on Proper Usage
Steven Pinker had a piece in the NYT yesterday about John Roberts’ flub of the Oath of Office, and why, from a grammatical standpoint, it doesn’t matter. He argues that the long-standing injunction against infinitive splitting is “a myth.”
Language pedants hew to an oral tradition of shibboleths that have no basis in logic or style, that have been defied by great writers for centuries, and that have been disavowed by every thoughtful usage manual. Nonetheless, they refuse to go away, perpetuated by the Gotcha! Gang and meekly obeyed by insecure writers.
I thought it was a pretty interesting argument, and I’m always glad to see a shibboleth overturned, so I forwarded the link to my friend Amy McDaniel, who of all my friends is probably the most interested in such things, as well as the best at them. (In addition to being an expert grammarian, she’s also an expert on food, and you can/should check out her contributions to the Slashfood blog.) She replied to my message with a one-liner: “Steven Pinker is an enemy of proper usage,” to which I replied that “his insidious claims are deeply seductive.” I imagine at this point she realized I don’t know anything about Steven Pinker–or as much as I should about grammar–and so she sent me a passage of David Foster Wallace’s “Tense Present,” wherein DFW critiques Pinker’s “descriptivist” approach to usage. The essay, which originally appeared in Harper’s in 2001, can be read in its entirety here, or you can find just the part that Amy sent me to settle the matter pasted in after the jump.
Wallace on Pinker:
As Descriptivist Steven Pinker puts it, “When a scientist considers all the high-tech mental machinery needed to order words into everyday sentences, prescriptive rules are, at best, inconsequential decorations.”
This argument is not the barrel of drugged trout that Methodological Descriptivism was, but it’s still vulnerable to some objections. The first one is easy. Even if it’s true that we’re all wired with a Universal Grammar, it simply doesn’t follow that all prescriptive rules are superfluous. Some of these rules really do seem to serve clarity, and precision. The injunction against twoway adverbs (“People who eat this often get sick”) is an obvious example, as are rules about other kinds of misplaced modifiers (“There are many reasons why lawyers lie, some better than others”) and about relative pronouns’ proximity to the nouns they modify (“She’s the mother of an infant daughter who works twelve hours a day”).
Granted the Philosophical Descriptivist can question just how absolutely necessary these rules are, it’s quite likely that a recipient of clauses like the above could figure out what the sentences mean from the sentences on either side or from the “overall context” or whatever. A listener can usually figure out what I really mean when I misuse infer for imply or say indicate for say, too. But many of these solecisms require at least a couple extra nanoseconds of cognitive effort, a kind of rapid sift-and-discard process, before the recipient gets it. Extra work. It’s debatable just how much extra work, but it seems indisputable that we put some extra neural burden on the recipient when we fail to follow certain conventions. W/r/t confusing clauses like the above, it simply seems more “considerate” to follow the rules of correct SWE … just as it’s more “considerate” to de-slob your home before entertaining guests or to brush your teeth before picking up a date. Not just more considerate but more respectful somehow — both of your listener and of what you’re trying to get across. As we sometimes also say about elements of fashion and etiquette, the way you use English “Makes a Statement” or “Sends a Message” — even though these Statements/Messages often have nothing to do with the actual information you’re trying to transmit.
We’ve now sort of bled into a more serious rejoinder to Philosophical Descriptivism: From the fact that linguistic communication is not strictly dependent on usage and grammar it does not necessarily follow that the traditional rules of usage and grammar are nothing but “inconsequential decorations.” Another way to state the objection is that just because something is “decorative” does not necessarily make it “inconsequential.” Rhetorically, Pinker’s flip dismissal is bad tactics, for it invites the very question it begs: inconsequential to whom?
Tags: Amy McDaniel, DFW, Steven Pinker, usage issues
I read that yesterday too. Just when I thought Obama had messed up, someone has to go and tell me that it wasn’t his fault… sheesh. If his presidency was a plot of a novel and not reality I would think he’s really set up for a fall… Will life imitate life? Stay tuned.
