[alecst]

Maybe I'm just a bonehead, but take topic sentence (one of many possible examples):

> In addition to testing the hypothesis that the linear extents of human language family boundaries represent potentially resistant areas to grizzly bear gene flow, we tested for the overall overlap and similarities in spatial structuring among Indigenous language families and bear genetic groups using analysis of similarities (ANOSIM) and multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA).

First of all, how many times do you have to read this sentence to understand what it means?

And, although I kind of get what it's saying -- both clauses seem like they could mean the same thing. I think you could rewrite it like this without losing any precision:

> The previous paragraph talked about how we found the spatial boundaries of language families and whether the gene flow of bears could easily cross these boundaries. Now we turn our attention to a similar but slightly different question. We compare the distribution of bear species vs the distribution of language families and see how much they overlap. As part of our toolbox we used ANOSIM (analysis of similarities) and MANOVA (multivariate analysis of variance.)

I'm sure some people will say this is worse, but I like it more, and I stand by my original position that this paper is hard to read.

[zeckalpha]

You added fluff! Concision is important. Here’s how I would put this:

> Separately, we tested overall overlap and similarities in spatial structuring among Indigenous language families and bear genetic groups using analysis of similarities (ANOSIM) and multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA).

That said, I found it quite readable, though I would have liked more inline math/diagrams/maps.

[wombatmobile]

You threw away the hypothesis!

[zeckalpha]

That was in the prior paragraph, no need to restate.

[dheera]

Hard to read papers are more likely to get accepted by reviewers. At some point the reviewers just go "aww fuck this" and approve it.