Page 186 - English for Writing Research Papers

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10.1 What's the buzz?

Carlsberg is a Danish beer producer and the world’s fourth biggest brewer. For
nearly 40 years Carlsberg ran one of the most successful advertising campaigns of
any product in the world, which simply said: "Probably the best beer in the world".

However, Carlsberg’s earlier adverts had had slogans such as
Lager at its best.

Unrivalled quality and flavour.
The world’s best.

(1) Why do you think Carlsberg decided to use the word ‘probably’?

(2) Can you see any connection between the claim made by Carlsberg and claims

made by researchers in their papers?
Modern day scientific writing had its origins in England and many stylistic rules

were devised by British scientists. One ‘rule’ is that when you present subjective or
unproven propositions, you should avoid sounding arrogant or 100% certain of what
you state. This approach, known as ‘hedging’, also spread to other scientists in other
Anglo societies.

In his book ‘How to be an Alien’, George Mikes, a Hungarian-born British author,
wrote that: In England it is bad manners to be clear, to assert something confidently.

It may be your personal view that two and two make four, but you must not state it
in a self-assured way because this is a democratic country and others may be of a
different opinion.

Although Mikes was being humorous, he was making an important point. Many of
the world’s most important journals are based in the USA and the UK. Consequently
you should consider stating your claims (i.e. things that you believe that you have
proved in your experiments and propose as being possibly true, but which in the
future could potentially be proved by others to be unfounded) in a slightly softer
way than you may normally do in your own language.

So particularly in the Discussion and in the Conclusions you may occasionally need
to use words and expressions that are not too direct and seem more tentative.