conjugation with infinitives as subjects

Question

I've always understood that the 3rd person singular formation of a verb is used when an infinitive is the subject, but I don't understand why this is true if I am using more than one infinitive as my subject? I just finished reading many of the posts on gustar because this is where it comes up the most but I just can't understand why this would be the rule.

For example:

Me gusta bailar. Me gusta bailar y cantar.

Since bailar and cantar are the subject of the second example, why is it not "gustan"? I just can't swallow the rule as is but I want to understand the explanation. Of course, this would apply to other sentences like:

Bailar y cantar (es? son?) divertido(s?). or No se permite(n?) bailar y cantar.

Which would it be?

Thank you.

Welcome to the forum! =) - NikkiLR, Oct 9, 2013

Answer 1

Not a native speaker but I think it would be "me gustan" for the first example and "son divertidos" for the second example.

Well I'm wrong again.

I found this link that explains it very well. Verbs are uncountable.

enter link description here

Thank you for that link. I also found the explanation helpful. This makes sense to me in the same context as when to use cuanto vs. cuantos in the context of being able to "count" the item (paper vs. pieces of paper, for example). - rwywrot, Oct 10, 2013

Answer 2

When gustar is followed by one or more verbs it is always singular. It only changes to "me gustan" when it is followed by more than one noun.

So the first answer is "me gusta" and the second "son divertidos"? - gringojrf, Oct 9, 2013