[PLUG-TALK] begging the question

John Jason Jordan johnxj at comcast.net
Sun Oct 4 04:27:18 UTC 2009


On Sat, 3 Oct 2009 19:53:01 -0700
Denis Heidtmann <denis.heidtmann at gmail.com> dijo:

> On Fri, Oct 2, 2009 at 9:51 PM, John Jason Jordan <johnxj at comcast.net> wrote:
> > On Fri, 02 Oct 2009 16:18:20 -0700
> > Galen Seitz <galens at seitzassoc.com> dijo:
> >
> >> Saw the following comment on slashdot.  JJJ, can you translate this
> >> into something I might understand?  It's been ~31 years since my last
> >> English class.
> >>
> >> http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1390695&cid=29621279
> >>
> >> > Begs the question" has a specific meaning related to circular
> >> > arguments.
> >>
> >> Yes, the intransitive construction "begs the question' does. The
> >> transitive constructions "begs the question <question>" is also in
> >> common use, and has a different meaning regarding calling for a
> >> resolution of a question. The meaning of the transitive form is
> >> essentially a generalization of the intransitive form such that the
> >> intransitive form is identical to the transitive form with the assumed
> >> object being the question actually at issue in the debate. This is a
> >> rather elegant rationalization of the poor translation into English of
> >> the dubious translation into Latin of the Greek phrase that ultimately
> >> turned into "begging the question".
> >>
> >> Arguing that the use of the transitive construction is wrong because
> >> of the well-established technical definition of the intransitive
> >> construction is, IMO, one of the most inane forms of misguided
> >> linguistic prescriptivist pedantry commonly seen, as the two are
> >> distinct constructions which are impossible to confuse with each
> >> other, and have meanings that are related the way one would expect the
> >> meanings of transitive and intransitive phrases to relate to each
> >> other (even though the more general, transitive form, is generalized
> >> from the more specific, intransitive form in a way which reflects the
> >> normal use of the English words in the phrase rather than etymology of
> >> the transitive form.)
> >
> > Let's start with some definitions.
> >
> > 1) "Transitive" means the lexeme can (optional) or must (obligatory)
> > take an object complement. Although the term can be applied to several
> > different parts of speech, it is most commonly encountered when
> > speaking of verbs. For example:
> >
> > The boy disappeared.
> > *The boy disappeared the mess in his room.
> >
> > 'Disappear' in English is obligatorily intransitive. It cannot take an
> > object complement and, if you try to do so, the result will be an
> > ungrammatical utterance.
> >
> > The children left.
> > The children left their clothes in a heap.
> >
> > 'Leave' in English is optionally transitive. Grammatical sentences can
> > be formed with or without an object complement.
> >
> > *The crew constructed.
> > The crew constructed a house.
> >
> > 'Construct' in English is obligatorily transitive. That is, it requires
> > an object complement. If you use it without an object the utterance
> > will be ungrammatical.
> >
> > 2) Prescriptive linguistics is in opposition to descriptive
> > linguistics. Prescriptive is what you were told as a child in language
> > arts classes was "wrong" or "incorrect English." Examples are negative
> > concord ("We don't need no ..."), third singular leveling ("He walk")
> > and a long list of other non-nos. Prescriptivists are convinced they
> > are working to save the language from certain destruction.
> >
> > Descriptive linguists say "there is no right or wrong, there just is
> > what is." If a native speaker utters it, it is grammatical. It may be
> > grammatical only for a particular variety of the language, but it is
> > still grammatical. Descriptivists make no value judgments.
> > Descriptivists know that languages have always changed and will
> > continue to change regardless of any attempts fix them, and no language
> > has ever died from failure to follow the rules of self-appointed
> > grammarians.
> >
> > 3) As for the meaning of 'beg the question,' in all human languages the
> > majority of words and expressions have more than one meaning. If you
> > don't believe me, pick up any dictionary and look at a random page.
> > Most of the words will list meaning (1), meaning (2), and so on. That
> > 'beg the question' has developed a second meaning is scarcely
> > remarkable. Semantic drift is just another way in which languages
> > continually change. It would be easier to stop the tides than to freeze
> > language. If someone insists that 'beg the question' has only one
> > meaning they are being a silly prescriptivist. Their efforts are doomed.
> > _______________________________________________
> > PLUG-talk mailing list
> > PLUG-talk at lists.pdxlinux.org
> > http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug-talk
> >
> I am having a little trouble with this, being a bit of a
> prescriptivist.  Shouldn't an utterance be unambiguous (unless
> ambiguity is the intention)?  Or perhaps the discussion should be
> about who qualifies as a native speaker.  If the intent is
> communication, then utterances which grate are a distraction, and
> interfere with communication.  Notice I did not use the word
> "correct".