I read that yesterday too. Just when I thought Obama had messed up, someone has to go and tell me that it wasn’t his fault… sheesh. If his presidency was a plot of a novel and not reality I would think he’s really set up for a fall… Will life imitate life? Stay tuned.
Isn’t the “don’t split infinitives” thing bogus because its only basis as a rule came out of some centuries-old attempt to make English more pure and perfect, like Latin, which with its one-word infinitive verbs makes such splitting grammatically impossible?
English is one of the few languages with a system of grammar that makes splitting infinitives possible. People who say it’s “wrong” or “improper” are merely following a set of (relatively) newer rules. It’s like when people say you can’t end sentences with a preposition. Yes, actually, you can. That’s why English is fun.
Isn’t the “don’t split infinitives” thing bogus because its only basis as a rule came out of some centuries-old attempt to make English more pure and perfect, like Latin, which with its one-word infinitive verbs makes such splitting grammatically impossible?
English is one of the few languages with a system of grammar that makes splitting infinitives possible. People who say it’s “wrong” or “improper” are merely following a set of (relatively) newer rules. It’s like when people say you can’t end sentences with a preposition. Yes, actually, you can. That’s why English is fun.
Thinking about English grammar gives me a rash. But wierdly, I enjoy thinking about it for German and Spanish. I love the crazy long nouns, which are like word compilations, in German. I love the way you put verbs at the end of sentences. “I to vienna went have”- stuff like that. And in Spanish, I love the way adjectives come after the noun. But in my “native” tongue, I get all anxious if I put thought into grammar. Hm.
Or the United States is in for something, because it is the American people who are high on him. Unless he’s high on himself. That’s cool too.
Or the United States is in for something, because it is the American people who are high on him. Unless he’s high on himself. That’s cool too.
What Dave said. The “don’t split an infinitive” rule assumes English is subject to Latin’s grammatical rules. It’s as bogus as using the word “octopi” to mean more than one octopus.
Pinker may be the enemy of proper usage, but not in this case. Even the good folks at the OED removed the injunction against infinitive splitting a few years back.
What Dave said. The “don’t split an infinitive” rule assumes English is subject to Latin’s grammatical rules. It’s as bogus as using the word “octopi” to mean more than one octopus.
Pinker may be the enemy of proper usage, but not in this case. Even the good folks at the OED removed the injunction against infinitive splitting a few years back.
i agree, grammar is nauseating, but that held for me when i took german and even when i took latin. grammar was always my biggest headache. when it comes to english i know the grammar, but i find that enough, i don’t want to focus on it.
that said, i like pinker, i read a book by him called The Language Instinct for an essay i was writing.
Man, I always knew that that British dude who does a good job of killing bad people in the movies was right about the plural of Octopus beinng Octopussy.
i agree, grammar is nauseating, but that held for me when i took german and even when i took latin. grammar was always my biggest headache. when it comes to english i know the grammar, but i find that enough, i don’t want to focus on it.
that said, i like pinker, i read a book by him called The Language Instinct for an essay i was writing.
i only have a cursory understanding of grammar. i read a layman’s intro a couple years back so that i actually know what an infinitive is. could any of you recommend a book on grammar that gets into the nitty-gritty, and i don’t mean just a list of technicalities but is also invigorating and will open up my mind to the heretofore unknown possibilities of language that i have been so desperately lacking all of my life?
i only have a cursory understanding of grammar. i read a layman’s intro a couple years back so that i actually know what an infinitive is. could any of you recommend a book on grammar that gets into the nitty-gritty, and i don’t mean just a list of technicalities but is also invigorating and will open up my mind to the heretofore unknown possibilities of language that i have been so desperately lacking all of my life?
Exacty!
Exacty!
