Re: TECHNICAL, ACADEMIC: use or not use `we'

[Joe Fockler <jfockler -at- IPHASE -dot- COM>]

According to Ad absurdum per aspera :

+ chen1 -at- csc -dot- liv -dot- ac -dot- uk (Mr. C. Chen) wrote:

+ > I have been told, many times,  that good academic papers and
+ > technical reports should be in the third person... and the
+ > passive voice...

+ Many authorities [this implies that many other "authorities" do not
consider] consider this to be obsolete
thinking. + The third-person-passive style is rooted in the slow and
+ painful evolution of what we think of today as rationalism
+ and normal scientific thought.  It has served us well in
+ that capacity, but does not seem necessary today.  Some
+ journals, and some scientists, still insist on it, though.

+ Note that it is possible to write clearly and engagingly in
+ that style, just as it is possible to write murkily and off-
+ puttingly in the first person and active voice.  Not every-
+ thing you are told by the grammar-checking module in a word
+ processor is to be taken as gospel, either.  :)

+ My advice:  *think* like a scientist and *write*, carefully,
+ in whatever style comes naturally to you. [This is great advice]

+ Crossposted to bit.listserv.techwr-l, a newsgroup and mailing
+ list devoted to technical-writing issues, with followups
+ back here to misc.writing.

+ Cheers,
+ Joe
+ "Just another personal opinion from the People's Republic of Berkeley"