My poetry is much more complex than Leanne's

[rayheinrich]

I was using a text content analysis tool on my computer tonight to
get an idea of how to dumb down an instruction manual I was editing.
And, just for fun, I decided to analyze one of my poems (which tend to
have a simple vocabulary) and one of Leanne's (which, as a rule, have
a much larger one). So, of course, you might think you could guess the
results; I did.

But when I got the scores, my poem was rated MUCH more complex
than Leanne's. This just didn't make sense until I read the criteria
more carefully. Sure, it looked at word-length and word complexity;
but one thing it REALLY thought was important was sentence length.

Leanne's poem had an average sentence length of 14 words.
My poem had an average sentence length of 168 words (the entire poem).

So, if you want to write easy-to-understand poems, use lots of "."
For more complex poems, such as mine, don't use punctuation marks.

And, oddly enough, that's not a joke, it's true.
Ray

[Achebe]

And this is not even taking into account your pictures, which by convention are worth a thousand words apiece. And then you also have those diagonal bracket thingies which channel the spirit of buggy code and infinite recursive loops.
It's a miracle the site still works.

[rayheinrich]

And this is not even taking into account your pictures, which by convention are worth a thousand words apiece. And then you also have those diagonal bracket thingies which channel the spirit of buggy code and infinite recursive loops.
It's a miracle the site still works.

Pictures now-a-days are typically worth 1x10^6 words (plus or minus a few orders of magnitude).

The technical terms for "those diagonal bracket thingies" are
"<" comfrm
and  
">" gozinta

My recursive microcode regularly broke speed records for total-stack-annihilation (also called executing-the-stack);
which, by the way, is an excellent method of preventing stack overflow as it can't if it ain't.
(The secret to lightning-fast recursive algorithms is self-modifying code.)     (no joke)

[Achebe]

Good one. Word = 32 bit, I had forgotten.

[rayheinrich]

But, yes, now about that poetry we were discussing; it was just grand, wasn't it?

Word = 8,16/24/32/36/48/64/96/128/256/... - it all depends on who's defining it that day.

[Magpie]

It's a conspiracy I tell you, the internet is full of it.
I hear mumbles about a new world order, some sort of hierarchy...
"RayHeinrich" is an anagram of "in hierarchy"
hmmm on the rest of the internet that would be all the proof needed.

Out of interest was it something to do with the Flesch–Kincaid readability tests that produced the score?

[rayheinrich]

on the rest of the internet that would be all the proof needed. <---

Out of interest was it something to do with the Flesch–Kincaid readability tests that produced the score?

The program lists a bunch of methods. I've cut and pasted them below:

Gunning Fog index (Indication of the number of years of formal education that a person requires in order
to easily understand the text on the first reading: 131.50 ...  (only 131.5 years? )

Approximate representation of the U.S. grade level needed to comprehend the text :
Flesch Kincaid Grade level : 126.86
ARI (Automated Readability Index) : 160.05
SMOG : 21.97

Some negative number whose definition isn't given:
Flesch Reading Ease : -233.83  

You can see how long sentences seem to drive the things bat-shit crazy.

[Magpie]

Interesting how it works out what a sentence is. I just pasted the first section of Ginsberg's 'Howl' and it said that it had 10 sentences and gave it a Gunning-Fog score of 90.4
However it has 10 full stops and only one sentence so I took out the 9 offending full stops that were used in abbreviations such as F.B.I. and then it gave it a Gunning-Fog score of 859.9
Inserting those 9 full stops back into any random place in the poem took the score right back to 90.4 again.

[QDeathstar]

what I got from this thread is numbers.

---

Word = 8,16/24/32/36/48/64/96/128/256/... - it all depends on who's defining it that day.

o.o

[rayheinrich]

Interesting how it works out what a sentence is. I just pasted the first section of Ginsberg's 'Howl' and it said that it had 10 sentences and gave it a Gunning-Fog score of 90.4
However it has 10 full stops and only one sentence so I took out the 9 offending full stops that were used in abbreviations such as F.B.I. and then it gave it a Gunning-Fog score of 859.9
Inserting those 9 full stops back into any random place in the poem took the score right back to 90.4 again.

Yeah, I just took one of my poems and put "." at the end of stanzas.

Without "." I got a Gunning Fog index of: 35.58 years of schooling.

After putting the "." in I got a Gunning Fog index of: 3.75 years.
This might explain why some of the critiques I get are written in crayon.

