I didn’t really know where to put this, but I figured the effect of grammar and spelling is a psychological one so it fit here.
The medium through which we usually express ourselves on this message board is words. Grammar and spelling are the rules of the written word. You wouldn’t listen to a song with incorrect music theory, you wouldn’t eat a meal that tastes awful, you wouldn’t watch a movie with horrible cinematography; why would you read a post with horrible grammar?
Whether you like it or not, people judge you on your grammar and spelling. It’s the standard by which we can measure your intelligence. It doesn’t matter if you’re doing math or critiquing art, the words you use can blow your credibility on a subject that has nothing to do with language. Misspellings and grammar mistakes are distracting even if the meaning of the sentence is easy to grasp. More often than not, though, these mistakes make a sentence difficult to understand, and then people have to toil through your sentence and guess at what you mean.
It’s kind of like the blues, in a way. You don’t need to be an expert in the blues to be a great musician, but other musicians will look at you funny if you can’t do a 12-bar blues and a basic blues scale or two.
I’m not saying everyone has to be an expert in language before they can say something meaningful. Certainly you should make exceptions for people who aren’t native speakers of the language they are using (although if it’s an academic paper they should have it thoroughly proofread by someone who does speak the language, so that’s no excuse for poor grammar and spelling in a thesis or serious essay). I’m just saying that an effort has to be made. Put it through MS Word before you post it if you know you’re terrible at language. It doesn’t even have to be completely correct; for instance I use passive voice all the time on non-academic writings because it’s conversational and easy. Hell, there are probably grammar mistakes in this post, but a post like this doesn’t require proofreading and it’s not like there are three or four in every sentence like some peoples’ posts.
There are other stylistic exceptions, too, like writers who choose to use poor grammar to make a point or set a mood. Usually this is done in novels, but it can be done in other places too, 'aight?
A few grammar and spelling mistakes are forgivable. Just don’t expect someone to take you seriously if every sentence has something wrong with it.
On the contrary, I see a person’s level of education in language and grammar a non hinderance. A person that is willing to communicate and learn even though their level of skill is below mine does not mean they have less knowledge of the topic. English hard enough but when you start throwing in slang generational words it does become a wee bit more difficult to master the core. The ability to master language is done through repitition. Seeing the language is different than hearing the language. I take seriously anyone who is willing to communicate. If I must try to translate then that can only benifit me. I learn. If they understand my responses to some degree then they learn. Trying to drag others to my level or a “higher”: level is insulting and rude. It berates the actual intelligence of the other. Of course my grammar is not perfect, nor is my spelling, I am a dyslexic, so that makes me a wee bit more tolerant perhaps. I prefer the actual subject knowledge to language barrier.
I look past it if they are trying and their intelligence is evident beyond the ability of their language, but read this sentence and tell me you take this guy seriously.
He wanted to say something like:
His proof is a complete failure because the conclusion that mathematics is inconsistent is the only result he could have come to given the axioms and impredicative definitions he used. These axioms and impredicative definitions lead to or end in paradoxes themselves.
It’s a circular sentence anyway, but do you see how much better that flows?
I’ll take that as a compliment, Tortoise It’s unfortunate that the sentence still doesn’t mean anything.
Do a google search on the importance of grammar, lots of very intelligent people say the same thing…I didn’t make this up: splashesfromtheriver.com/gra … rtance.htm
In fact, I think it was my 10th grade English teacher who was the first to actually explicitly tell us about the importance of writing well. It should be obvious, but maybe others haven’t had the benefit of being smacked in the face with it.
Yes I saw the thread where this came from.The guy was reaching beyond his means that is all. It is a confusing statement because of that. My highly intelligent nephew used to do that. He would put familiar words together in a way that he thought was correct and even made a few up thinking they were real. After he would leave the room we would bust out laughing because it was so cute. Now that little boy with the big words and mixed up sentences holds a PHD raking in about 80 gs a year. We don’t know how old this guy really is that made this statement. He could be 12 trying to be 25. That he tried to make sense is at least an effort of learning. I might be a bit more patient because I recall the verbal antics of a little boy trying to stretch his mind. So I could be wrong.
Language is important period and grammar specifically so, and the rules of grammar as well.
Do you know what determines if language is grammatical or not? How well the the language concept envolved reflects the ‘language of thought’ that reflects it.
For example, we can say, he filled a cup with water (because fill is a change-state) but we can’t say, 'he filled water into the bucket" because thats a motion-state which fill isn’t.
theres a lot of exceptions to the rule and etc. The rules of generating grammar are also important because they help people understand one word out of an infinite possible potential meanings to the child learning the language, a near impossible computational task.
