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Let me regale you with another example (is that really something one can be "regaled" with?) of poor textbook writing from my GIS text. The authors are discussing maps, and the issue of map scale - that is, the ratio that tells how much of real life distance is represented by a specified unit of measure on the map. One common way to show the scale is with a representative fraction (RF)....
This is a simple ratio in the form of 1:1,000,000 or 1/1,000,000. In an RF, the number on the left side is the map distance, and its value is always unity.
Unity. Not 1 (or one). Presumably that would be too.... pedestrian? I mean after all, we're academics. We're supposed to be smarter than other people, and we ought to express ourselves in such a way as to make clear how smart we are. Am I right? By using the term unity in its mathematical sense as a reference to the numerical value of 1, we show the reader, who has never met us, that the tops of all our hats have worn thin in the center.
Then, just for giggles, let's look at the brief mention of temporal scale as it applies to maps: "The unit of measurement of a temporal scale can be years, months, days, hours, minutes, or seconds." But nothing else, apparently. Decades, centuries, and larger units are not to be used (it would seem).
If I ever write a text book, I'm going to try really hard to make it actually useful. And provide relevant content. And make sure it's clear - or at least reasonably so.
Within the first 3 days of classes, I've been frustrated by both of my textbooks.
In one of them, the author(s) is/are discussing the difference between deductive and inductive reasoning. Deductive reasoning, we're told, is informally called "top-down" - it starts at the higher level of theory and works down to details and observations. Induction, in contrast, works from specific observations up to general theories. For this reason, it is sometimes called a "bottom-up" approach to research. Then we get this little gem, inserted parenthetically:
(Please note that it's bottom up and not bottoms up, which is the kind of thing the bartender says to customers when he's trying to close for the night!)
Yes, they include an exclamation point, presumably to emphasize the importance of this clarification between the two phrases. And thank goodness for that, because if I'm in a discussion with someone and they mention inductive reasoning, I don't want to embarrass myself by looking around for a glass or bottle to drain before grabbing my coat, slapping a fiver on the counter, and dashing out the door! Not only was the information irrelevant, but it completely derailed my train of thought. Now every time I see an opening parenthesis, I don't know if I should be paying attention or not.
In my GIS textbook, the first sentence of the first chapter is:
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are also commonly known as Geographical Information Systems outside North America.
I had to read it four times to figure out what they hell they were telling me. I wrote technical documentation for 5 years, and I'm pretty sure that sentence would never have made it past my reviewers (and they weren't writers).
Obviously, expertise in a field of study does not translate into an ability to communicate one's expertise. Sadly, it seems that most textbooks are chosen by others who, while experts in that field, frequently share that lack of understanding good communication. I guess it's the college textbook version of the circle of life.
Am I the only person who thinks it's ridiculous when a character in a book or movie or tv show says, "Blah de blah, [name]. Blah de blah." Nobody talks like that in real life. Nobody says something, then says the name of the person they're talking to, then says the thing again. I've never heard that in real life, reader. I've never heard that in real life.
**Clarification**
Ben suggested I post an example to explicate what I mean here. The best example I have is from Futurama, where they've just watched an episode of All My Circuits. (I can't remember the dialogue exactly, but I'll paraphrase as accurately as I can.)
Amy (crying): Will Calculon's evil twin ever come out of his coma?
Hermes: I don't know, Amy. I just don't know.
Hermes's line is an example of what I'm talking about. Another might be, after a trip to the grocery, "I'll bring in the milk, Jane. I'll bring in the milk."
Latest poll results:
Q: Hey, I read that book!
A: True: 6/7 (85%)
...False: 1/7 (15%)
Total: 7/7 (100%)
Don't fail to miss the new poll!
Friday night Ben & I went to see the latest Harry Potter flick. Unlike the vast majority of the audience, I have not read any of the books, and have no desire to do so. Nonetheless, I have enjoyed all of the films. People have complained about the loss of content, and shallow character development. At least one user said that if you hadn't read the book, you wouldn't be able to follow the plot. Completely untrue. I had no trouble with the plot, and while the movie may have focused excessively on HP, isn't that the point of the story? Isn't he the central character throughout the series?
