Comments on: Theoretical Physics Status Envy?

By: Synthetase

Synthetase — Tue, 22 Mar 2016 07:57:31 +0000

“I suspect that if they were written in plain easy-to-understand English many of them would either be banal statements of the obvious, or make ridiculous assertions that would be easy to refute.”

I have wondered the same thing for a while, too.

I remember reading a scientific journal submissions guideline paper that said that jargon and abbreviations should be used as an aid for the reader and not to indulge the laziness of the author. Words to live by

By: Tim Hall

Tim Hall — Mon, 21 Mar 2016 20:00:33 +0000

@Michael

Letterboxing is a hobby that combines orienteering with puzzle-solving
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letterboxing_%28hobby%29

Having read that it makes slightly more sense, but not much

@Synthetase

Agree with that. Many scientific papers are written for other scientists rather than for the general public, but the humanities surely have a different purpose. I suspect that if they were written in plain easy-to-understand English many of them would either be banal statements of the obvious, or make ridiculous assertions that would be easy to refute.

By: Synthetase

Synthetase — Mon, 21 Mar 2016 14:00:10 +0000

I used to enjoy reading different philosophy papers. Depending on the author, you could get very ‘human’ essays. Some had first person self referencing – almost thinking out loud. It made nice change from the ‘hard science’ of my field. I did my degree, and worked for a while, in the biological sciences where jargon is necessary, so papers could be quite dry and jargon-heavy.

All the humanities stuff you’ve been posting lately are not just dry but could be entrants in a C-code obfuscation contest. I mean why? If the purpose of publishing a paper is to COMMUNICATE knowledge to your audience, why on Earth would you make it more difficult than necessary for them to follow your ideas?

By: Michael

Michael — Sun, 20 Mar 2016 23:48:58 +0000

This might make sense if I knew what “letter boxing” is.
Without that key definition, which is not supplied, the whole thing is utter gibberish.