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Good Writing

paulgraham.com

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Re: Good Writing

#331

Post by pdonis »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #326
pdonis wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Those aren't different claims. Yes, they are. The first claim (the one he backs away from) is A implies B, where A = "this writing is beautiful" and B is "this writing is true". The second claim is Not A implies Not B. Those are not logically equivalent. The second claim is logically equivalent to B implies A, i.e., "this writing is true" implies "this writing is beautiful". But B implies A is not equivalent to A i…

Expanding a little further... > What is necessarily the case is that, if writing that sounds bad is less likely to be right, writing that is right is less likely to sound bad. That's true. You're 100% right about this. But if you're able to prove it, you should be well aware that exactly the same proof will quickly show that writing that doesn't sound bad is more likely to be right. > Which, as above, is not logicall…

> if you're able to prove it

It's a logical tautology, at least if we make the implications definite (i.e., "sounds bad" necessarily implies "not right", and therefore "right" necessarily implies "does not sound bad"). In other words, "A implies B" is logically equivalent to "Not B implies Not A". There's no need to give any further proof.

> you should be well aware that exactly the same proof will quickly show that writing that doesn't sound bad is more likely to be right.

No, it won't. You really need to learn some basic logic.

> They are the same statement

No, they're not. Again, please learn some basic logic. "A implies B" is not logically equivalent to "B implies A". You are claiming that it is. Any basic textbook on logic will tell you that you are wrong.

Re: Good Writing

#332

Post by pdonis »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #321
pdonis wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Those aren't different claims. Yes, they are. The first claim (the one he backs away from) is A implies B, where A = "this writing is beautiful" and B is "this writing is true". The second claim is Not A implies Not B. Those are not logically equivalent. The second claim is logically equivalent to B implies A, i.e., "this writing is true" implies "this writing is beautiful". But B implies A is not equivalent to A i…

> It could also be the case that both types of writing, sounding bad and not sounding bad, are less likely to be right (because, say, sophistry is very prevalent). No, it cannot be the case that every type of writing is less likely to be right. Less likely than what?

> Less likely than what?

Think of it this way: some percentage of writing that sounds bad is wrong, and some percentage of writing that does not sound bad is wrong. I am simply pointing out that it is perfectly possible for both percentages to be the same, so that whether or not the writing sounds bad gives no useful information about whether it's right or wrong.

I think you are taking "less likely" too literally. PG makes it clear that he is not talking about exact mathematical functions. His intent is much better captured by treating the statements as logical implications, as I and others have been doing.

Re: Good Writing

#333

Post by thaumasiotes »

pdonis wrote: post #331
thaumasiotes wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Expanding a little further... > What is necessarily the case is that, if writing that sounds bad is less likely to be right, writing that is right is less likely to sound bad. That's true. You're 100% right about this. But if you're able to prove it, you should be well aware that exactly the same proof will quickly show that writing that doesn't sound bad is more likely to be right. > Which, as above, is not logicall…

> if you're able to prove it It's a logical tautology, at least if we make the implications definite (i.e., "sounds bad" necessarily implies "not right", and therefore "right" necessarily implies "does not sound bad"). In other words, "A implies B" is logically equivalent to "Not B implies Not A". There's no need to give any further proof. > you should be well aware that exactly the same proof will quickly show that…

If you want to go around calling things basic math, maybe you should actually do the math. You're not going to impress anyone by just parroting the idea that you're an idiot.

I can do it for you:

            +----------+--------+
            | eloquent | clumsy |
    +-------+----------+--------+
    |  true |    A     |   B    |
    +-------+----------+--------+
    | false |    C     |   D    |
    +-------+----------+--------+
Imagine there are A papers that are eloquent and true, B papers that are badly worded and true, C papers that are eloquent and false, and D papers that are badly worded and false. We'll also assume none of these values are 0.

For convenience, I'll use the lowercase letters to refer to probabilities rather than counts: a = A / (A + B + C + D), b = B / (A + B + C + D), etc.

We are given the postulate "papers that sound bad [in our terminology, "clumsy"] are less likely to be true". There are two possible interpretations of this:

1. Clumsy papers are less likely to be true than the average of all papers.

2. Clumsy papers are less likely to be true than eloquent papers.

Fortunately for us, each of these implies the other, so I'll use interpretation (1), again for convenience.

We can now define our postulate precisely:

    b / (b + d)
Observe here that the four values a, b, c, and d are all positive and their sum is 1.

We can use basic algebra to rearrange the postulate:

     b / (b + d)
Let's examine whether eloquent papers are more likely to be true. As an algebraic statement, this is:

    a / (a + c) > (a + b) / (a + b + c + d)
Same process:

     a / (a + c) > (a + b)
     a > (a + b)(a + c)
     a > a^2 + ac + ab + bc
     a > a(a + c + b) + bc
     a > a(1 - d) + bc
     a > a - ad + bc
     0 > 0 - ad + bc
    ad > bc
We have now proven that eloquent papers are more likely to be true if and only if ad > bc. We've also proven that, if clumsy papers are less likely to be true, bc Why did you insist - repeatedly - that a very basic and obvious fact was false? What were you thinking?

Re: Good Writing

#334

Post by thaumasiotes »

pdonis wrote: post #332
thaumasiotes wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It could also be the case that both types of writing, sounding bad and not sounding bad, are less likely to be right (because, say, sophistry is very prevalent). No, it cannot be the case that every type of writing is less likely to be right. Less likely than what?

