Plus, raises and begs aren’t synonyms, they’re of differing degrees. Lots of things raise other questions, but there’s a subset within the set of things that raise questions that raise them in such an obvious way to be begging for one.
It isn’t clear to me that, as the prescriptivists claim, the “new” meaning of the word must necessarily have evolved from a misunderstanding of the old. As you say, the new meaning is intuitively clear, and it seems reasonable that the new meaning evolved independently of the old (unless there’s some evidence otherwise).
Our last debate here on the very same issue.
I love how the prescriptivists and the anti-prescriptivists cannot get along without starting to sling mud at each other. :rolleyes:
This always made it clear for me:
I suppose this is the crux of the whole debate. You can substitute many words or phrases for the “it” here. For example, “comprise” is commonly used today to mean the *opposite * of what it originally meant. And resistance by pedants is waning. Perhaps the same transition is occurring for “begging the question.” The real question is, “If a phrase is used erroneously by enough people for a long enough time, does it become correct?” Which, I’ll be the first to admit, should be shuffled off to GD.
Mud slinging in a pit thread, eh? Whodathunkit?
Rolleyes, indeed.
I was talking about in here. 
You’re right, sorry.
Maybe not, but it’s remarkably coherent if you’re a gorilla using sign language.
Nice wording. You can’t just say prescriptivists and descriptivists? :dubious: Oh well, not the place for it.
The colloquial form of “begging the question” is perfectly understandable because we use it the same way in other contexts that aren’t actual begging for money or food. Said of a man on a construction site without a hard hat: “He’s just begging to have a brick to fall on his head.” It’s not unusual in the least.
I guess that’s an empirical question. I’d bet a few dollars if I had any money.
-FrL-
Having never heard the original Philosophical usage of it, I just went and read the Wiki article referenced above … and I have to say—Aristotle or no—it’s a terrible phrase. The current usage finally makes sense. The old usage is flabby. “Begging the question” is not very accurate, at least in English. Why not simply “an unsupported premise?”
Sure it is. See definition 3 which, while no longer common in current usage, is actually the original meaning.
There could be a bajillion “good reasons” not to use it. In the end, they don’t matter.
Grammatical and semantic correctness is determined by usage.
And this is precisely why you should not be complaining about the extension of meaning in “begs the question”.
Terms of art are esoteric enough that it’s irrelevant whether the popular usage matches up with them. Ultimately, it’s up to philosophers and other logicians to determine whether they wish to use more obviously philosophical language (e.g. “circular reasoning” or “Petitio Principii”) or whether they wish to continue using “begs the question” in its traditional sense and disregard any confusion that might result from a lay reader who wanders ignorantly into their writings and becomes lost and confused.
Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage has citations from “begs the question” in the sense of “evading the question” which go back more than fifty years.
Grammatical and semantic correctness is determined by usage.
“Acceptable” is meaningless as a criterion for correctness if it’s based only on your opinion. This is GQ, and this is a factual question. It has a factual answer. In the previous pit thread on “begs the question”, I did a Lexis search on the term. The result? Not only is the older, philosophical meaning less common, it is actually so uncommon that I had trouble finding uses of the traditional meaning.
And more recently, I did a JSTOR search of academic publications in the humanities (specifically literature). The result? The incidence of “begs the question” was much more evenly split, but the newer usage was still quite prevalent and quite easy to find.
The newer usage is standard, and that’s the end of it.
Again you use the word “acceptable”, and again it has no meaning outside your own subjective opinion, which happens to flatly ignore the concept of “register”.
Look at the statement: “The people they were waiting for.” It is possible to avoid ending this fragment with a preposition, but to do so, we need to say: “The people for whom they were waiting.” But that formulation is highly formal, and as such, it would be unequivocally unacceptable in informal contexts.
It could still be a valid GQ question if we’re actually interested in the facts of language. Descriptive linguists do grapple with notions of correctness, and their scientific methodology can be discussed here.
Slight hijack, but basically relevant. I have a question about this.
Correctness is determined by usage. But what determines usage?
I’m aware that linguists study speech errors, and my question is, what marks the distinction between “usage” (which is what determines grammatical and semantic correctness) and “error” (which is irrelevant to determining correctness according to linguists, AFAIK)?
Believe it or not I actually did a concentration (not a major) in linguistics long long ago as an undergrad, and I am pretty sure I once knew an answer to this question, but it’s no longer in my head whatever that answer was.
-FrL-
Was there a time, then, when more than a few people were taught formal logic?
-FrL-
When The American Heritage Dictionary first appeared, in 1969 I think, it’s big selling point was its Usage Panel. 100-200 big name writers and word mavens were asked their opinions on the correctness of a long list of terms whose usage was changing. The real shock for prescriptivists was learning that at least some of these supposed experts could be found to approve any of the controversial terms. (Hopefully got 44% approval.) And no two of the experts had the same list of what they considered correct.
That was the death knell of prescriptivism in America. What conceivable standard could they hold others to when no two good, even great, writers could agree on a set list of English correctness.
How did one even define the term after this? If 51% of the Usage Panel approved was that a high number or a very low one? If only 10% approved, that still meant that a goodly number of people whose writing would be widely read, normally with praise, were committing that crime.
The Panel was repolled for each succeeding edition. Not surprisingly, the percent who approved of each term changed with each succeeding edition. (Some terms got less approval with time, interestingly.)
The English language changes usage on a daily basis. There is no standard for correct usage. Good writers make the decision for themselves, every day, with every use, in every context, of how and whether to use a word or term.
So what are less good writers supposed to do? The traditional advice has been to write conservatively. Go with the older, historically correct usage. Don’t offend pedants. Don’t rile the people who write into Safire’s column and complain that their English teacher taught them one way in high school, and by the FSM, they’re never going to change.
It’s hard to fault that advice, because most poor writers do so little formal writing that it doesn’t make much difference if they keep to the good side of those who are judgmental.
The problem is twofold. One is that a changed usage may so take over that the old usage is forgotten by almost everyone. Begs the question is close to that level, if not there already. The other is that it makes it harder to read everyday, semi-formal (newspaper, etc.) writing because so many terms are used in modern ways that confusion is always lurking.
Admission: I was a prescriptivist myself when I was young and foolish. Then I spent many years reading about the history of the English language, reading the works of true historical linguists and lexicographers rather than self-appointed language mavens (anyone remember when John Simon and Edwin Newman were pontificating idiotically?), and trusting myself to make my own judgments. I was wrong then, and maybe that makes me extra defensive. But everything I learned from actual experts said that prescriptivism didn’t have a leg to stand on. It was not an equal alternate. It’s not that you can be one or the other and that both approaches are good in their own way.
Prescriptivism is factually and historically wrong. It can’t be defended intellectually. It’s a purely emotional response to language. That’s why it needs fighting if we’re here to fight ignorance.
Excellent effort at working a veiled insult into your post. Kudos!
Some more info on the origin.
And a mention by William F. Buckley: “There is no law in English save usage.”
Note that other things once frowned upon were “kid” for “child” and “mom” for “mother.”
Kinda puzzling that people get so worked up over it. It’s not like it’s the only phrase or word that has multiple meanings.