Ways to avoid using the word 'very' • Hacker News Board

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#101

Post by dllthomas » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 6:59 PM UTC

sdegutis wrote: post #64

sabbatic13 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rules like these aren't really good guide to style though. They are the sort of guidelines suited to curing teenagers of bad habits. That's the problem I have with articles like these. They aren't adult discussions of language; they do not teach effective writing, and do not promote an understanding of language. One should ideally outgrow such pedagogy by one's second year of college.

But what about "thusly"? I'm pretty sure that should never be used.

It can, on occasion, be used thusly.

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#102

Post by grecy » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 6:59 PM UTC

gweinberg wrote: post #54

Isn't this ass-backwards? It seems to me that if exhausted really does just mean the same as "very tired", etc, we should be dumping all these other more intense adjectives. If your purpose in writing is to communicate, then needlessly complicating your speech with uncommon words is a bug, not a feature.

I prefer 'double plus tired'.

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#103

Post by JoshTriplett » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 7:00 PM UTC

habosa wrote: post #100

When I was in high school we couldn't use the verb "to be" in assignments for English class. No is, am, are, was, were, has been, will be, etc. Of course this is overly restrictive, but 80-90% of the time there was a better way to phrase the sentence if you thought about removing the "be" verb. 10% of the time it was awkward, which sucked. Aside: also taught me that MS Word has a very advanced find feature where I co…

> When I was in high school we couldn't use the verb "to be" in assignments for English class. No is, am, are, was, were, has been, will be, etc.

> Of course this is overly restrictive, but 80-90% of the time there was a better way to phrase the sentence if you thought about removing the "be" verb. 10% of the time it was awkward, which sucked.

I do the same thing, habitually, as a tool to improve my writing, inspired by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime .

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#104

Post by gruseom » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 7:08 PM UTC

bane wrote: post #92

gruseom wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How interesting that the French use food for superlatives. Do we have anything like that in English? It feels weird to me, so I'm guessing no.

Not all that common, but sometimes. "He's quite the meat head." "He's an old salt." "Her personality was rather spicy." "He's a chicken." "Don't be a fruit." "Talking to her is like talking to a vegetable." "She's such a potato." "He's pretty corny around executives." "That guy is a rotten egg." "Her mind is like a pretzel." "She was such a cute pumpkin." "He's such a pig." "He's nuts." "What a cow."

Those aren't superlatives. We'd need to find something like "wicked" or "sick", but from food. The ones I can think of all come from religion or sex.

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#105

Post by Houshalter » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 7:09 PM UTC

Avoiding words seems rather arbitrary. English has a lot of over-used words, for example the words "of", "a", "the", "with", etc, etc. It seems more likely to me that people just associate certain styles of writing with professional or amateur writers. Rather than the style of writing being objectively superior.

For example use of slang or misspellings becomes highly associated with the education or intelligence of the writer. This creates a feedback loop where people trying to appear as high-status as possible imitate the writing style, look up standardized spellings, avoid "less-formal" words, etc.

I'm not saying that this is true in this case, it's just something I notice.

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#106

Post by Kluny » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 7:11 PM UTC

brightsize wrote: post #98

maw wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where I grew up we used "wicked" as an intensifier, as in "he is wicked nice." Sound any better?

"Wicked" was extremely common in Vermont where I grew up, and I expect it still is. I sometimes find myself using it in everyday speech and it never seems to raise an eyebrow even out west here. "Friggin" is another word that I think is mostly a New England thing.

Where I am "friggin" has the context of a junior high kid who thinks it's a bad swear word, but doesn't quite have the nerve to say "fuck". So you don't generally hear it from people out of their teens.

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#107

Post by aestra » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 7:18 PM UTC

maw wrote: post #47

sker wrote: post #37

I was always bothered by the overuse of the word "pretty" on the Internet in place of "very." As a non-native English speaker, I grew up thinking of pretty as synonym of beautiful. Now that I see everyone using it as they would use very , I find it hard to parse.

Where I grew up we used "wicked" as an intensifier, as in "he is wicked nice." Sound any better?

That's New England dialect. Almost nobody says that outside of New England but people commonly know what it means.

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#108

Post by bane » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 7:19 PM UTC

gruseom wrote: post #104

bane wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not all that common, but sometimes. "He's quite the meat head." "He's an old salt." "Her personality was rather spicy." "He's a chicken." "Don't be a fruit." "Talking to her is like talking to a vegetable." "She's such a potato." "He's pretty corny around executives." "That guy is a rotten egg." "Her mind is like a pretzel." "She was such a cute pumpkin." "He's such a pig." "He's nuts." "What a cow."

Those aren't superlatives. We'd need to find something like "wicked" or "sick", but from food. The ones I can think of all come from religion or sex.

Good point. I can't think of any example off hand.

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#109

Post by aestra » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 7:23 PM UTC

sabbatic13 wrote: post #42

sker wrote: post #37

I was always bothered by the overuse of the word "pretty" on the Internet in place of "very." As a non-native English speaker, I grew up thinking of pretty as synonym of beautiful. Now that I see everyone using it as they would use very , I find it hard to parse.

How do you handle "fairly"? It is similarly polyvalent.

I take fairly to mean less than pretty. Oh somewhat like "ok." or the newer word "meh."

Tone of voice and situation sometimes counts though.

In order:

fairly > pretty > [the word] > very

Re: Ways to avoid using the word 'very'

#110

Post by notlisted » Mon, Feb 17, 2014, 7:31 PM UTC

Let me disagree.

Many words in the "rather say" column hinder clear communication.

* If a dictionary visit is required, you've failed the audience.

* If multiple interpretations are possible, you've failed yourself.

Ex:

- Sagacious is out of favor since 1920 (google ngram).

- Solemn vs 'very serious' (implies religious aspects where there were none)

- Accomplished vs 'very capable (implies having attained something, not the potential to do so)

- Unyielding vs 'very strong' (replacement rarely applies) etc etc

  Use of sagacious is not sagacious and a solemn problem indeed.
  This accomplished man, accomplished tiny.
  Behold, unyielding password encryption.