I am the person who claims that Pinker is an enemy of proper usage. That doesn’t mean he’s wrong about split infinitives, it means that he’s using the long-settled debate about split infinitives to prove a larger point about the pointlessness of all prescriptive grammar and usage rules. It’s a classic straw-man argument: he’s letting an absurdly extreme example–a rule which he himself admits was debunked by every authority and non-authority over half a century ago–stand in for the whole of prescriptivism. I’ve read The Language Instinct and The Blank Slate, fascinating books both, and while much of Pinker’s research is sound, many of his conclusions lack nuance and duck obvious counter-evidence and argument.
I am the person who claims that Pinker is an enemy of proper usage. That doesn’t mean he’s wrong about split infinitives, it means that he’s using the long-settled debate about split infinitives to prove a larger point about the pointlessness of all prescriptive grammar and usage rules. It’s a classic straw-man argument: he’s letting an absurdly extreme example–a rule which he himself admits was debunked by every authority and non-authority over half a century ago–stand in for the whole of prescriptivism. I’ve read The Language Instinct and The Blank Slate, fascinating books both, and while much of Pinker’s research is sound, many of his conclusions lack nuance and duck obvious counter-evidence and argument.
Point taken, Amy.
Point taken, Amy.
I don’t know what is more sad. That you all bicker incessantly about these topics, or that I took the time to read your bickering. What do you think?
I don’t know what is more sad. That you all bicker incessantly about these topics, or that I took the time to read your bickering. What do you think?
I hate myself for doing this, but I’m gonna play Gotcha! with DFW for a second. I believe he commits either a usage error or a redundancy error in using the phrase “invites the very question it begs.” I’ve spent more than a few nanoseconds parsing what he means and whether the “inviting” and the “begging” are different.
I hate myself for doing this, but I’m gonna play Gotcha! with DFW for a second. I believe he commits either a usage error or a redundancy error in using the phrase “invites the very question it begs.” I’ve spent more than a few nanoseconds parsing what he means and whether the “inviting” and the “begging” are different.
I love this sentence, and it’s absolutely correct. Begging the question means to make a claim but offer no evidence for the claim except the claim itself and to assume that’s enough. It is the logical fallacy of a circular argument. It is often used to mean invite or raise the question but actually has a different and more interesting meaning. So Pinker’s statement both claims that prescriptive rules are inconsequential to these unnamed people but offers no evidence of such AND causes one to wonder, who are these unnamed people to whom this is apparently inconsequential?
Wallace was a formal logic guy before he was a writer, so he lamented the fact that so few people used “beg the question” to refer to the logical fallacy. It’s the most elegant way to refer to the circularity of arguments. So I think he was excited to find an example where someone both begged and invited the very same question. Also, when he talks about nanoseconds, I don’t think he’s referring to cases in which the reader simply doesn’t know the meaning of terms.
I love this sentence, and it’s absolutely correct. Begging the question means to make a claim but offer no evidence for the claim except the claim itself and to assume that’s enough. It is the logical fallacy of a circular argument. It is often used to mean invite or raise the question but actually has a different and more interesting meaning. So Pinker’s statement both claims that prescriptive rules are inconsequential to these unnamed people but offers no evidence of such AND causes one to wonder, who are these unnamed people to whom this is apparently inconsequential?
Wallace was a formal logic guy before he was a writer, so he lamented the fact that so few people used “beg the question” to refer to the logical fallacy. It’s the most elegant way to refer to the circularity of arguments. So I think he was excited to find an example where someone both begged and invited the very same question. Also, when he talks about nanoseconds, I don’t think he’s referring to cases in which the reader simply doesn’t know the meaning of terms.
