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Rules of good writing (2007)

(dilbertblog.typepad.com)
103 points santiviquez | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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mtlynch ◴[] No.44505052[source]
>Readers comprehend “the boy hit the ball” quicker than “the ball was hit by the boy.” Both sentences mean the same, but it’s easier to imagine the object (the boy) before the action (the hitting). All brains work that way.

I agree with this, but I doubt that all brains work this way. It's probably true of almost all English speakers.

I think the processing effort is likely a side effect of English mainly using sentence constructions that go subject->verb->object. Not all languages do that, so I suspect that your brain has an easier time processing whatever's most common in the language.

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bbor ◴[] No.44505185[source]
I had the same thought, glad you phrased it so succinctly! Surprisingly, a Holocaust-denying white nationalist is not someone you should trust on matters concerning global anthropology.
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alvah ◴[] No.44505760[source]
>Holocaust-denying

Didn't he write "no reasonable person doubts that the Holocaust happened" in the blog post you are referring to? That's an....unusual way to deny the Holocaust.

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1. gblargg ◴[] No.44506747[source]
A discredited organization labeled Adams a Holocaust-denier, so NPCs consider him such.