On 11/1/2010 2:35 PM, Bill Fairchild wrote:
Many repliers have emphasized clarity and precision.
Although Mr. Gilmore's word choice is sometimes arcane
and obscure, nevertheless his words under attack were
not "big" or "complex" words; e.g., "ætat", having only
five letters, cannot possibly be characterized as "big",
and its meaning is instantly obvious given a knowledge
of Latin roots, as was "lacunae", also not a "big" word.
John's post did not include ætat, that I can see.
Nor did he describe the OP as "naïve." He said that the OP was
"a naïf."
No. He said: "They are radically naif.", speaking of the OP's
questions.
> These two words are not synonymous. Naïve is an adjective
> and naïf is a noun, as he used it.
No. He used "naif" as an adjective, and did not include the
diaeresis. The Merriam-Webster online dictionary says:
Definition of NAÏF: naive
Variants of NAÏF
na·ïf
na·if
If you take Mr. Gilmoreto task for lack of clarity and
precision, then please be sure that your post is just as
clear and precise as you wish his had been.
A two-edged sword, indeed.
Were it not for Mr. Gilmore's predilection for precise meanings,
I would still be ignorant of the words "antipode" and "boustrophedon"
(the latter of which is big, complex, and arcane, but amazingly precise).
As I also do not have an OED on my shelf, he often drives me happily
to an online English dictionary, into a word's etymology, and from thence
to further French, Greek, Italian, or even Icelandic dabbling.
I agree with you there. But for people looking for some
technical information, or even a pointer to a document or
other source, the digression is not necessarily the path
they want to follow.
Bill Fairchild
Rocket Software
-----Original Message-----
From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of
Ted MacNEIL
Sent: Monday, November 01, 2010 2:32 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: ATTACH
There's a lot to be said for vocabulary enhancement.
Yes, but there is a lot to be said for communicating.
I'm tired of hearing that everything must be written for a 5th grade level
audience.
There's a reason for that. Most people are lucky if they can read at that high
of a level.
What ever happened to 'look it up'?
That's fine in the classroom;difficult in real life.
The whole purpose of communicating is to communicate!
If your reader doesn't understand you, through the uses/abuse of large/obscure
words or complex phraseology, it is not the reader's fault.
It is the fault of the writer.
And, using those big words to answer the OP, did not solve the problem.
The calling of him naive was also insulting.
Just because somebody is a novice, is no reason to talk down to him.
If I had answers, I would have responded.
--
Kind regards,
-Steve Comstock
The Trainer's Friend, Inc.
303-393-8716
http://www.trainersfriend.com
* To get a good Return on your Investment, first make an investment!
+ Training your people is an excellent investment
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