While linguists are close to 100% descriptive, abhorring the
prescriptive grammarians, when writing papers they nevertheless adhere
to standards. I have never read a paper in a linguistics journal where
the author used negative concord.

I was struck when, while taking a class on sociolinguistics, the
professor informed us that data "are," and that we'd best use it in the
plural in our work. This was the same professor I took Intro to
Linguistics from, where he proclaimed in the very first class how evil
prescriptivism is. It amused me greatly that linguistics professors
eschew prescriptivism, and then turn around and prescribe to their
students.

In my native English data "is" and, to this day, before handing in a
paper, I must do a search on "data" to be sure I have pluralized the
verb.

When I was 12 years old I was informed by my language arts teacher that
it was incorrect to say "people that." People are "who" and things are
"that." Like most Americans, I had always used 'who' and 'that'
interchangeably for people. Being an annoying little kid I argued with
her, but to no avail. One day, some weeks later, I encountered a
passage in Shakespeare where the bard had said "people that." "Aha!" I
cried with joy. I quickly checked the book out of the school library
and brought it with me to class the next day. Triumphantly I laid it on
the teacher. And what did she say in response? 

"Well, when you're as famous as Shakespeare you can say 'people that.'"

You cannot win with prescriptivists.

As a historical perspective, 'who' and 'what' were the native
Anglo-Saxon relative pronouns; that is, "people who" and "things what."
The relative pronoun 'that' was borrowed from the Danes sometime in
late Anglo-Saxon. In the Danish of the day, 'that' was used for both
things and people. So the usage of "people that" is at least a thousand
years old. It was never declared wrong until the late 1700s. From then
until the present day prescriptivist teachers have been trying to stamp
it out. Most Americans today say "people that" regularly. Apparently
the efforts of the prescriptivists have not succeeded.

Here's another one:

In Anglo-Saxon negative concord was the norm. In fact, extra negatives
were used optionally for emphasis. This continued until the late middle
English period. You can find multiple negatives as late as Shakespeare.
But with the dawn of the scientific age someone noticed that in
mathematics two negatives makes a positive. Suddenly more than one
negative per sentence was declared a no-no. And not just in English,
but throughout the world of Germanic languages. (The romance languages
used negative concord for over a thousand years, and continue to do so
today.) Here is an example where the prescriptivists have more or less
succeeded. Negative concord in English survives, but only in some
varieties of the language.

And that beings me to what is evil about prescriptivism. If you
encounter someone on the street who says something like "I don't have
no ...," what is your reaction? Unintelligent? Quite possibly. At least
most Portlanders would take it as lack of intelligence. But is that a
fair judgment of a person who simply speaks a different variety of
English than you? What is the attitude of a first grade teacher toward
a child who arrives using negative concord? You cannot convince me that
the teacher will not be prejudiced about the child's intellectual
abilities. At the same time, if a child showed up speaking a version of
Australian English, an American first grade teacher would make no such
assumptions. Yet all versions of Australian English are more different
from "American broadcast English" than negative concord versions of
English. 

Languages are extremely logical things (albeit massively complex), but
there is little logic in our attitudes about language.




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