Editing

I don’t know why everyone thinks scientific manuscripts need to all have the same ‘boring’ style. I mean, would it kill anyone to write papers that could potentially capture the interest of an audience beyond the limited circle of experts to which these papers are always addressed. Seriously...I’m totally sick that 90% of science papers sound ‘forced’ and the good ones sound aloof. Probably 1 out of ever 100 papers I read is ‘exciting’. What’s wrong with putting that voice in there?

And yes, if anyone’s read my papers you know that my papers sound aloof at best, and forced more often. This isn’t my fault. This is because everyone who edits my papers tells me things like “This sounds strange” or “Yuck!” or “Make more clear”. As far as I can tell these comments translate to: Write it like everybody else would.

Ok, sometimes it’s because I just suck, but let’s not ignore the point.

Every time I see someone write the phrase ‘make more clear’ I can’t help dying a little on the inside. Do people even know what the word ‘clear’ means? You can’t make something more clear, you can only make it clear!! And these are the people who think I’m not being clear.

And yes, a journal editor just told me her suggestion “Makes this more clear.” Even Microsoft word knows that’s just wrong.

And don’t get me started on the way people use the word ‘disconnect.’