Today's Blog of Note (spoken loudly into echo chamber): Books for Africa. I'm not including a link - you'll see why in a moment. I thought it looked like a cool idea. The premise, it looks like, is to provide books to orphans in several African countries in an effort to provide them with an education. Of course, I wondered if my books written in English are really ideal....
Further investigation revealed the the program is run by the Rafiki Foundation, "a Christian organization whose goal is to help Africa’s orphaned and vulnerable children become godly contributors to their communities and the world."
I thought, "Hmmm, I have a feeling I know where this is going, but let's give it a chance - there's a very remote chance that they are providing education without trying to indoctrinate these kids." Not surprisingly, that hope was dashed:
The Rafiki Foundation provides God's Word and ministries of
mercy to the youth (both boys and girls) of African countries.
and
Rafiki schools provide a quality Christian education for the children who reside at the Village. The children learn to think, live, and lead others from a Biblical worldview.
In other words: We're going to provide them with an education, but we'll make sure they follow our wacky belief system about an invisible man in the sky who watches everything you do, and, while he loves you, is eager to condemn you to eternal damnation if you don't follow is bizarre rules.
I wonder if I should send my copy of Achebe's Things Fall Apart.
... instead of an honest man, I'm looking for something worth adding to my "Random Links." And instead of a lantern, I'm using teh internets. But otherwise I'm exactly like Diogenes. Really.
Blogger.com features a "Blog of Note" each weekday, and oftentimes they're interesting enough to merit attention and placement on that list. I saw one the other day called The Caffeinated Librarian and thought it might be promising. When I went to check it out, I was bombarded with post after post about Harry Potter. Well, so much for that.
Today I decided to check again. The first one that caught my eye was Guerrilla Busfare, and I thought, "That might be interesting - it sounds like it could be someone who is pro-mass transit, and that's cool." Then I read the brief description at the top of the page: "There's a fine line between criticism and haterism. Tread lightly." Well, so much for that.
Then there was a link labeled Yeah, That Vegan ****. Hmm. Let's see what this is aboot. Description: "Vegan recipes that will make you scream with unbridled pleasure." I like food, and while I'm a dedicated omnivore, I have no issues with animal-free meals every so often. Plus, I know no fewer than 4 vegetarians. (Hay guys!) Looks like we have a winner!
I think I can officially count today as the first day of summer productivity, from a mood perspective. Yesterday I started work for my summer class, and today I feel all energized & shit. I've already been to the grocery, and am ready to get my reading done, and tomorrow I meet with my instructor for the first time. I've got my primary text here, all marked up, and I've decided to write up short summaries of each reading as well, to help my brain get into writing mode. There are a couple of additional texts that I ought to pick up, so I'll be stopping by the library tomorrow as well. Oh, how exciting!
Huzzah for urban form! Huzzah for urban design! Huzzah for reading copious literature and writing papers! Huzzah, I say, huzzah!
I label this post Part 1 not because I know there will be subsequent parts, but because there might be, and because it implies that there will be, so people will keep coming back in anticipation of future "Summer Vacation" posts. Seriously, they will. I'm sure of it.
So I've been finished with the school for 5 days now, and what have I been doing with myself? I had thought, "Once the semester is finished, I'll have time to make a blog entry every day. How exciting and modern I will be! Everyone will want - nay, need to be my friend." (Perhaps I need a catchy slogan.)
I should have known better, of course. Summer vacation has been, at least initially, a time for sleeping in and watching TV, and doing a bit of reading, and avoiding anything that smacks of responsibility. Until today.
Today, I moved several dozen strawberry plants. The story goes like this: A couple of years ago, Ben's mom gave us a 5 or 6 very sickly little strawberry plants that were of a variety she didn't care for. I figured I'd stick them in the ground & see what happened, but was more keen on getting them to grow than really getting anything out of them. They were planted in very poor soil, but watered regularly, and seemed to perk up.
Then they started spitting out runners. And this year, there was a thick mass of strawberry plants covering about 30 square feet. So I moved them, and decided that if I spaced them about 12 to 18 inches apart, they would have enough room around them to spread a bit. We now have about 100 square feet of strawberries, and I'm curious to see what happens over the next couple of years.
