“There are a lot of people who mistakenly think intelligibility is the standard. ‘Oh, you knew what I was saying.’ Well, that’s not the standard. That’s a really bottom-of-the-barrel standard,” he says. “People who are concerned with English usage usually want to have their words taken seriously, either as writers or as speakers. And if you don’t use the language very well, then it hard to have people take your ideas seriously. That’s just the reality.”