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Down with Dry Writing

March 28, 2012

"Why must dryness be written by us?" Adam Ruben asks in a passive voice in Science Careers this week. As scientists, he actively asks, "why can't we tell our science in interesting, dynamic stories?"

Ruben goes on to discuss the ways in which scientific writing is "just plain different from all other writing." He says that journal articles are "not written in English, per se; they're written in a minimalist English intended merely to convey numbers and graphs." For example, scientists are often taught to avoid writing in the first person. "Science succeeds in spite of human beings, not because of us, so you want to make it look like your results magically discovered themselves," Ruben jokes. Another oddity, he adds, is that many journals prefer manuscripts be written in past tense.

"But there's a reason scientific journal articles tend to be dry, and it's because we're writing them that way," Ruben says. "We hope that the data constitutes an interesting story all by itself, but we all know it usually doesn't. It needs us, the people who understand its depth and charm, to frame it and explain it in interesting ways."


Nowadays, scientific research

Submitted by S. Pelech - Kinexus on Wed, 03/28/2012 - 16:47.

Nowadays, scientific research manuscripts are more written by committees than individuals so they will appear to be very impersonal despite the passion that underlies the work. I agree with Adam Ruben that there is a strong tendency for scientists to want to "let the results speak for themselves." I actually find this rather timid and annoying.

Almost any scientific research paper that one reads is full of phrases like "the data suggests" or "the results suggested". How can experimental observations and results be capable of communicating concepts and ideas? It's absurd. In reality, people can form opinions and conclusions by taking the raw data and putting them into the context of their world experience and themselves make suggestions as to what it all means.

I look at publishing scientific research papers like sending out your best writings in bottles into the open ocean. You never really know who is going to find it and what they will do with the information. You hope that it will prove illuminating and helpful to kindred spirits that can further build on what you have found. As a sincere effort to understand more about the universe and honestly convey what you think you and your colleagues have found, a published scientific research paper stands as part of your legacy for the future. You may as well make it as complete and interesting as possible.