerve to thrum.
As for novelists, journalists and others for whom standard English is a tool of their trade, they need to be aware that the rule still matters to a lot of educated English speakers.
Many readers will not notice a lay/lie error. But as long as the rule has any remaining life in it, many of your readers will doubt your credentials if you misuse these two verbs.