What are some of the things that irritate you relative to how members communicate and how to improve the manner in which we discuss and debate the issues?
Well, here's a good example of at least two of them. One, stop using the word "relative." I've yet to see one single example of you using it properly. Most of the time, all it does it give the impression that you really don't know what you're talking about and trying to bullshit past your ignorance. Two, there are at least two different sentences encompassed by that quote, but only one period. Stop trying to put more than one idea in a single sentence. You can't do it properly, and most of the time that you try it's two different ideas that belong in two different sentences.
Quite honestly, Buz, I think your real problem is lack of clarity in thought. It's impossible to clearly express an idea in writing that you do not completely understand. The only solution to this is to learn to think clearly. Clarity of thought does not come naturally. It must be learned. You have not learned. I don't intend this to be an insult, but simply an observation based on years of reading what you've written.
However, in the absence clarity of thought, here are a few tips to help you express yourself more clearly in writing.
First, and most important, read
Strunk and White. Learn it, love it, live it. There has never been a better manual of style for writing in the English language. (Incidentally, the White of Strunk and White is E.B. White, author of
Charlotte's Web and
Stuart Little, among other treasures.)
Second, write in shorter sentences. If you can't express an idea in 12 or fewer words, you shouldn't be writing about it. In most cases, when you write a sentence longer than that, you're trying to say too much in one sentence.
Third, learn basic rules of grammar. Your subject/verb agreement and sentence structures are atrocious. These are things that most people in this country learned in grade school. If you ever knew them, you've forgotten.
Fourth, get and use a spell checker. No matter how well you express an idea or compose a sentence, if you're misspelling simple words, you look ignorant. I'm not talking about occasional tyops, everyone makes those. But I'd venture to guess that you have yet to post a message of more than 50 words or so that didn't have a misspelling.
Fifth, proof read. There's a wonderful little button next to the "Submit Reply" button that says "Preview." I preview probably 75 % of what I write here, and most of the time I catch a mistake that I missed in composing a message and that spell check didn't catch because it wasn't a spelling error. (I've previewed this post twice and am still finding small mistakes.)
I suspect you will ignore these suggestions, but they would benefit anyone, even me. So I'll present them for general purposes.
Tyop in paragraph 7 is intentional and included for comedic purposes.
Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. -- Thomas Jefferson
We see monsters where science shows us windmills. -- Phat
It has always struck me as odd that fundies devote so much time and effort into trying to find a naturalistic explanation for their mythical flood, while looking for magical explanations for things that actually happened. -- Dr. Adequate
...creationists have a great way to detect fraud and it doesn't take 8 or 40 years or even a scientific degree to spot the fraud--'if it disagrees with the bible then it is wrong'.... -- archaeologist
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