Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the first edition
- Preface to the third edition
- Acknowledgements
- PART I PROBLEM: THE ILLNESS
- PART II SOLUTION: SYMPTOMATIC RELIEF
- 3 Guidelines to clearer writing
- 4 Is there a better word?
- 5 Superfluous words
- 6 Imprecise words and phrases
- 7 Superfluous phrases
- 8 Trouble with short words
- 9 Use of the passive voice
- 10 Consistency: number and tenses
- 11 Circumlocution, metaphor and cliché
- 12 Word order and pronouns
- 13 Punctuation
- 14 Constructing sentences
- 15 Drawing clear graphs
- PART III PRACTICE: RECUPERATION
- Appendix: examples to rewrite
- References and further reading
- Index
6 - Imprecise words and phrases
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 November 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the first edition
- Preface to the third edition
- Acknowledgements
- PART I PROBLEM: THE ILLNESS
- PART II SOLUTION: SYMPTOMATIC RELIEF
- 3 Guidelines to clearer writing
- 4 Is there a better word?
- 5 Superfluous words
- 6 Imprecise words and phrases
- 7 Superfluous phrases
- 8 Trouble with short words
- 9 Use of the passive voice
- 10 Consistency: number and tenses
- 11 Circumlocution, metaphor and cliché
- 12 Word order and pronouns
- 13 Punctuation
- 14 Constructing sentences
- 15 Drawing clear graphs
- PART III PRACTICE: RECUPERATION
- Appendix: examples to rewrite
- References and further reading
- Index
Summary
Some words are used as ‘catch-alls’, when a little thought would suggest a better word. Sometimes associate, involve, concern and regard are appropriate; but often they indicate laziness.
Lavoisier believed it impossible to dissociate language from science or science from language. Sloppy language means sloppy science.
If you find the following words in your first draft, think carefully about whether they could be replaced by more precise ones.
ACHIEVE, ATTAIN
If achieve cannot be replaced by obtain or reach, then it might indicate that the construction of the sentence should be altered. Achieve is commonly superfluous.
Maximum pressures are said to be attained after…
Attain, achieve and reach can all mean to get there, but reach means just that; it is a good simple word that does not colour its surroundings. A guide to the best verb can be the noun formed from it: the achievement of a lifetime's ambition; the attainment of a great, perhaps metaphorical, height. Looked at in this way, these words are not good ones for our rather more mundane purpose. Maximum pressures are said to be attained after … is rather grand for a scientific report. The best verb here, though, is occur: are said to occur after … (even though occur is suffering from overuse (p. 40)).
The only way in which a lower rate can be achieved …
The writers were discussing the settings on a ventilator: obtain is perfectly good.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Medical WritingA Prescription for Clarity, pp. 104 - 115Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2006