As I mentioned yesterday, when my students come to my office for consultation on their term papers, I try to be straightforward in my advice: “Don’t shoot for literary elegance.  Use simple, straightforward prose.  Keep your sentences and paragraphs short.  Use familiar words.  Don’t write using prose you wouldn’t use in conversation: generally speaking, if you wouldn’t say it, don’t write it.”   But today I want to focus on some of the writing advice that I give them and... Read more

As a college professor, I often am asked for writing advice. There are a couple of pieces of advice that I give to almost all of my students. Not only do I try to abide by these guidelines in the professional papers that I write, but also in my comments on my student papers and in any blog posts that I write online.   First, good writing is most of the time modest and makes a small point. But it... Read more

Sometimes I struggle to understand how my atheist friends can get excited about their non-belief. What is there to get excited about when you believe that there is no centerpiece to the universe? Now, I can easily understand a regretful atheist. Such a person might believe that the evidence, in spite of his wishes, points to God’s non-existence. He might hope for something more, but be willing to settle for what he sees as a hard-nosed reality. But I do... Read more

I love January, even though it gets cold and wet where I live. The reason why is that I love seeing my students return after their winter break. Their eager faces and eager minds are inspirational.   Of course there are lots of reasons to be cynical about higher education. The statistics show that education is becoming more expensive and less effective. Apparently, contemporary students are less motivated than their parents. Their writing skills are supposed to be worse too.... Read more

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