I just wanted to state publicly my whole-hearted endorsement of the “wrong” use of the phrase, begging the question.
Have you heard this phrase? Do you have a self-righteous opinion about it? Then this post may make you angry. Please look away. If you’re a potential new user of the term, read on to see how you can help corrupt it and do your part for the evolving English language.
I started seeing it more in blogs and articles, so I looked it up on Wikipedia. And even though today’s entry says “This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia’s quality standards,” let’s freeze the wikimoment on begging the question:
In logic, begging the question has traditionally described a type of logical fallacy (also called petitio principii) in which the proposition to be proved is assumed implicitly or explicitly in one of the premises. Begging the question is related to the fallacy known as circular argument, circulus in probando, vicious circle or circular reasoning. The first known definition in …
