Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

We can’t have both facts and adjectives. Can we?

Facts are facts. It is 27° F outside.

Adjectives are, well sort of fuzzy. It is cold outside. (Cold to whom? Cold compared to what?)

“The fact is, they were aggressive.” Oops. “Aggressive” is an adjective.

“The fact is, he is tall.” Well, “tall” is an adjective, but 98.6% of the world considers someone who is seven feet tall to be, well, you know “tall.”

Engineering specifications should be facts that are measurable and testable. Engineers should express the goals of a system with adjectives like, “happy users” and “easy to use.”

Good grief; this is confusing. “Confusing” is an adjective. Good grief. I think “good grief” is all adjectives as well.

This gives me a headache. Oops. Can’t measure a headache. Is a headache a fact or an adjective?

Why can’t this be simpler? (yet another adjective) This requires work and effort and caring to find facts and use adjectives when they are appropriate. This is our task. Let’s do better.