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Comment Threads

• Ro67 commented on Creative writing challenge!
  We had the same thing in mind Greg!...
• Scott Sanford commented on Creative writing challenge!
  Yes, we nerds tend to take instructions literally. I remember a college writing professor mentioning that she loved teaching engineering majors for just that reason. They were no better writers than anyone else - but they did by Dog read the instructions, meaning that what they sent back had some relationship to the assignment given....
• LAvery commented on Creative writing challenge!
  I remember a college writing professor mentioning that she loved teaching engineering majors for just that reason. They were no better writers than anyone else - but they did by Dog read the instructions, meaning that what they sent back had some relationship to the assignment given. This is a good characteristic in people who build bridges, airplanes, and critical life-support systems. Assuming those who write the instructions are similarly careful....
• P J Evans commented on Creative writing challenge!
  Engineers and other sciencey people have to write reports. It requires being able to do it right. (My father, a mechanical engineer, wrote one on what might happen if an LNG tanker, anchored near a nuclear power plant, then blew up.) As a CS student, I wrote a manual covering error messages for an invented language, including probable causes for the messages. (The error messages were real, taken from an existing language.) The professor really liked the way I did it....
• LAvery commented on Creative writing challenge!
  When I was a prof, I used to tell me students (who were, almost to a person, appallingly bad writers), "No matter what kind of a career you have as a scientist, you're going to have to write. Learn to do it well."...