81–90 of 174 posts
It seems that the reason it's wrong is that typographers say it is. The author has not given an actual reason , other than appeal to authority. I will continue to double-space until I'm dead.
> I will continue to double-space until I'm dead. Do you have a reason for doing so?
As far as typesetting goes, TeX makes an inter-sentence space a bit wider (but less than 2x) than an inter-word space, unless you tell it otherwise. Since I trust Knuth more than this guy, I suspect that's at least considered typographically admissible.
If you're using a word processor with a monospaced font, it seems like it makes sense to follow the typewriter convention (two spaces between sentences). If you're using a word processor with a proportional font, and you want to follow the TeX typesetting convention, I think you're stuck: it's not trivial for a computer to distinguish between an inter-sentence space and an inter-word space (because of things like "etc."). So if you use a single space between sentences, it's going to be smaller than it would be in the typeset document, and if you use a double space, it's going to be larger than it would be in the typeset document. Or you could conveniently decide to follow the "french spacing" convention, in which inter-sentence spaces are the same size as inter-word spaces. Which is apparently what the author favors.
At least they take their own advice.
It seems that the reason it's wrong is that typographers say it is. The author has not given an actual reason , other than appeal to authority. I will continue to double-space until I'm dead.
It seems that the reason it's wrong is that typographers say it is.[single space]The author has not given an actual reason, other than appeal to authority.
If two spaces is right and one space is wrong, why is it that I just opened up a half dozen books and saw that they only use single spaces? If two spaces is better for readability, why can't I find books using two spaces?
From the HLA source he cited (http://www.mla.org/style_faq3): "... As a practical matter, however, there is nothing wrong with using two spaces after concluding punctuation marks unless an instructor or editor requests that you do otherwise."
Articles with the word "never" in the title: Beware their myopia, lack of vision, and narrow-mindedness. Articles with the word "ever" in the title: Beware their gross generalizations, lack of gray area, and hasty conclusions. Articles with both the words "never" and "ever" in the title: Never, ever read them. (oops)
What galls me about two-spacers isn't just their numbers. It's their certainty that they're right. Over Thanksgiving dinner last year, I asked people what they considered to be the "correct" number of spaces between sentences. The diners included doctors, computer programmers, and other highly accomplished professionals. Everyone-everyone!-said it was proper to use two spaces. What the articles fails to clearly menti…
Prescriptivists are universally incorrect, when they criticise universally practised convention.
This is a trend I've noticed a lot lately on articles on typography and design - they're very light on 'why' and pretty much just invoke appeals to authority - "my design school taught me to do it this way, QED." There is a good reason to use one space, and that is that when you're typing, you're only creating text, not typesetting. Software does the typesetting now, and will automatically space out sentences in a wa…
Counter-argument, in the form of a strategic rewording.
He's amusingly wrong in his certainty that everybody else is wrong. Two spaces grew out of a typographic convention of using a 1.5-width space that was favored by typesetters for proportional typespaces because typewriters didn't have half-width spaces represented on their keyboards. The actually "correct" approach would be 1.5-character width spaces, because even in proportional typefaces a little extra space serves…
He does link to the Chicago Manual of Style Q&A on the matter: http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/CMS_FAQ/OneSpaceorTwo/On... The view at CMOS is that there is no reason for two spaces after a period in published work. [...] So, in our efficient, modern world, I think there is no room for two spaces after a period.