Then I moved some daylilies. I had moved a few when we first moved into the house, and they were doing fine in their new home. The problem was, that new home was getting overrun with weeds, and was also a place better suited to the strawberries. So I moved the lilies again, and now I have to go back outside and move the others that are still next to the house. I've no idea when they were last divided, but I can imagine it's been a while. Also, because they are currently in heavy shade, they haven't bloomed since we've been in the house. Their future home has more sunlight, so maybe we'll get to see what they look like in flower - though I suspect they're the standard yellow or orange ones, which can be nice, but a bit boring, no?
Wow. If you made it this far, you have a higher tolerance for boring rambling b.s. than I'd anticipated. Maybe I'll need to try harder next time, yes?
I recently (ok, a week ago) received an email from Barnes & Noble .com with the subject line "As Featured Today on Oprah: Scam Proof Your Life." Is this really appropriate, given that she's pushing this "The Secret" bullshit? Discuss.
It's been acknowledged and widely recognized that I'm a nerd. I'm good with that. No problems there. But every once in a while, I wonder if I'm more nerdy than usual - perhaps a new breed of super-nerd, with powers beyond the fathoming of mere mortals.
So I'm writing up a short summary of some readings for one of my classes (I've finished the hardest of them; the other two should be easy). I'm putting together a bibliography, as one does, and realized how enjoyable it is to do that. I don't know what exactly makes it enjoyable. Is it the ordering of disparate sources into a brief list? The selection of certain pieces of information about the work that do not tell us anything about the content (beyond what we can infer from the title), and yet give us everything we need to locate the work? I don't know. It's odd, but after putting all three of them on the list, I had a feeling of more than just accomplishing one part of a larger task. I was filled with a momentary serenity, a sense that all was right with the world.
I just recently read Sam Harris's Letter to a Christian Nation. It is short, but easily the most succinct and clear work on a perils of religion in the modern world. I can't emphasize this enough: READ THIS BOOK! Seriously, READ THIS BOOK!!
I have in the past been accused of linguistic prescriptivism. Denial would be silly, as I have tended to take a normative view of usage and grammar in the past. And, to be sure, in some ways even the most staunch opponent of prescriptivism must understand that there need to be certain standards in the use of language. Take, for example, the case of someone relating a story about a woman "giving a long misogynistic speech," completely unaware of the meaning of misogynistic. I think the lesson there is: you have to know what a word means if you plan to use it. Barring the existence of conventions and rules of some kind, of windmill campfire hoping above compost a lamp the, pre-chaplain fries yes.
The question of conventions and rules, however, is not whether we need them in language. Rather, it is an issue of where do they come from? A prescriptivist holds that rules need to be imposed by ... someone. They maintain that there are certain ways in which words can and should be used, and that phenomena such as verbing are anathema to the vitality of language and its ultimate utility. Descriptivism, on the other hand, is focused on how language actually is used rather than how it should be used. Verbing is not a new phenomenon, for example. It has been occurring for as long as we've had language, and is a basic process in the growth of language. Crying about it won't make it go away. Ever. And while I agree that solution as a verb sounds ridiculous, I in no way suggest that it impossible, in 100 or 200 years, it will commonly be used as such. Good? Bad? No. Just different.
The best thing I've read of descriptivism, and a work that has driven the last vestiges of prescriptivism from my blood, is Guy Deutscher's The Unfolding of Language. It's humorous, readable, and informative. It achieves a level of accessibility that is rarely, if ever, seen in books about linguistics. Four stars! The book is not an examination of the prescriptivist/descriptivist debate, but rather describes how languages change over time, from our ancient ancestors' first primitive grunts and gestures to the elaborate variety of languages we hear today. However, in outlining this history, the author implicitly undermines a prescriptivist approach to grammar and usage.
A favorite example of mine is orientate. The verb orient is related to orientation in the same way that create is related to creation. Dozens of verbs ending with -ate have a related noun that ends with -ation. But when you look at the orient/orientation pairing, that pattern doesn't hold. Craving an orderly system, people see the -ate/-ation pattern in other words and apply it to orientation, and, ta-da! Orientate!
So, at the risk of causing a logical paradox and bringing about the end of the universe: What happens if a descriptivist maintains that rules should arise organically from the language itself?