This is a good case of Wallace lamenting the common misuse of “beg the question” not because it’s an error and errors are annoying, BUT because there’s a cool meaning that is being forgotten now that most everyone things of “begs the question” as synonymous with “invites the question.” Language can be more elegant and direct and alive (to use some of Orwell’s requirements) if different words and terms have different meanings, instead of having so many indistinguishable synonyms. Another example would be “nauseous.” The old meaning is “nausea-inducing.” So it would be some gross display that would be nauseous, not the person about to throw up. But now nauseous just means nauseated, probably irretrievably. People would look at you funny if you said, “Please remove this nauseous hamburger from my sight.” Instead you have to more long-windedly say, “Please remove this hamburger from my sight lest I vomit” or some such. Sure, usage changes and we can’t stop it. But so too do people die, but we still want doctors. I still want people like Wallace who are at least trying to preserve and promote a certain elegance of expression.
This is a good case of Wallace lamenting the common misuse of “beg the question” not because it’s an error and errors are annoying, BUT because there’s a cool meaning that is being forgotten now that most everyone things of “begs the question” as synonymous with “invites the question.” Language can be more elegant and direct and alive (to use some of Orwell’s requirements) if different words and terms have different meanings, instead of having so many indistinguishable synonyms. Another example would be “nauseous.” The old meaning is “nausea-inducing.” So it would be some gross display that would be nauseous, not the person about to throw up. But now nauseous just means nauseated, probably irretrievably. People would look at you funny if you said, “Please remove this nauseous hamburger from my sight.” Instead you have to more long-windedly say, “Please remove this hamburger from my sight lest I vomit” or some such. Sure, usage changes and we can’t stop it. But so too do people die, but we still want doctors. I still want people like Wallace who are at least trying to preserve and promote a certain elegance of expression.
I genuinely thank you for the explanation. That said, I’m going to respectfully disagree.
I agree that DFW wasn’t referring to cases of ignorant readers failing to know the meanings of words (or worse, misunderstanding words to mean something they don’t) when he argued that solecisms require extra nanoseconds of effort, though I see how you could have assumed otherwise once you had presupposed that I misunderstood what it means to beg the question. Maybe you didn’t assume. Maybe you were just covering your bases in case I (or someone else reading this exchange) was being ignorant. In any event, I’ll be explicit.
I understand what it means to beg the question and that it is distinct from the (sadly now) more common use to mean, in a general sense, to invite the question. It’s apparent from your comments that you too appreciate this distinction, but I’ll quibble over your definition anyway, if only just for fun.
I reject your definition that to beg the question means “to make a claim but offer no evidence for the claim except the claim itself and to assume that’s enough.” I revise it slightly to the following: to make a claim based solely on a premise that assumes (usually implicitly) that the claim is true. I believe your definition to be a bit narrow, for while both our definitions would seem to agree that the following argument begs the question–
It is raining. I know this because it is raining.
–only my definition would unambiguously say the same of the following as well:
It is raining. I know this because rainwater is pouring from my gutters.
Of course, the former example is a bit silly. Even the poorest logician wouldn’t seek to support a claim by using the exact same words (and only those words!) as his only premise. I believe your definition begins to show graying lines somewhere around arguments such as “It is raining. I know this because condensed water vapor is falling from the clouds.” But anyway, my definitional disagreement was a quibble. I’ll be on to the meat in a second, but before I do, I want to point out that neither your definition nor mine would view a standalone claim–e.g. “It is raining.”–as begging the question. OK, now on to the meat.
It is still not apparent to me that DFW hasn’t made a usage error or redundancy error here.
1. Where is the circularity in Pinker’s argument? How does Pinker’s dismissal of prescriptive rules as inconsequential beg the question? That he claims that prescriptive rules are inconsequential to these unnamed people but offers no evidence is not sufficient to meet either of our definitions–like saying “It is raining.” and nothing more. Pinker hasn’t argued in the quoted passage that prescriptive rules are inconsequential because they are inconsequential.
2. Even if I grant that Pinker has begged the question (if he did, it’s far from obvious and warrants explanation), why is it particularly interesting to note that he invites the very question he begs? If you are begging the question, you are necessarily inviting that question. Begging the question is a special subset of inviting questions. To beg the question is to invite certain questions: specifically, questions about the circularity of your logic AND (not or) about the lack of support offered for your claim. When I say “I know it’s raining because rainwater is pouring down my gutters,” do I not invite the very question I beg? Is that very question not “How do you know it’s rainwater?” How is it possible to beg the question without inviting it?
