Wednesday, April 08, 2009

Emphasis not Helpful

Often you read an essay, and the words in italics, or in ALL CAPS, seems off. The emphasis is unhelpful at best, and makes the passage difficult to read. I was struck by Mark Rubinstein's mention of John Lintner CAPM paper from 1965 (in A History of the Theory of Investments). Lintner was one of 4 co-discoverers of the CAPM, the others being Bill Sharpe, Jan Mossin, and Jack Treynor.


Lintner's writing style, unfortunately, makes his results difficult to digest. He habitually uses very long setnences stating precisely all conditions and frequently italicizes words to help the reader pull out the most significant ideas. Despite this, it is often difficult to tell what is important and what isn't.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

academic mumbo jumbo... WHY DO YOU BOTHER?

Eric Falkenstein said...

I'm finishing up MY BOOK!