For the avoidance of doubt: Difference between revisions

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{{a|g|[[File:Rene Descartes.jpg|450px|thumb|center|I ''think'' this is [[René Descartes]]. But ...]]
{{a|g|{{image|Rene Descartes|jpg|I ''think'' this is [[René Descartes]]. But ...}}
{{subtable|The [[JC]] likes to rush in, as you know, where fools fear to tread. So let us try to achieve what Descartes could not. If you cannot ''avoid'' it, at least put a ''name'' on it. So let us  — [[for the avoidance of doubt]] — thoroughly define what we ''mean'' by “[[doubt]]”:
{{subtable|The [[JC]] likes to rush in, as you know, where fools fear to tread. So let us try to achieve what Descartes could not. If you cannot ''avoid'' it, at least put a ''name'' on it. So let us  — [[for the avoidance of doubt]] — thoroughly define what we ''mean'' by “[[doubt]]”:
===The meaning of doubt===
===The meaning of doubt===
{{ftaod}}
{{ftaod}}
}}}}{{quote|''And to this end they built themselves a stupendous super-computer which was so amazingly intelligent that even before its databanks had been connected up it had started from “[[I think, therefore I am]]” and got as far as deducing the existence of rice pudding and income tax before anyone managed to turn it off.''
}}}}{{quote|
:—Douglas Adams, {{hhgg}}}}
{{rice pudding and income tax}}}}
===Should a lawyer ever say these words?===
===Should a lawyer ever say these words?===
When one whose [[Legal eagle|livelihood]] attests to unusual semantic facility — uses the ugly expression “[[for the avoidance of doubt]]”, she surrenders without a shot to the demands of the English language. Even as a piece of English the phrase is hideous: who [[Nominalisation|converts]] “avoid” into a [[noun]]? What kind of glass-half-empty misanthrope sets as a guiding objective ''not being confusing''?  
When one whose [[Legal eagle|livelihood]] attests to unusual semantic facility — uses the ugly expression “[[for the avoidance of doubt]]”, she surrenders without a shot to the demands of the English language. Even as a piece of English the phrase is hideous: who [[Nominalisation|converts]] “avoid” into a [[noun]]? What kind of glass-half-empty misanthrope sets as a guiding objective ''not being confusing''?