OK, now I’m being redundant.
I genuinely thank you for the explanation. That said, I’m going to respectfully disagree.
I agree that DFW wasn’t referring to cases of ignorant readers failing to know the meanings of words (or worse, misunderstanding words to mean something they don’t) when he argued that solecisms require extra nanoseconds of effort, though I see how you could have assumed otherwise once you had presupposed that I misunderstood what it means to beg the question. Maybe you didn’t assume. Maybe you were just covering your bases in case I (or someone else reading this exchange) was being ignorant. In any event, I’ll be explicit.
I understand what it means to beg the question and that it is distinct from the (sadly now) more common use to mean, in a general sense, to invite the question. It’s apparent from your comments that you too appreciate this distinction, but I’ll quibble over your definition anyway, if only just for fun.
I reject your definition that to beg the question means “to make a claim but offer no evidence for the claim except the claim itself and to assume that’s enough.” I revise it slightly to the following: to make a claim based solely on a premise that assumes (usually implicitly) that the claim is true. I believe your definition to be a bit narrow, for while both our definitions would seem to agree that the following argument begs the question–
It is raining. I know this because it is raining.
–only my definition would unambiguously say the same of the following as well:
It is raining. I know this because rainwater is pouring from my gutters.
Of course, the former example is a bit silly. Even the poorest logician wouldn’t seek to support a claim by using the exact same words (and only those words!) as his only premise. I believe your definition begins to show graying lines somewhere around arguments such as “It is raining. I know this because condensed water vapor is falling from the clouds.” But anyway, my definitional disagreement was a quibble. I’ll be on to the meat in a second, but before I do, I want to point out that neither your definition nor mine would view a standalone claim–e.g. “It is raining.”–as begging the question. OK, now on to the meat.
It is still not apparent to me that DFW hasn’t made a usage error or redundancy error here.
1. Where is the circularity in Pinker’s argument? How does Pinker’s dismissal of prescriptive rules as inconsequential beg the question? That he claims that prescriptive rules are inconsequential to these unnamed people but offers no evidence is not sufficient to meet either of our definitions–like saying “It is raining.” and nothing more. Pinker hasn’t argued in the quoted passage that prescriptive rules are inconsequential because they are inconsequential.
2. Even if I grant that Pinker has begged the question (if he did, it’s far from obvious and warrants explanation), why is it particularly interesting to note that he invites the very question he begs? If you are begging the question, you are necessarily inviting that question. Begging the question is a special subset of inviting questions. To beg the question is to invite certain questions: specifically, questions about the circularity of your logic AND (not or) about the lack of support offered for your claim. When I say “I know it’s raining because rainwater is pouring down my gutters,” do I not invite the very question I beg? Is that very question not “How do you know it’s rainwater?” How is it possible to beg the question without inviting it?
OK, now I’m being redundant.
I barely passed logic, so this is tough for me to wrap my head around. I’ve thought a lot about the sentence and i think sometimes i really do get it, why pinker is both inviting and begging, but then i lose it. i won’t hold to my def of begging the question at all–it sounds like you know much better than i. sorry for assuming you didn’t–i figured that if you thought it was redundant, that you just thought begging and inviting were the same, as they are commonly used.
i don’t think begging the q means you are also inviting the q. as i understand it, the “question” is whatever issue is at hand; in this case, the issue is whether prescriptive rules serve a purpose. so presumably the question is on the table already and doesn’t need to be invited. begging it would be concluding that it is settled without any actual evidence for that, like in your example.
so, here, i think pinker is begging the question by saying, in effect, “As to the question of whether prescriptive rules matter, well, remember that we can communicate without them, therefore they don’t matter.” But that middle statement doesn’t do anything toward proving his point.
maybe wallace’s sentence isn’t quite right, but i don’t think that’s because it’s redundant. pinker begs the question at hand, but he also invites the question of to whom exactly this is inconsequential. so maybe wallace should have said, “It begs the question while inviting another: inconsequential to whom?” I can easily see how Pinker begs the question, as i understand the logical fallacy, and i can see how he invites the “to whom” question, but what i concede is that those don’t seem to be one question
what do you think about that? i am over my head here. but i really suspect that redundancy and usage error isn’t the issue.
