博文
Simple is best
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简单的语言
在本贴中，我将介绍简单的语言对于学术文章的重要性。科学是复杂的，因此语言需简练。复杂的语言会让读者难以理解你想表达的学术内容。最好使用简单、清楚、简洁的语言让读者易于理解。我在后面还会提供一个图表帮助作者来简化文章中的语言。
The nature of reality and science are complicated enough without English getting in the way
"Easy writing's curse is hard reading." --Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816)
The origins and evolution of the universe, the Earth and life. The climate system and effects of humans on the environment. Alternative energies and sustainability. The struggle to understand ageing, cancer and neurodegenerative diseases. These are only some of the issues being addressed currently by modern science, and they are all extremely complex.
A commonly-used approach in science to manage this complexity is to tackle one small part of the problem at a time, and it is in this incremental approach that the modern scientific endeavor has been so successful in helping us understand our universe. Never the less, the methods, technologies and language of science are also extremely complex. Our disciplines are replete with their own vocabularies of technical jargon, often with their specific “grammars” in which only certain combinations of terms make scientific sense.
Given this complexity of nature and our scientific methods and language, clear and concise written scientific English is essential. Unfortunately the English language is not intrinsically concise, although it is becoming more so. Compare, for example, the following lists:
a majority of most
a number of many, several, some
at a rapid rate rapidly
as a consequence of because of
at this point in time currently
based on the fact that because
despite the fact that although
due to the fact that because
in order to to
so as to to
on the basis of based on
On the left are terms that are perfectly correct, but not concise. The concise versions are on the right. The list on the left is a legacy from when English was more formal and “wordy”. These terms are still used frequently in much English writing, but in technical scientific writing they are being discarded increasingly in favor of the terms on the right.
Many native English writers believe that using the wordy terms appears more intellectual or clever, and non-native writers have also been taught the same. This is wrong. The use of these wordy terms is fine in creative literature and poetry and in other types of writing where style may be considered as important as substance, but in scientific writing we should be aiming for concision.
In my time here in China, I’ve twice had Chinese people tell me about their school education in English. A common task would be for the teacher to tell the class to write, for example, 200 words on a particular topic. Frequent use of terms such as “in order to” and “at this point in time” were a good way to reach the word limit, but in scientific writing the objective is usually the opposite: to say as much as you can in as few words as possible. The less you use these wordy terms the more space you have to use the technical and often complex scientific language you should be focusing on. This is especially the case for abstracts, where upper word limits need to be strictly adhered to.
Another simple way to improve concision is the use, or rather not using, the word “of”. As you know, this word indicates the possessive of something, for example “the slope of the mountain”. This can be shortened to “the mountain slope”, where the word “mountain” is now used essentially as an adjective to describe the slope. Now take the short sentence “the slope of the mountain that is covered with forest.” This can be shortened to “the forested mountain slope”, where the adjective “forested” means the same as “covered with forest”. The sentence has been reduced from 10 words to four, and means exactly the same thing.
This is a very simple and general example of improving concision, but this process constitutes much of the editing I perform on English manuscripts written by non-native English writers.
The opening quote of this post – “easy writing's curse is hard reading” – means that writing the first thing that enters your head will usually convey most of what you want to say, but will often contain too many words and too much repetition. This can make it difficult and tiring to read. An initial draft of a piece of English writing can almost always be improved and made more concise. One of the great things about English is that although it has the capacity to be unnecessarily wordy, it is flexible enough to improve concision dramatically, as the above example showed.
Unfortunately, this is often not an easy thing to do, especially for non-native speakers and writers. Similar to native speakers, non-native speakers need to spend time both writing and reading in English to develop the writing (and re-writing) skills needed for optimal concision. It is not just in English that this is an issue. The 17th Century French mathematician, physicist and theologian Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) famously said to a correspondent in a letter: “I would have written a shorter letter, but I did not have the time.” He meant that to have improved the concision of his letter would have required much more thought and effort than the initial draft. Pascal wrote this in French, but it still applies equally to making things concise in English.
Returning to a theme of an earlier post (Writing and the art of scientific reading), good readers make good writers. The more English text you can read in your scientific field, and the greater familiarity you gain with the scientific vocabulary and grammar of your discipline, the more easily you will be able to use it in your writing. This includes learning the most concise way to write things.
The nature of reality and science are complicated enough without wordy English getting in the way. Try your best to write concisely and clearly, and let your English language be an open doorway to the importance of your research, not an unwieldy barrier.
Matthew Hughes, PhD
Soil Sciences Editor
Edanz Group China
https://m.sciencenet.cn/blog-288924-464896.html
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