I want to say this is because this is how we've been trained to write, regardless of whether it was purposeful or not. We learn to write from school. There is no set grading system on writing between teachers, but what tends to get you a better grade in a class? It is filling up the required page length with fluff that is sufficiently tangible as to feel prose-ish. If teachers were truly concerned about fixing this, it should be reflected in the grades they give.

I disagree with this point. I think we use the older terms because they are established at conveying a very specific idea by using far less words.

I think I feel the same way as the writer, especially when watching media. How many times do we hear a familiar phrase in a moment that's supposed to be invoking the audience's emotions, and we just kind of shrug and go "yeah, ok, that's the right description for the moment, sure"

To be honest, I've never considered the possibility of living in an age that creates phrases. Phrases are just kind of there and they've been invented so that we can use them now. I'm kind of intrigued at what I could come up with if instead I view it as creating a new phrase for efficient use in getting my own thoughts across.

Yep, this is definitely true. How many of us speak to each other in a secret language of pop culture quotes (I am definitely culprit). When it comes to writing, it seems particularly pressing to use forms of language that are immediately recognizable as, well, being recognizable.

Smart, haha, if they've written so poorly that you can't understand the abstract, it probably won't help much to read the paper

Trying to understand the thought processes of the author actually seems like a pretty effective way to understand a paper

This seems like a particularly useful approach to reading scientific articles: analyze why the information in the paper is important to you. Otherwise all you've really done is learned something cool you'll probably forget pretty soon

Funny how he indirectly tells us here that everything he just did to understand the article was part of a process that he never used again (because it's way too long and arduous!)

Honestly, this is basically a must for me with any kind of reading, so I completely support this step