I barely passed logic, so this is tough for me to wrap my head around. I’ve thought a lot about the sentence and i think sometimes i really do get it, why pinker is both inviting and begging, but then i lose it. i won’t hold to my def of begging the question at all–it sounds like you know much better than i. sorry for assuming you didn’t–i figured that if you thought it was redundant, that you just thought begging and inviting were the same, as they are commonly used.
i don’t think begging the q means you are also inviting the q. as i understand it, the “question” is whatever issue is at hand; in this case, the issue is whether prescriptive rules serve a purpose. so presumably the question is on the table already and doesn’t need to be invited. begging it would be concluding that it is settled without any actual evidence for that, like in your example.
so, here, i think pinker is begging the question by saying, in effect, “As to the question of whether prescriptive rules matter, well, remember that we can communicate without them, therefore they don’t matter.” But that middle statement doesn’t do anything toward proving his point.
maybe wallace’s sentence isn’t quite right, but i don’t think that’s because it’s redundant. pinker begs the question at hand, but he also invites the question of to whom exactly this is inconsequential. so maybe wallace should have said, “It begs the question while inviting another: inconsequential to whom?” I can easily see how Pinker begs the question, as i understand the logical fallacy, and i can see how he invites the “to whom” question, but what i concede is that those don’t seem to be one question
what do you think about that? i am over my head here. but i really suspect that redundancy and usage error isn’t the issue.
[NB: I’m a bit sauced. Forgive my syntax.]
In the spirit of concession, I’ll do my part: We may both be in over our heads. And your having barely passed logic trumps my never having tried it. I concede too that having re-read both Pinker’s quote and Wallace’s retort many times, on some occasions I get the sense that I’ve finally gotten it. But then I lose it. I’d like to imagine DFW, were he living, would happily resolve our petty dispute and congratulate us both for being so thoughtful as to debate such seeming pedantry.
In a related spirit, I forgive you for having perhaps accused me of ignorance– a totally understandable accusation, given what little support I offered in my initial claim–and no small one at that, accusing the venerable DFW of committing an error relating to a commonly misused phrase that I imagine (as do you?) was very dear to him, his being a logician and the phrase being one related to logic.
OK, niceties over. Resuming intellectually honest debate.
I do think begging the question is to invite the question–not just any question, mind you, but one in particular. That is, to beg the question isn’t to beg any old question, but to beg THE QUESTION.
I’d always thought–let me correct that: since I was first corrected on the usage of begging questions I’ve thought–that THE QUESTION begged could, in all instances, be phrased thus: The premise offered-as-evidence being predicated by the veracity of the claim, what support have you for the claim independent thereof? (My, that’s tortured!) But you raise an interesting alternative THE QUESTION: whichever question was originally at issue. Thus, begging the question is to proffer evidence in support of your view of the question at issue that invites the very question at issue. Maybe these are the same. I’m not of mind to say.
But through the lens of this latter interpretation of THE QUESTION, I think I better understand now how Pinker begs it. As you astutely point out, THE QUESTION is whether prescriptive rules matter or are useful or are of consequence. Pinker’s view (the rules don’t matter) is already known to us (he being already established as a descriptivist of one flavor or another) and his argument doesn’t offer much of a rationale–not even a debatable premise. He merely restates the his answer to THE QUESTION: “prescriptive rules are inconsequential” and gussies it up with a call to consider the “mental machinery” required to communicate. Thus, it is the last clause of the Pinker quote–not the first–that begs the question.