For anybody wanting to play with this, one of the 15 or so places you can do it
on the web is here: Readability Calculator

It tells you quite a few other statistics and gives you a list of the sentences that are in need of improvement.
Here's what it says about Lincoln's Gettysburg Address:

Number of characters (without spaces) : 1,149.00
Number of words : 272.00
Number of sentences : 10.00
Average number of characters per word : 4.22
Average number of syllables per word : 1.38
Average number of words per sentence: 27.20

Indication of the number of years of formal education that a person requires in order to easily understand the text on the first reading:
Gunning Fog index : 13.38 years

Approximate representation of the U.S. grade level needed to comprehend the text :
Coleman Liau index : 7.98
Flesch Kincaid Grade level : 11.24
ARI (Automated Readability Index) : 12.07
SMOG : 11.49

Flesch Reading Ease : 62.90

List of sentences which we suggest you should consider to rewrite to improve readability of the text :

   It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
   Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
   It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.
   Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.

[Erthona]

Of course complexity does not necessary mean that a piece of writing conveys anything of intrinsic value. which holds out in the two different types of poetry between you and Leanne. While Leanne writes poetry of a sublime nature (if a bit overly controlled), You write humorous gibberish, or as the Bard said "A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing." I say this not to be disparaging, as I think the Bard was saying it to so degree about himself, so you are are in good company.

Well anyway, I come to praise not to barely you.

dale

[dukealien]

What ever happened to "bra" and "ket?"  Those were easy to remember...

And this is not even taking into account your pictures, which by convention are worth a thousand words apiece. And then you also have those diagonal bracket thingies which channel the spirit of buggy code and infinite recursive loops.
It's a miracle the site still works.

Pictures now-a-days are typically worth 1x10^6 words (plus or minus a few orders of magnitude).

The technical terms for "those diagonal bracket thingies" are
"<" comfrm
and  
">" gozinta

My recursive microcode regularly broke speed records for total-stack-annihilation (also called executing-the-stack);
which, by the way, is an excellent method of preventing stack overflow as it can't if it ain't.
(The secret to lightning-fast recursive algorithms is self-modifying code.)     (no joke)

[Leanne]

Now Dale, you're generalising.  Ray's gibberish is hardly ever humorous* :p

Those readability tests are a phenomenal load of shite peddled by the world's most reprehensible shite-merchants:  people who make money out of lying about what is needed for education.  These are the people who standardise everything and reduce the mind to a series of simplistic algorithms which, interestingly enough, don't even appear on their standardised tests because they're not proper maths or science or even phys-ed.  In a society obsessed with political correctness, we are still forced to measure outcomes against a load of bollocks generated by a bunch of dicks.

Poets must rebel against such tyranny!  Let us feed "complex" poems through this moronic calculator until it explodes and spews its contents back on its anally retentive overlords and forces them to drown in metaphor.

*Of course this is not so.  Ray neither gibs nor hums -- rather, he echoes the song of the universe.  If readers are not ready for such enlightenment, so be it.  They may return to their caves and watch some more shadows.

[Erthona]

"Poets must rebel against such tyranny! Let us feed "complex" poems through this moronic calculator until it explodes and spews its contents back on its anally retentive overlords and forces them to drown in metaphor."

That reminds me of a poem I rote.

dale

---

1st Christmas joke of the season (it has to be done.

It was the night of the birth of the Saviour (sorry, spell check made me capitalize that), in fact he had been born. enter the three wise men into said stable.
The first of the three wise men enters (I think it was Balthazar, but it could have been Melchior). As he steps into the the stable with his golden slipper on, he puts his foot right down in a big wet cow pie.

"Jesus Christ," he exclaims!"

Mary turns to Joseph and says,

"See, I told you that was a better name than Irving!"


I can't take credit, however my editing makes it much funnier.

dale

[rayheinrich]

... as the Bard said "A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing." ...
Well anyway, I come to praise not to barely you.

The bard was assuring a wealthy dolt of a patron that he'd failed to understand nothing;
and, being a wealthy dolt, he was quite happy to take nothing away from it.

What ever happened to "bra" and "ket?"  Those were easy to remember...

"Bracket" is the generic term for quite a few pairs of containment symbols.  (),{},[],<>,/\, “”,‘’,¡!,¿?,«»

If you call "apples" "fruits" you will slip on "bananas"

Poets must rebel against such tyranny!  Let us feed "complex" poems through this moronic calculator until it explodes and spews its contents back on its anally retentive overlords and forces them to drown in metaphor.

While I applaud your fantasies, the moronic calculator, being a moronic calculator, eats anything as it can't tell the difference
which is why it's a moronic calculator.

And those overlords aren't anally retentive; they're assholes without the ability to retain and, unfortunately,
we're under them.

...he echoes the song of the universe  If readers are not ready for such enlightenment, so be it.  They may return to their caves and watch some more shadows.

No, you've got it wrong: we're the ones making the shadows. That's what "echoing" (art) is all about.
Unfortunately, no one in the cave is watching our shadows; they've got computer games now.
Not that it matters. The cave is the only place left for us, the real world outside the cave was
stolen by the overlords years ago.