Morendil comments on Improving The Akrasia Hypothesis - Less Wrong

69 Post author: pjeby 26 February 2010 08:45PM

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Comment author: Morendil 27 February 2010 11:02:33AM 1 point [-]

Yes; although some people can do that and get away with it (i.e. their readers ends up remembering the take-away point).

Writing with power and writing with clarity are two separate skills. You want to develop both, but clarity takes priority. If you write clearly, at least it will be obvious when what you write doesn't matter.

Comment author: timtyler 27 February 2010 12:59:15PM *  3 points [-]

They won't "get away with it" with all readers. The abstract allows skimmers to get the gist quickly - and delve deeper if they are still interested. With no abstract, there is only the title as a guide to the contents - and the reader faces an "unfortunate" choice between risking wasting their time by delving in - or skipping the article entirely.

Comment author: wedrifid 27 February 2010 01:04:34PM 3 points [-]

On a related note I actually took more from the abstract of Alicorn's recent post than I did from the main text. This is something that happens relatively often with posts in general.