5 ms·
I have no idea what that means.
by jgrahamc 5y ago
I have no idea what that means.
- technothrasher 5y agoBe glad. Misuse of the phrase "beg the question" is like salt in my ears. But I mostly keep my mouth shut as it's a battle hopelessly lost at this point.
- dnautics 5y agothe way to fight back is to aggressively use it correctly when it's due. E.G: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29291894 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29291894
- criddell 5y agoWhat would you say determines correct usage of a word of phrase?
- dnautics 5y agoMe. What response were you expecting?
- criddell 5y agoI assume you considered a bunch of different perspectives and concluded that one is more correct than the others. I was curious about the reasoning that went into your decision. I went through that process myself a while ago and came to a different conclusion based on the idea that the meaning of a word or phrase in conversation is determined by what it communicates. I qualify with "in conversation" because there are audiences and venues where that's not necessarily true (like in a courtroom).
- dnautics 5y agoIt's completely arbitrary, from case to case. To answer your question about "begging the question" I think the concept of "circular reasoning" is important enough to have a cutesy phrase associated with it.
- criddell 5y agoThat's interesting. I agree that the concept is important and that's why I avoid begs-the-question. Most of the time it doesn't communicate what you hope it does.
- sowbug 5y agohttp://begthequestion.info/ http://begthequestion.info/ TL;DR: almost every common usage of the phrase is incorrect.
- criddell 5y agoThe "raises the question" use far outstrips the "laying claim to the principle" use. In general it's wrong to call either use incorrect. I'd avoid it entirely. The original phrase is a bad translation and the modern use triggers prescriptivists.
- OJFord 5y agoI've seen it used correctly just once: by a lecturer of Contemporary Philosophy marking my essay...