I don’t have three hours to wade through all that to figure out what your point/question is, but assuming it’s relating to grammar/style, do you really think such a topic is going to get so heated that it belongs in this forum?
This is going to become a prescriptivist vs. descriptivist debate within a few minutes, but once in a while I do remind people what “begging the question” originally means. It’s a fallacy that deserves it’s own name in my opinion.
For those who might need brushing up on their Grammar Nazi Party Doctrine, here’s a relatively accessible explanation of what the OP’s complaint is about:
I’ve seen this objection hundreds of times, and it never makes sense.
For one, “this begs the question” as used in the excerpts provided by the OP makes perfect sense when the phrase is parsed literally - in every case there is an obvious question that needs asking.
For two, Safire has to go out of his way to avoid using the phrase, with his usage of “This demands that a question be asked…”, a far clumsier phrase, IMO.
For three, anybody who cannot differentiate between the use of the term in the examples provided, and the concept of petitio principii, is a moron.
Finally, the article begs the question, when it asserts that the common, idiomatic usage of the phrase must have been derived from a mistaken understanding of Aristotle’s usage. Is there actually any evidence of this?
I realize you don’t hold the views I’m objecting to.
Capt. Ridley’s Shooting Party said most everything I was going to say.
I will that there are at least two other common, easily understood, equally efficient phrases that match the prescriptivist meaning of “begging the question”, those being “dodging the question” and “avoiding the question”. If one wanted to get creative, one might even “eschew the question” or “duck the question”. There is, as far as I’m aware, no such equivalent of the literal (and, these days, descriptivist) meaning of “begging the question”; the best I can come up with off the top of my head is “provoking the question”, which sounds a bit too forced for my liking.
I’ll also throw in the old standby observation that not liking common word usages isn’t going to make them go away, so your choices are to either get used to them or continue pissing into the wind. The only time I’ll support even attempting to turn the tides is when adoption of the new usage results in an awkward loss of distinction (see literal; as it stands, if we want to be clear, we’re left to say things like: “No, really, seriously, his head actually did explode. Like a bomb, BOOM!”)…and even in those cases, I recognize that it’s largely futile, and it will only be a matter of time before a new linguistic convention shows up to fill the place of the old one.
With “begging the question”, though, not only does insisting on the ‘offical’ definition not prevent this sort of awkwardness, it actively creates it, as demonstrated above. To the fiery pits of hell with it, I say.
