The Colinments of Style: "No lying, no exceptions"

I begin this project with five short "bad writing samples" I've been linked up to on some school's site. Though these have been pre-filtered for their badness and as such aren't 100% what I'm looking for, most any starting point is a serviceable one. Excerpt the first:

As that there are alot of people (weather they are philosophers or not) there are many exceptions to moral rules or laws. One thing I find interesting about Immanuel Kant, are his strong feelings toward not lying at any time ever no matter what and not to deal with the consequences and the considerations of individual situations and circumstances and possible exceptions that need to be accounted for when making a decision of morality and ethics. Immanuel Kant felt strongly that lying was always wrong, he was against it. But whose to say? Wasn’t lying just Kants biggest how shall I say "pet-peeve"? "No lying ever, no exceptions" needs to be addressed more seriously in the future by later philosophers, if you ask me its worth a try. Immanuel Kant was probably one of the most supportive philosiphers of absolute rules in the ethical and moral decision-making systems of thought I have studied.

Hey, it still beats Judith Butler.

The basic spelling and grammatical errors indicate a more thoroughly shoddy paragraph than I'd like, but a few basic repairs Windex any glass, even if the ideas behind it turn out to suck. I was very nearly demoralized by the first sentence alone, a dog's breakfast whose meaning took me about five beats to discern:

As that there are alot of people (weather they are philosophers or not) there are many exceptions to moral rules or laws.

Cosmetically, I'm obsessively — and compulsively! — driven to fix the misspellings and non-word first. (If you could tell me the story of how "alot" gained currency, I'd be terribly grateful.) We can do without the parentheses, since they break the flow — I say we go comma. And the strip of tire spikes that is "As that there are" will be mostly de-toothed by the removal of "that." So:

As there are a lot of people, whether they are philosophers or not, there are many exceptions to moral rules or laws.

This reduces to the unsound proposition that a large number of moral exceptions follow from a large number of people, but if I get into that we'll be here all night. Now to trim the fat:

As there are many people, philosophers and otherwise, there are many exceptions to moral laws.

To clarify the thought process behind what I'm doing here, my goal is to cut down the word count while at the same time changing the words that remain as little as possible. I could probably make what remains of this sentence fancier, but then I wouldn't be far from performing not just the editing but the writing itself.

One thing I find interesting about Immanuel Kant, are his strong feelings toward not lying at any time ever no matter what and not to deal with the consequences and the considerations of individual situations and circumstances and possible exceptions that need to be accounted for when making a decision of morality and ethics.

This writer's teacher would most likely ding him for the personal pronoun, but I'm of the mind that most prose should be more personal, not less, so I'll treat this less as part of an objective analysis than as a subjective, more or less conversational essay. (Never mind that subjective essays are really the only form in which I'm competent to work.) This second sentence, while superior to the first, is a bloated, rambling mess, much like a dissolute uncle at Christmas. Let's see how much we can reduce it:

One thing I find interesting about Immanuel Kant's are his strong feelings toward not never lying at any time ever no matter what and not to deal dealing with the consequences and the considerations of individual situations and circumstances and possible exceptions that need to be accounted for when making a moral or ethical decisions of morality and ethics.

Thus:

I find interesting Immanuel Kant's strong feelings toward never lying and not dealing with the consequences and considerations of individual circumstances and exceptions to be accounted for when making moral or ethical decisions.

Still a line only a mother could love — "I find interesting" grates, but to pull it would require a purpose-defeating teardown and rebuild — but at least it's, in theory, understandable.

Immanuel Kant felt strongly that lying was always wrong, he was against it. But whose to say?

Ladies and gentleman, I give you the High Philosophy Undergrad parodic style. But other than the misspelling and the choppiness of two separate sentences, this one needs little in the way of mechanical improvement:

Immanuel Kant was against lying, feeling strongly that it was always wrong, but who's to say?

And, oh my, this:

Wasn’t lying just Kants biggest how shall I say "pet-peeve"? "No lying ever, no exceptions" needs to be addressed more seriously in the future by later philosophers, if you ask me its worth a try.

Part of me wants simply to put that first sentence out of its misery, but my respect for authorial intention demands otherwise. It must be said, however, that the paper has at this point devolved into an overheard bar conversation. About Kant. "No, no, dude. Dude. Wasn't lying just one of Kant's, like, pet peeves? We gotta take a look at that shit ourselves, you ask me." There also seems to be some confusion about chronology, but I'll just cut through that particular Gordian knot. My revision:

Wasn’t lying just Kant's biggest — how shall I say — "pet peeve"? Future philosophers must address "No lying, no exceptions" more seriously; it's worth a try, if you ask me.

I know, I know; semicolons were forged by Lucifer himself. I've been trying not to lean too hard on them, but this seems like a place for a semicolon if I've ever seen one. This next sentence shouldn't need its magical powers, though:

Kant was probably one of the most supportive philosiphers of absolute rules in the ethical and moral decision-making systems of thought I have studied.

It's bad news when a philosophy student to employs the spelling "philosiphers," sure, but we're here to help this guy. (Though the text is posted on a page called "Examples of Bad Writing", so I feel as if I can be a bit harsher, a bit snarkier than I normally would.) The whole paragraph displays an unnervingly common tendency to qualify statements down to nubs: witness the use of "probably one of the most," at which point you're better off not writing anything at all. I submit it would profit by having its qualifiers trimmed back, which I accomplish like so:

Kant is one of the philosophers most supportive of absolute rules in ethical and moral decisionmaking I have studied.

Ehh. An flaccid sentence with which to end a paragraph, that's for sure, and still not one amenable to uncharitable reading. But still, better than before!

Here's the paragraph fully revised:

As there are many people, philosophers and otherwise, there are many exceptions to moral laws. I find interesting Immanuel Kant's strong feelings toward never lying and not dealing with the consequences and considerations of individual circumstances and exceptions to be accounted for when making moral or ethical decisions. Kant was against lying, feeling strongly that it was always wrong, but who's to say? Wasn’t lying just Kant's biggest — how shall I say — "pet peeve"? Future philosophers must address "No lying, no exceptions" more seriously; it's worth a try, if you ask me. Kant is one of the philosophers most supportive of absolute rules in ethical and moral decisionmaking I have studied.

And here's a more radical edit:

Just as there are many people, there are many exceptions to moral laws. I find Immanuel Kant's strong feelings about never lying despite the considerations of individual moral and ethical circumstances interesting. Kant felt that lying was always wrong, but who's to say? Wasn't lying just Kant's pet peeve? If you ask me, philosophers must address "No lying, no exceptions" more seriously in the future. Kant is more supportive of ethical and moral absolutes than most any philosopher I've studied.

Ah, the lengths to which we go to refute the categorical imperative.

You should send along any and all 100-700-word samples of prose with which I can dick around to colinjmarshall at gmail. These should preferably not include the author's name or any source information. Bonus points if you somehow punk me into revising one of the pillars of western civilization.

Comments

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It's a nice project, to be honest I just read a couple of chapters about it, but it'd be interesting if I can read it all. By the way, I think you should annex something about Immanuel Kant and his philosophies as a Economist headman, he was the best ideologist and we can't ignore his legacy. 23jj

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Are you a philologist or just an amateur? nice correction buddy, you're so precise.