Neil deGrasse Tyson explains why words, names, and labels matter.
“The universe is hard enough. The last thing the universe needs is a complex lexicon laid down between the communicator and the listener to confuse them about what it is they’re trying to listen to.”
Listen to how he contrasts the words, names, and labels used in astrophysics compared to biology and chemistry.
Choose your words carefully – especially if you want other people to be touched by them. They have wide-ranging impact.
Colin Summers
on 18 Sep 12The three hardest things in programming are counting and naming things.
Anonymous Coward
on 18 Sep 12http://gettingreal.37signals.com/ch13_Name_Hook.php
Andrew Meinker
on 18 Sep 12@Jason F
You made a funny.
That’s obviously a joke on your part, right?
After reading this blog for years – there exist countless examples of you, or DHH, posting an article to this blog and the community gets outraged in something you wrote because it was mis-interpreted solely because you didn’t chose your words carefully in the blog post.
Wesley B
on 18 Sep 12@Andrew
Which pretty much gives them permission to post something like this, right? If what you are saying is true (I seldom read comments, so I really don’t know) they have hands-on experience on the matter and are allowed to make recommendations based on that.
ADI
on 18 Sep 12Nothing like using good old fashioned complex lexicons to communicate to people.
David Andersen
on 19 Sep 12Someone tell this to the marketers in IT; no one knows how to obfuscate and bullshit more than they do.
Jonta
on 19 Sep 12This is a great opportunity to transparently monetize The Cloud™! Synergizing our resources to focalize on our core customer demographic, while still seeking innovative streams of revenue, and…
Gah, how can people write this kind of thing without harming themselves?
Ajit
on 20 Sep 12This is nice concept about noise and signal… thanks for sharing information..
Jonas
on 20 Sep 12I like that guy.
cowardly
on 20 Sep 12wish I could have that hour and a half back – no just kidding, pretty funny and thanks for posting – and speaking of jargon, there is way too much of it in some fields and don’t get me started on religious jargon – take scientology for example, not singling them out just an example, all religions have jargon, but for example theirs is like a cross between science fiction and 007 maritime banter
Noj
on 22 Sep 12Tyson is a bauwsss. Respect.
This discussion is closed.