I feel strongly about this. Yes, I'm a scientist. Yes, I use jargon and have the capability to describe everything I've done, and can do, in the most obtuse manner possible. As physicists, we place a lot of weight on being able to have conversations about science. We even hold weekly meetings called ''colloquiums'' in order to spark up conversations about science. Why then do we insist on writing in an archaic manner in which we actively attempt to confuse people and fellow scientists? This is illogical and as a logical person, I find it unnecessary. I will not compromise my principles about writing in a manner that is clear and easy to understand. - Andy Maloney

I agree with you for the most part. Since you weren't there "behind closed doors," I can say that the predominant concern was basically for whether _other_ scientists (i.e. future bosses / colleagues) would understand your goals with your dissertation. I.e., like the one member said to you, he literally wasn't sure whether you were talking tongue-in-cheek or not, and you know we really respect his opinion. I suppose somewhere in the document, you could explain that you're intentionally writing in a less formal style than we have to for peer-reviewed publications, in order to communicate as you think is most effective. If you do work that in somewhere, though, try to be a little less bitter :) - Steve Koch

Ha! I'm not bitter. Just passionate about not being a "high brow" linguist. I've thought of this already and I am going to add a prologue that describes this very issue and why I have decided to not write so formally. - Andy Maloney

Hey, I remember having this discussion with my PI too! I won the fight about "active voice is the voice that is preferred by us" by showing them Nature's guidelines which specifically call for it, but I gave in on some of the more innovative document structure concepts I used initially. I think new PhD's have a duty to keep pushing the envelope, because they're the only ones who will and someone has to, but I also see the arguments about too much too soon being a distraction from the paper itself. - Mr. Gunn

Some jargon and field-specific conventions are there for a real purpose, not just to confuse the plebs and make us look smarter. One of the easiest examples is methods: I don't want to read a thousand different descriptions of how a plasmid library was constructed, no matter how good and clean the prose. If you used a standard method, I want you to describe it in standard terms -- basically, the same description I read in the last ten papers that used it. That way your prose becomes transparent to me, and the information goes straight into my brain without the need for translation. - Bill Hooker

Andy or Steve, can you repost the link to Andy's diss? I'd like to read through it -- I'm very interested in this idea of clarity in scientific writing, and to what extent formalisms help and hinder that goal. - Bill Hooker

Bill, for now the wiki chapters are linked on Andy's OWW home page here: http://www.openwetware.org/wiki... - Steve Koch

Chapter 1 is probably a good place to start--it's methods http://www.openwetware.org/wiki... - Steve Koch

Thanks, Steve. Andy, for what it's worth, I think I'm seeing two kinds of "colloquial" writing here. First, there's the kind in your introduction section, which is chatty and fun and completely fucking pointless in a scientific document. I'm not there to swap movie quotes with you. Blog that stuff if you gotta get it out. Then, there's the actual methods section, where the colloquial tone largely results in writing that is clear and straightforward and efficiently captures a great deal more important detail than "standard" formats. (Even there, I'd lose the stuff about how you hear LTP milk tastes better and DMSO on your skin makes you taste garlic and so on -- again, Chatty Kathy stuff that distracts from the point of the document, which is to convey to fellow experimentalists (whether in a garage or MIT) how to do the work you did. I guess that stuff is OK in a thesis, but it would just annoy me in a paper.) - Bill Hooker

What I'm saying -- and again, fwiw, meaning you shouldn't listen too much to random weirdos on the internets -- is that your stated goal is to make the writing clearer, the transmission of information to the reader more efficient. Where it works, where you stick to the point, your writing does this extremely well, and I would defend it for clarity against any of the usual formalisms. I would simply beware the beside-the-point stuff, which for my money reduces clarity and efficiency just as much as archaic linguistic conventions. - Bill Hooker

Bill: Ha! Love it! I completely agree with you about the "Chatty Cathy" segments. Very true. But, sometimes it's good to have your attention shaken a little bit with some randomness because I bet you $10,000 that you remember the section where I spoke about DMSO and I can guarantee you won't remember what section has glucose in it. - Andy Maloney from iPhone

Bill: You are also correct that I would not want to have verbal diarrhea in a paper. I'd never want to read such dribble in a journal article myself if all I'm after is the methods. In fact, I'd just read the methods section and be done with it. This is why I structured the chapter to have links to the important methods sections and can be navigated to if so desired. But, this wasn't a journal article. And, I've had comments from non scientists state that my dribble actually helped them understand things because they could relate it to something they understood. Which, in my opinion is the point of teaching and why I think it's okay to have written what I did in this format. - Andy Maloney from iPhone

Oh, and for some awesome dribble from actual journal articles where you can read about scientists bitching about each other, you should read some articles from the early 1900's. - Andy Maloney from iPhone

Bill: Here's a good question, when was the last time you read a dissertation? Better question, when was the last time you read a dissertation that you didn't want to stop reading and have a stiff drink? I was under the impression that dissertations sat in the library with the $20 you planted in there and that was it. So, from you reading it Bill, I suppose I owe you $20. :) - Andy Maloney from iPhone

Nah, you only get the $20 if you find it in the physical copy! Last time I read a dissertation was a couple of months ago; it was a bit of a slog because it wasn't my field (behavioural risk factors for HIV -- lots of stats). I still think it wouldn't have been improved by asides about how milk tastes! But when I read dissertations, even more than when I read papers, I'm usually looking for something specific -- so your point about structure and navigation is well taken. - Bill Hooker