How important is it to use “important” in your writing?

Have you read an article where the author talks about “an important process” or “the important role of another process”? Do these sort of platitudes go in one of your ears and out the other? Are you convinced by the author’s use of the word “important” that it truly is an important process? Or, do … read more

Problems with the term “overrunning”

Several authors have criticized the use of the term overrunning to represent warm-frontal lifting here and here. I don’t need to add anything to those Web pages, but I do want to point out that the definition provided in the American Meteorological Society’s Glossary of Meteorology is wrong and ambiguous. overrunning—A condition existing when an … read more

Is it in your nature to use “nature” in your scientific writing?

Some authors have a habit of using the word “nature” commonly in their writing. I suspect that they don’t even think about it. It just seems, well, natural. In fact, the word is empty of meaning in many contexts. “cumuliform nature”: “the cauliflower-like visual appearance of convective clouds” “nature of the convection”: What do you … read more

Dump the tilde

I am an Assistant Editor at the Electronic Journal of Severe Storms Meteorology. As we have no paid staff, we depend upon authors to send us manuscripts that are near-ready to publish. The rest of the work we do ourselves, including much of the layout, technical and copy editing, and Web pages. For all that, … read more

Take the Pledge: I Won’t Use Map-room Jargon!

If you regularly attend discussions in the weather-map room, subscribe to weather or storm-chaser discussion lists, or have reviewed articles for Weather, Monthly Weather Review, National Weather Digest, or Weather and Forecasting, then you have been exposed to it. Map-room jargon. Often the speakers of map-room jargon don’t even know what they are doing. (I … read more

Junk the Jargon Podcast

I’ve appeared in the University of Manchester Junk the Jargon Podcast (Junkcast). You can listen or read the transcript here. In this Junkcast, I talk about how to engage an audience, giving some examples from my and others’ presentations.

Giving proper credit to Monin and Obukhov

Often in the literature, you will hear about the Monin-Obukhov length (30,400 results in google today) and Monin-Obukhov similarity theory (9520 results in google today). Monin-Obukhov similarity theory is the correct term. But, the length L should only be referred to as the Obkhov Obukhov length, as correctly stated in the AMS Glossary and on … read more

Upsidence?

Dave Mechem (University of Kansas) and my Manchester colleagues have been telling me about a new term that has been adopted from geology into atmospheric science: upsidence. My understanding of upsidence is that the term means ascent in an environment with otherwise large-scale descent. The term is used to refer to an “upsidence wave”, a … read more

What are your pet peeves?

Appendix B: Commonly Misused Scientific Words and Expressions of Eloquent Science was inspired by a list of incorrect science expressions and annoyances maintained by Chuck Doswell. Many of Chuck’s pet peeves are included in Appendix B. I also surveyed my friends and colleagues about their pet peeves and included many of them in Appendix B. … read more

Terrible use of jargon

———————————————————- 2010-04-05 The Future of Family Science Stan J. Knapp of Brigham Young University conditionally prognosticates a jargon-free future for his fellow family scientists: “Authorizing Family Science: An Analysis of the Objectifying Practices of Family Science Discourse,” Stan J. Knapp, Journal of Marriage and Family, vol. 64, no. 4 (Nov., 2002), pp. 1038-1048. . Knapp … read more

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