It's an interesting idea, certainly. But reading the descriptions I can't help but feel that these ideas could be more easily explained using a less restricted vocabulary and still be accessible.
Jargon can make an explanation more eloquent as it does not have to be filled with contrived collections of less suitable words. If the jargon is explained before it is used it still can be readily understood.
But removing all the details and jargon that the lay person might not understand isn't even the right way to go about making the jounal articles more comprehensible to a general audience. That thows away most of the information.
You're not wrong that the terminology is needlessly confusing, but that also doesn't mean the ideas themselves are obvious or aren't powerful. The same happens in many academic spheres; good ideas are created, and then they're also dressed up in obscure language to make the creators feel like the concepts are as hard to understand as they were to invent.
Definitions are useful for experts in a field. It is much faster to just refer to a concept by its name rather than explaining it every time.
Unfortunately, definitions are a terrible thing for students. Even more unfortunately, most books are written in the following style:
1. Here's a paragraph-long definition that makes no sense to you at this point.
2. Here's a proof of this thing you don't yet understand.
3. Oh, you want to practice? Here's an example problem and a solution. When you see a problem like this one, plug numbers into this formula in the bold box.
4. A bunch more problems to try plugging numbers into yourself.
5. The discussion on what this thing is actually useful for is outside the scope of this book. Read about that somewhere else.
The best teachers actually explain how the thing they are teaching works. They start with a limited concept the student can understand, and then refine it to make it more formal. Good textbooks do this too. The bad ones start with the definition in a box.
The problem is that by the time a professor writes a textbook, this stuff is second nature to them. The prof is an expert. So he/she starts with the definition, since that is how the professor commonly communicates this concept. The book then ends up looking like the author is trying to make him/herself look smart at the expense of the reader. Writing an accessible book is a rare talent.
The fact that the author needs to explain how it works on an Internet forum is evidence it was neither a clear nor clever choice, but a probably a bad choice.
Also, the entire article would be much clearer with plain language. Analogies are overrated and ELI5 method actually hurts in grasping complex abstract topics.
Yes, I was a bit torn between showing a bunch of what it can do, and getting so verbose that people stop reading. This tool is surprisingly difficult to explain concisely!
This. It makes it sound like more than it is, and while the basic idea should be taught (briefly), it isn't some amazing concept worthy of enshrining in some holy Acronym.
It's like an exhaustive, confusing list of examples rather than explaining briefly the very simple and largely intuitive reasons that lead to these examples.
Yes, but to a lot of people that sounds like a lot of woo-woo. What this article does is explain it in a clear and persuasive way to the people in a particular field.
The fact that you didn't pick this up leads me to think you are more interested in being smart than helpful, but perhaps I am wrong about that.
If the author can't be bothered to explain his idea in intelligible and clear terms, and also is unable to present a concrete example showcasing his proposed approach, then there is no point to waste time reading a manifesto as the creators themselves are incapable of leveraging the idea to produce any result.
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