Looking up information on wikipedia and through old college english books, there's really no definitive rule concerning this. I will quote however, what I found in wikipedia (<3 it 4eva):
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Irregular plurals
There are many other less regular ways of forming plurals, usually stemming from older forms of English or from foreign borrowings.
[edit] Nouns with identical singular and plural
Some nouns spell their singular and plural exactly alike; these are regarded by some linguists as regular plurals. Many of these are the names of animals:
deer
fish (and many individual fish names: cod, mackerel, trout, etc.)
moose
sheep
swine
The plural deers is listed in some dictionaries,[3] but is considered by many to be an error.
Fish does have a regular plural form, but it differs in meaning from the unmarked plural; fishes refers to several species or other taxonomic types, while fish (plural) is used to describe multiple individual animals: one would say "the order of fishes," but "five fish in an aquarium." The plural fishes is found in the King James Bible, in the miracle of the loaves and fishes, for example, and is also sometimes used for rhetorical emphasis, as in phrases like sleep with the fishes.
Other nouns that have identical singular and plural forms include:
aircraft
blues3
cannon (sometimes cannons)
head4
Note 3: Referring to individual songs in the blues musical style: "play me a blues"; "he sang three blues and a calypso"
Note 4: Referring, in the plural, to animals in a herd: "fifty head of cattle" |
Basically, it seems like it depends on how it sounds and flows in conversation that is best suited to how the plural should be written. And, ultimately, it depends upon what the intention is of the creator of the word.
Given the example of gold, one would not use the term "I have 80 golds," to signify a plural sense of of the word gold. It would be assumed that the word "gold" is the plural form of the word. The same example can be taken for the chinese yen. "I have 8000 yens," would not be a grammtically correct way to pronouce the word "yen."
If you ask me, it stems from social acceptance. The idea of what "sounds the best" seems to be the rule of thumb.
I hate the word gils. It sounds unintelligent. "I have 80 gil," equates to a more sublime, audible tone.
However, if we wanted to use a socially accepted phrase with a plural form of gil, I refer you to the following:
"stfu noob I gawt 8million gilzorz lawl!!!111 I pwn j00"
(and shame on me, I broke a rule of English where, using quotation marks to accentuate meaning is actually done by italicizing a word and not placing it into quotation marks.... bad Kage /slap)
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