Topics Language

Question Sometimes I'll be writing a paper late at night, and my words will appear perfectly lucid to my sleep-addled brain; but the next day, after I've gotten some rest, I realize that it's all gibberish. Is clarity an objective quality? Is it possible for someone to think that a piece of language is clear, and be wrong?

Accepted:
December 12, 2007

Comments

It is not only possible, but a common experience. Clarity is very much in the eye of the beholder, and we often think we are being clear but we are not. I used to have a colleague with chauvinist tendencies who would read his work out to his wife, and if she understood it, he claimed he knew it was written at too simple a level to be acceptable for his fellow academics. There is still an important trend in philosophy which thinks that profoundity goes hand in hand with obscurity. For those of us who think that clarity is significant, though, the reactions of others are crucial to knowing where we have got it wrong.