Skip to main content

Like, you know?

By
I plan to make all of my students watch this video:

Typography from Ronnie Bruce on Vimeo.


I've noticed the creeping vines of questions crawling on sentences in many recent science talks, especially by the "young'uns." The non-question question mark is a defining characteristic of Caltech undergrad speech patterns? I've also noticed a lot of, "Today, I want to tell you about low-mass stars." Oh yeah? You want to tell me that? Well tell me, instead of leaving me in doubt right off the bat! "Today I'm going to tell you about low-mass stars." Period. Then do it!

Another pet peeve of mine is "sort of." There are way too many things in astronomy these days that sort of do things, and sort of correlate with other things. In practice, you don't sort of extract your spectrum. So don't tell me you did.

Tell me what you know. Be the expert in the room. Not just for your sake, but for mine and the rest of the audience.

Hat tip to my seester Amy P. for the video.

P.S. Can you tell I'm suffering from post-AAS burn out?
Labels:

Comments

Anonymous said…
Like, you know, sort of... one of the phrases my first boss made me eliminate from my vocabulary was "I guess". I am not guessing! I need to tell him yes or no and why! He was right, and I still remember that conversation even though it's been 10 yrs ago now (yikes, am I that old?). It goes along with the "sort of", though. And I can't believe I am old enough to criticize the way young folks talk. Am I that old already???
January 14, 2011 at 2:05 PM
Anonymous said…
Way to go, John! Fight the good fight!!
January 14, 2011 at 8:36 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A view from your shut down

By
The Daily Dish has been posting reader emails reporting on their " view from the shutdown ." If you think this doesn't affect you, or if you know all too well how bad this is, take a look at the growing collection of poignant stories. No one is in this alone except for the nutjobs in the House. I decided to email Andrew with my own view. I plan to send a similar letter to my congressperson. Dear Andrew, I am a professor of astronomy at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA). The CfA houses one of the largest, if not the largest collection of PhD astronomers in the United States, with over 300 professional astronomers and roughly 100 doctoral and predoctoral students on a small campus a few blocks west of Harvard Yard. Under the umbrella of the CfA are about 20 Harvard astronomy professors, and 50 tenure-track Smithsonian researchers. A large fraction of the latter are civil servants currently on furlough and unable to come to work. In total, 147 FTEs
Post a Comment
Read more

The Long Con

By
Hiding in Plain Sight ESPN has a series of sports documentaries called 30 For 30. One of my favorites is called Broke  which is about how professional athletes often make tens of millions of dollars in their careers yet retire with nothing. One of the major "leaks" turns out to be con artists, who lure athletes into elaborate real estate schemes or business ventures. This naturally raises the question: In a tightly-knit social structure that is a sports team, how can con artists operate so effectively and extensively? The answer is quite simple: very few people taken in by con artists ever tell anyone what happened. Thus, con artists can operate out in the open with little fear of consequences because they are shielded by the collective silence of their victims. I can empathize with this. I've lost money in two different con schemes. One was when I was in college, and I received a phone call that I had won an all-expenses-paid trip to the Bahamas. All I needed to d
8 comments
Read more

back-talk begins

By
me: "owen, come here. it's time to get a new diaper" him, sprinting down the hall with no pants on: "forget about it!" he's quoting benny the rabbit, a short-lived sesame street character who happens to be in his favorite "count with me" video. i'm turning my head, trying not to let him see me laugh, because his use and tone with the phrase are so spot-on.
4 comments
Read more