tldr "Use your brain to think of words that are good"
How to Be Clear
51–58 of 58 posts
Re: How to Be Clear
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
So... Viral content?
Viral storytelling? Hmm, there's a thought. So one challenge with designing a story to be told, is how to make it stable. Else it becomes a source of misconceptions, rather than of understanding. If the story is then passed on further, that becomes the telephone game, and stability... becomes even harder. Status quo disinclination to pass on (pervasively flawed) understanding does have benefits. So what if it were pa…
Might an example for this community be xkcd links?
Re: How to Be Clear
#53This is a great opportunity to talk about the worst-written sign I have ever seen. The "slippery when wet" signs at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport read: ** Caution Please be careful while using the restroom. For your safety, we remind you that flooring can be very slippery when wet. Your safety is our concern. ** https://imgur.com/Uh9DrLh These make me so irrationally frustrated. Why do they use suc…
Ya, it should just read "slippery when wet". Maybe add an exclamation mark to show urgency and that you care. So how we would describe the sign is usually what it should say. Like, "STOP".
Or in this case "Caution" which usually is the largest text on these type of signs. Caution and some indication they are referring to the floor, which could just be contextual. The queue that these signs are often short will natural indicate the eye to look at the floor, so that is nice when it works out.
Re: How to Be Clear
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not really commenting on the guide, but for me, clarity of thought follows writing. Not the reverse.
Yup. For me the process is something like: 1. Think that I know something. 2. Write about it. Realize I didn't know it anywhere near as well as I thought. 3. Reflect on and actually understand thing. 4. Edit writing now that I actually know what the hell I'm talking about.
And further than that, even if when do know most the pertinent details, the best way to communicate them is probably not the jumbled order it appears in your head, nor is it even some "logical" order (such a timeline or logical argumentation).
Writing for clarity often involves careful consideration of how to sequence the information such that it can be consumed given the audience and knowing when to elide details or otherwise footnote them.
Re: How to Be Clear
#55"Think about what your readers might already know." This alone is an excellent starting point. You know the feeling of dismay when someone starts talking beneath your level of understanding and you fear they'll never go above it? Thinking about what your audience (written or spoken) might already know is the intelligent, considerate, and efficacious thing to do.
And the opposite is exceedingly frustrating: when someone starts explaining something in terms of base concepts you've never even heard of, and you have to stop them every few seconds to fill in the blanks (and then some of those explanations have holes of their own, etc). In some cases you may be so new to a topic that you don't even know which questions to ask, so it's impossible for you to shepherd them into telli…
This is when I find good teachers/explainers switch to analogies - however imperfect they might be.
Re: How to Be Clear
#56> Write shorter sentences, with simpler words What is the urge to write shorter sentences? Short sentences are akin to verbose code in a language like Java. Every new sentence you write must include the essential components of a sentence, the skeleton, for it to be grammatically correct or in Java: public static void method1(String[] args) public static void method2(String[] args) public static void method3(String[]…
I suspect most non-social-media writing more often suffers from longer, more complex sentences than those too short. The programing analogy might be cyclomatic complexity and separation of concerns. Examples abound of functions with overloaded conditionals, long parameter lists and other smells that might it difficult to reason about the operation of such a function. On the other-hand, you do see the overzealous craft trivial functions that should just be inlined in the few places they are used.
Clarity, for both prose and code, involves finding the right tradeoffs and abstraction boundaries.
Re: How to Be Clear
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
Viral storytelling? Hmm, there's a thought. So one challenge with designing a story to be told, is how to make it stable. Else it becomes a source of misconceptions, rather than of understanding. If the story is then passed on further, that becomes the telephone game, and stability... becomes even harder. Status quo disinclination to pass on (pervasively flawed) understanding does have benefits. So what if it were pa…
Might an example for this community be xkcd links?
Oh, nice example. I wonder if repackaging a viral content of '' as a conversational cartoon, 'A: "!" B: "LOL!"', might increase the likelihood of it being spoken? Perhaps yielding viral content spread, with oral storytelling leaves. Or maybe even A: "" B: "Neat! ?" A: "" to scaffold further conversation and thought?
There's a common professorial comment, that they didn't really understanding some topic, until after preparing for, and teaching it. So the exploratory question is, how might 'preparing for, and teaching it' be made a greater part of the science education content and outreach experience. For the additional motivation of sharing the knowledge with others. And for the incentive towards clearer, more integrated understanding - eg, to be able to answer non-toy real-people questions.
Re: How to Be Clear
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
> 4. What do they already know? Yeah, I've found that this is what's most commonly overlooked when communicated with people at work. They either spend too much time explaining things you already know, or assume context you don't have.
I very much prefer when they explain too much than too little. Yeah, it might be boring to listen to or you might have to skim a big part of the text, but that is much better than being lost.
In text I don't mind so much, but in meetings it can waste a lot of time.