[jvvw]

I've got a PhD in maths and can translate symbols into concepts in my brain much quicker than words into concepts in general. Also writing symbolically forces a rigour on the writer. I've been trying to read some semi-mathematical stuff written by scientists but non-mathematicians recently and it is painful trying to figure out what they really mean!

[Smaug123]

Sure, but the problem is that it was written by non-mathematicians, not that they were not using symbols. That's kind of what I was trying to say: symbols help you be rigorous, but they slow you down, and often the complete text-on-the-page doesn't actually need all the rigour that's forced on you by the symbols.