05 April 2008

Verbosity? Who Says?

On average, Zenobia's blog posts are around 2079 words in length.
This is 449 percent longer than other bloggers who took this test.
Do you talk too much in your blog?
Created by OnePlusYou

I can't help it. I like adjectives. Especially uppity adjectives. And circumlocution.

Plutarch (who should know -- given the incredible wordiness, prolixity, and perhaps even occasional windiness of his Moralia) consoles me thus:

Do not fight verbosity with words: speech is given to all, intelligence to few.
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6 comments:

  1. Anonymous5/4/08 12:36

    Oh no no no, I'm not going anywhere near that test. Not till every comment I get is "TLDR". They may not have enough figures on the calculator for me...

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  2. Anebo5/4/08 18:02

    I am sorry to be posting here out of place, but you made a reference to the Baghdad batteries being thoroughly debunked on the Respectful Insolence blog and I thought if I posted at that old post there, neither you nor anyone else would read it. Nor did a search for battery here find any hits.

    So far as I know the batteries have not been debunked and they most likely were used for TENS therapy (the Greeks having used electric fish for this for some time before--Socrates' 'torpedo fish')--pehaps you meant debunked in the sene that they could not ahve been sued for electro-palting as once thought?

    Here is the msot recent bibliogpraphy on the subject I have:

    Keyser, Paul T., "The Purpose of the Parthian Galvanic Cells: A First-Century A. D. Electric Battery used for Analgesia," JNES 52 (1993): 81-98.

    If you have something more recent, could you please pass it along?

    anebo10@gmail.com

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  3. irenesbooks5/4/08 18:11

    I'm exactly 40% shorter . . .

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  4. Judith Weingarten6/4/08 10:53

    Hi Anebo,

    I had some correspondence on this very subject with an Italian specialist on ancient technologies just a few years ago, but I'm not at home at the moment and so unable to find the references she sent me.

    Meanwhile, check out this 1996 article in the Skeptical Inquirer -- always a good resource on such pseudo-science problems: Gerhard Eggert, The enigmatic 'batteryof Baghdad'; and try to find:

    E. Pászthory, "Electricity: Generation or magic? The analysis of an unusual group of finds from Mesopotamia" (1989). In: Fleming, Stuart J. & Schenck, Helen R. (eds.), History of technology : the role of metals. MASCA research papers in science and archaeology ; v. 6. University of Pennsylvania: 1989, p. 31-38. Abstract: Discusses the magical meaning of metals at that time and suggests these objects, including the so-called "Parthian Batteries", were containers for blessings/incantations written on organic material (thus the papyrus in the Selecuia examples). Based in large part on Pászthory's article in German published in Antike Welt 16(1) (1985), pp. 3-12.

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  5. Judith Weingarten6/4/08 11:12

    Irene,

    Only 40% shorter? Your writing feels much crisper than that! :-)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Nancy Ewart9/4/08 19:42

    You aren't verbose. You are eloquent. Besides, shorter is not always better, or at least, more informative.
    Will not be taking test.
    txnks.

    ReplyDelete