I got through about 1/2 of that and then realised it was just a joke (but I forgot to laugh). Keep trying Chris! Friendly Regards Nigel -----Original Message----- From: austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of lofting@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Wednesday, 23 February 2005 1:58 PM To: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: atw: Re: SEC: UNCLASSIFIED Gerunds rule OK (WAS Re: Macquarie dictionary Howard, the price of precision is a focus upon exaggeration and nominalisation - verbs into nouns. This act 'pushes away' the relational nature of the verb and so cuts off the writer of the phrase from the involvement in the activity; and so no responsibility for the activity (think of the use of the verb "to divorce" - people will nominalise it to "this divorce is killing me" where the terms imply one has no control of it, it has become a 'thing', independent) differentiating allows for precision but comes with a property of push away to make the 'point'. differentiating also focuses on assertion of universals such that nominalisations are also exaggerated, can be made more 'grandious' in expression. The gerund reflects a superposition, verb and noun share the same space, and context, be it personal or social, collapses the 'wave' into a 'particle'. The more 'differentiating' the context the more a focus on using the noun. The more integrating the context - the more a focus on using the verb. The verb form is more organic, (AND oriented, linkage, relational) the noun form is more mechanistic (XOR oriented, discrete, object). Technical documentation will often reflect the attempt to universalise something through pumping it up with 'energy', to over-emphasise the 'point'. It will also reflect specialisation (a product of XOR thinking is fragmentation) and so jargon develops. If the technical documentation is FOR technical people then they can get off on the jargon and over-emphasis - it is all about precision. The less technical so the more 'feely' the document, more verbs, more flow, less bullet points containing jargon ;-) Chris. ************************************************** To post a message to austechwriter, send the message to austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx To subscribe to austechwriter, send a message to austechwriter-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with "subscribe" in the Subject field. To unsubscribe, send a message to austechwriter-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with "unsubscribe" in the Subject field. To search the austechwriter archives, go to www.freelists.org/archives/austechwriter To contact the list administrator, send a message to austechwriter-admins@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ************************************************** ************************************************** To post a message to austechwriter, send the message to austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx To subscribe to austechwriter, send a message to austechwriter-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with "subscribe" in the Subject field. To unsubscribe, send a message to austechwriter-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with "unsubscribe" in the Subject field. To search the austechwriter archives, go to www.freelists.org/archives/austechwriter To contact the list administrator, send a message to austechwriter-admins@xxxxxxxxxxxxx **************************************************