Well then, he still demonstrates his lack of intelligence by broadcasting his incorrect theories with incorrect grammar. I disaggree with lots of people and still respect them, because they are able to communicate to me why they believe what they believe. Maybe Colin has something interesting to say, but we can’t discern it from his incoherent babbling.
He’s not just trying to make sense, he’s trying to make history. Effort towards understanding is one thing, falsely thinking you do understand and projecting those thoughts is quite another.
It is true that if grammar is very, very bad, then the meaning of a post can become difficult to follow. However, what is the purpose of language? It’s purpose is to communicate what we are thinking. There are plenty of times when someone uses bad grammar when speaking to me yet that does not interfere with my understanding of what they are communicating.
I personally find that I communicate better when writing ‘stream of consciousness’ style i.e. not worrying about grammar. When my focus is on rules and regulations (grammar) then it interferes with what I am actually trying to communicate. So for that reason I don’t worry about spelling mistakes too much either. In fact, I HATE word processors that underline every damned spelling error or grammatical error because it diverts me from my true purpose, which is to communicate what I am thinking.
So I don’t worry about grammar when I am writing because it makes me focus on the wrong thing. It makes me focus on rules and regulations instead of on the clarity of what I am trying to communicate.
Sure but, apply that to age, This is just a kid. not an experienced adult. This is a kid with a hormonal puberty sized masculine ego… I am not condoning. Bear in mind, I am just trying to have patience and to express patience for one so handicapped. Young folks often reach beyond their means and jumble crap up. Not all just some. Those that try at least are doing something besides killing monsters online. I don’t think there is an online forum that is dedicated to people such as this. If there was we could escort the lad there and lock the door. As it is, well, either try to communicate or walk away.
Of course, another interesting aspect of this post is that the subject under discussion - grammar - is discussed with reference to languages such as English which are symbolic languages. Words are simply symbols - so the word ‘table’ is a symbol for a ‘picture’ we have in our heads of a table. In actual fact words are very primitive and very limiting with respect to what can be communicated.
The saying goes that ‘a picture paints a thousand words’. What that means is that images are actually a much more effective means of communicating and, indeed, the human mind copes with images very well - far better than with words. (In fact the human mind has actually evolved to deal with images so using symboloc languages is preventing the mind from evolving. Ever wondered why we dream in images? Why dream in images if words could do better?)
The reason we dream in images is because images communicate what is in our minds much more effectively than words. That is because word are symbols but images are metaphors. Here’s an example of a metaphor - as it happens, it was an image from a recent dream of mine - the image was of a board-walk jutting out over water. Now, as it happens, that board-walk was a metaphor for these message boards or forums that I contribute to. Each plank of the board-walk representing a message board to which I contribute. There are, of course, many other examples of metaphors and many are to be found in poetry.
So, does grammar only have relevance to symbolic languages? What about languages based on metaphor? Does grammar have any relevance there? In other words, can images mean whatever we want theem to mean or does their meaning follow a set of rules?
It’s certainly a lot more pleasurable reading well written posts. Especially since reading here-abouts is a leisure activity, I do like it to be a pleasurable experience!
That’s the difference between posting and chatting - I have higher expectations of the effort which ‘should’ go into constructing something for my /others viewing pleasure
Yes, it’s great that people make an effort to communicate, whatever their skill level, but if it is for the purpose of sharing with others, then taking the time to pop it through a checker (or computers can be set to check as you type in the posting box ) is likely to improve the experience of your viewers, who are then more likely to comprehend / pay attention to the meaning of your message.
While it’s true that most people will measure your intelligence based on how well you articulate, it is not the best way to decide if a person is smart.
The fact that they lack strength in an area, such as spelling or grammar, is not always a sound indication of their intelligence in ALL areas. A person who can not form a written sentence may actually be highly intelligent in other areas, and just lack skill in spelling. Similarly, a person may be a moron but be able to deliver their stupid ideas very well grammatically.
Hey I just found out that you can install a spell-checker “add-on” to Internet Explorer, for checking text in any editable part of your browser. This is perfect for forum users like us! The program is called ieSpell.
Grammar is one of those pathological symptoms where our compulsive obssessions leads us to seek perfection in everything we do. ( Like writing for instance.)
We live in a society where we don’t cheer writers for what kind of message their explaining but rather that their book was written well.
I personally don’t see it as being significant at all and I am sure I’m a minority on that note too.
It’s unfortunate that the sentence still doesn’t mean anything.