> Less likely than what? Think of it this way: some percentage of writing that sounds bad is wrong, and some percentage of writing that does not sound bad is wrong. I am simply pointing out that it is perfectly possible for both percentages to be the same, so that whether or not the writing sounds bad gives no useful information about whether it's right or wrong. I think you are taking "less likely" too literally. PG…

> I think you are taking "less likely" too literally.

> I am simply pointing out that it is perfectly possible for both percentages to be the same

Come on. If you believe those percentages are the same, what's left of PG's claim?

> , so that whether or not the writing sounds bad gives no useful information about whether it's right or wrong.

He notes, and you stipulate, that if the writing sounds bad, that gives useful information about whether it's right or wrong.

> His intent is much better captured by treating the statements as logical implications, as I and others have been doing.

I have been treating them as logical implications. The difference is that I actually know what the implications are.

How do you think the argument "assuming badly worded papers are no more likely to be wrong than any other papers, it isn't necessarily the case that if badly worded papers are more likely to be wrong than other papers, conclusion X would follow" works? You want to use logic instead of algebra? Every conclusion follows from a contradiction.

Re: Good Writing

#335

Post by pluies »

bsaul wrote: post #130

In french we have this very old expression : "ce qui se conçoit bien s'énonce clairement". "what is well understood will be clearly phrased". It's been consistently used by parents and teachers since the 17th century, so i guess there must be some truth to it.

It's from Boileau! Beautiful alexandrine verses:

> Ce que l’on conçoit bien s’énonce clairement, > Et les mots pour le dire arrivent aisément.

Re: Good Writing

#336

Post by [deleted] »

nchmy wrote: post #292
selcuka wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was wondering if I’m the only one who thinks that way. He might be a better writer than some (including myself), but that’s a pretty low bar. The ideas are neither novel nor deep, and the writing is subpar. I pasted the essay into ChatGPT, and this is what it said (just for fun; I’m not taking ChatGPT’s evaluation seriously.) The essay is superficial, mildly derivative, and wrapped in a tone that suggests insight w…

I'm VERY curious as to what your prompt was. Because I just did the same thing, simply asking "do you think this is an example of good writing?" and it responded with this Yes, this is an example of good writing—in terms of clarity, structure, insight, and style. But it’s worth breaking that claim down, because "good writing" is context-dependent. Strengths Clarity and Flow: The essay is easy to follow, despite discu…

[deleted]

Re: Good Writing

#337

Post by selcuka »

sbierwagen wrote: post #304
nchmy wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm VERY curious as to what your prompt was. Because I just did the same thing, simply asking "do you think this is an example of good writing?" and it responded with this Yes, this is an example of good writing—in terms of clarity, structure, insight, and style. But it’s worth breaking that claim down, because "good writing" is context-dependent. Strengths Clarity and Flow: The essay is easy to follow, despite discu…

Evergreen genre of tweet: "Wow, look at this crazy thing an LLM said! Incidentally, in the prompt I told it to say something crazy."

Exactly. That's why I said I'm not taking it seriously. LLMs tend to always agree with you (i.e. your prompt). I don't have the exact prompt handy but it was something like

    I read the following article and found that the ideas are not novel, and the content is not insightful. What is your opinion?
If I used a more positive prompt, I'm sure it would have told me that it's a great article.

Re: Good Writing

#338

Post by the_af »

pdonis wrote: post #245
the_af wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, most people commenting on it here on HN seem to understand the first meaning (looks good => is good). I can guess what this says about the readership of HN, but what does it says about the clarity of PG's essay?

> what does it says about the clarity of PG's essay? This seems pretty clear to me: "[W]hile we can't safely conclude that beautiful writing is true, it's usually safe to conclude the converse: something that seems clumsily written will usually have gotten the ideas wrong too." And I'm not the only one who has quoted that passage in this discussion.

It's the second to last paragraph, when someone reading the essay may have already formed a hard to dislodge opinion on the kind of writing PG means. And indeed, many people here on HN did so.

The order of paragraphs, how early in the text ideas or clarifications are introduced, etc, all make for clear writing.

I'd say this is an example of an essay that lacks clarity, i.e. one that is not "good writing".

Re: Good Writing

#339

Post by juliusdavies »

idlewords wrote: post #28

Reading Graham's essays on writing always puts me in mind of the videos where Mexican moms react to Rachael Ray trying to cook ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFN2g1FBgVA ), or a Malaysian guy has to watch a BBC cook make rice ( https://youtu.be/53me-ICi_f8?si=0AaZ82dk_AYFqJAx&t=226 ).

For me the beauty of idlewords's own blog (https://idlewords.com/) is that it's so good it makes me want to write.

Similarly, I find Graham's writing so bad that it also makes me want to write.

(note: idlewords, if you see this, your blog is misbehaving at the moment. For example, PHP is complaining bitterly on this page right now: https://idlewords.com/2018/10/ )

Re: Good Writing

#340

Post by sfpotter »

martin82 wrote: post #327
crossroadsguy wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think witch-hunting at any scale should be okay on online forums. Please don’t. Maybe respond without feeling the need to visit someone’s profile or history?

Why not? How else would you identify a troll? What if someone has a hidden agenda and in isolation their arguments seem sound, but when you zoom out you see the agenda and understand that the arguments are biased and manipulative and actually counterproductive?

Because in many cases no "troll" has been found at all; and discouraging people from witch-hunting leads to a more positive environment that's conducive to interesting conversations. Often the witch hunter is just salty about something someone said. For instance, thomasanders0n is evidently a big fan of Paul Graham's writings. I left my impression of their article, which was short and to the point; I personally think the article is so bad that doesn't merit a lengthy teardown. But because I feel differently, my response has been interpreted as bitter and jaded. Shrug.
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