Unfortunately, this doesn’t quite resolve for me how Pinker is begging the same question he invites–or, if he is, why it’s particularly noteworthy to point out that these questions are the “very” same. I much like your rephrasing: Pinker begs the question and invites another. Perhaps our solution is that this is a usage problem w/r/t “very”, not begging or inviting questions.
[NB: I’m a bit sauced. Forgive my syntax.]
In the spirit of concession, I’ll do my part: We may both be in over our heads. And your having barely passed logic trumps my never having tried it. I concede too that having re-read both Pinker’s quote and Wallace’s retort many times, on some occasions I get the sense that I’ve finally gotten it. But then I lose it. I’d like to imagine DFW, were he living, would happily resolve our petty dispute and congratulate us both for being so thoughtful as to debate such seeming pedantry.
In a related spirit, I forgive you for having perhaps accused me of ignorance– a totally understandable accusation, given what little support I offered in my initial claim–and no small one at that, accusing the venerable DFW of committing an error relating to a commonly misused phrase that I imagine (as do you?) was very dear to him, his being a logician and the phrase being one related to logic.
OK, niceties over. Resuming intellectually honest debate.
I do think begging the question is to invite the question–not just any question, mind you, but one in particular. That is, to beg the question isn’t to beg any old question, but to beg THE QUESTION.
I’d always thought–let me correct that: since I was first corrected on the usage of begging questions I’ve thought–that THE QUESTION begged could, in all instances, be phrased thus: The premise offered-as-evidence being predicated by the veracity of the claim, what support have you for the claim independent thereof? (My, that’s tortured!) But you raise an interesting alternative THE QUESTION: whichever question was originally at issue. Thus, begging the question is to proffer evidence in support of your view of the question at issue that invites the very question at issue. Maybe these are the same. I’m not of mind to say.
But through the lens of this latter interpretation of THE QUESTION, I think I better understand now how Pinker begs it. As you astutely point out, THE QUESTION is whether prescriptive rules matter or are useful or are of consequence. Pinker’s view (the rules don’t matter) is already known to us (he being already established as a descriptivist of one flavor or another) and his argument doesn’t offer much of a rationale–not even a debatable premise. He merely restates the his answer to THE QUESTION: “prescriptive rules are inconsequential” and gussies it up with a call to consider the “mental machinery” required to communicate. Thus, it is the last clause of the Pinker quote–not the first–that begs the question.
Unfortunately, this doesn’t quite resolve for me how Pinker is begging the same question he invites–or, if he is, why it’s particularly noteworthy to point out that these questions are the “very” same. I much like your rephrasing: Pinker begs the question and invites another. Perhaps our solution is that this is a usage problem w/r/t “very”, not begging or inviting questions.
Sounds like we agree generally. I still don’t think begging the question is a way of inviting the question. To say, “I know it’s raining because I see rain” is not to invite the question, “Is it raining?” because that question has already been asked/presented. I think calling that inviting the question is imprecise.
But yeah, I don’t quite see how Pinker is inviting the question he’s begging. Still, Wallace was a brilliant student of logic and I bet he knew something we don’t know.
As to whether this particular usage problem was dear to Wallace, as you wonder, I can tell you for sure that it was. He talked about it vehemently in the classes I took with him.
Sounds like we agree generally. I still don’t think begging the question is a way of inviting the question. To say, “I know it’s raining because I see rain” is not to invite the question, “Is it raining?” because that question has already been asked/presented. I think calling that inviting the question is imprecise.
But yeah, I don’t quite see how Pinker is inviting the question he’s begging. Still, Wallace was a brilliant student of logic and I bet he knew something we don’t know.
As to whether this particular usage problem was dear to Wallace, as you wonder, I can tell you for sure that it was. He talked about it vehemently in the classes I took with him.