Comment by hugh3 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by hugh3 | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

Well, everyone has their own standard. Rules falling within that standard are important for clarity, and rules outside that standard are needless and fussy. However...

You should never end a sentence with a preposition.

I like to follow this one, but only as a hobby, and not in casual conversation unless I'm talking to another pedant. I do admit that the syntactical knots into which I sometimes need to tie myself in order to avoid the preposition at the end make the sentence harder rather than easier to parse. On the other hand, sometimes prepositions at the end can make sentences harder to understand, in instances where the sentence seems to have a different meaning until you get to the preposition at the end. (I can't think of any examples right now.)

You should never split an infinitive

Agreed, that's just plain random.

Never use the passive voice

I have never heard this from anyone except Microsoft Word Grammar Check.

Don't start sentences with 'but' or 'and' or 'however'.

Now now, here I'm really going to have to disagree with you. "However" is reasonable, but "and" and "but" really belong in the middle of the sentence, not at the beginning. There are exceptional circumstances under which you can break this rule, but they're few and far between.

Never use the passive voice

I have never heard this from anyone except Microsoft Word Grammar Check.

An English teacher told my class that it's often used to lie. I think she was right. Maybe it'd be better to say that it is often used to mask the truth (hey, we were fourteen or fifteen, and subtlety wasn't exactly one of our strengths). Consider the difference between "mistakes were made" and "I screwed up."

(On the other hand, also consider the difference between "I screwed up" and "we screwed up." You can still play fast and loose with the truth using the active voice.)

I think it's fair to say that overuse of the passive voice is often associated with strained credibility, so you'd often be better off avoiding it, or at least using it sparingly. Of course, sometimes it reads more smoothly, and in those cases you should use it.

However, if you're writing fiction, passive voice is your friend. My high school teachers never realized this despite handing out creative fiction assignments.

Passive voice is for lab reports, research papers, similar scientific/engineering documentation, although I also see a lot of "we" used in papers, especially CS papers.

The use of active voice in scientific papers is an increasing trend. In the old days it was thought more scientifically appropriate to merely state that things were done without personalizing it, but gradually folks came to realise that scientific papers are hard enough to read already and that page after page of passive voice just makes it harder.

I tend to use a blend.

Well, I certainly agree that it's typically harder to write a long document in the passive voice. Describing what I did accurately and clearly is a big enough challenge without also having to contort everything into the passive voice.

Using the passive voice is not recommended by me. A book was read by me that contained the rule against it: The Elements of Style by Strunk and White. Also a passage in Stephen King's On Writing that makes the same point was read by me a bit later in my life.

In short, I do not recommend the passive voice. The Elements of Style has a rule against it, and I read the same point later in life in a passage from Stephen King's On Writing.

But you don't have to believe them. You can figure out why they recommend it for yourself.

Julia Lennon bore John Lennon in 1940 and Mark David Chapman murdered him in 1980.

John Lennon was born in 1940 and murdered in 1980.

The passive voice is recommended in some situations.

John Lennon: 1940-1980 Mother: Julia Killer: Mark David Chapman

J/k

Point taken.

A critical thinker would try to find a sentence that sounds best in the active voice, then try to find one that works best in the passive voice. Succeeding both times, he would then conclude that both are useful.

Specifically, the passive voice allows you to mention the action while omitting the actor. This is sometimes useful, other times harmful.

A mean spirited person would manage to slip a dig at someone's critical thinking skills into an otherwise well-taken comment. Not that this paragraph implies anything about the comment I'm replying to.

(Seriously, wtf)

Using passive voice is also a characteristic error of young bad writers. I would not presume to tell an old good writer how to do their job.

And incidentally, it doesn't take the awesome might of my critical thinking army, arrayed like the crusaders going to war, pennons snapping in the wind, to point out that there are better reasons to avoid the passive voice than 'MS Grammar Check says so'.

> Never use the passive voice > > I have never heard this from anyone except Microsoft Word Grammar Check.

"Never" is definitely over-stated, but avoiding passive voice does tend to make writing more concise, clear, and engaging. Using passive voice habitually is probably just careless.

I have to admit I use But, in particular, at the beginning of sentences fairly frequently. I usually follow the shorter is better rule when it comes to sentences and try to avoid long sentences that have semicolons and other non-period bridges.(Not always, but most of the time.) I find it tends to make writing snappier and easier to read.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com