Jonathan Iwry | Begging to be questioned

The Faithless Quaker | Not all language can be bulldozed to mean whatever you want it to mean — some things carry meaning that shouldn’t be lost

By Jonathan Iwry 09/30/14 10:54pm

O ne of the first things they teach you in “Intro to Philosophy” is the sixteenth-century phrase “beg the question.” According to the teaching assistants, to beg the question means to offer a premise in place of a conclusion, also known as circular reasoning. When someone argues that God exists because the divinely ordained Bible says so, they are “begging the question.”

While many (read: philosophers) remain faithful to its original meaning, many others use it as a slightly fancier substitute for “raise the question.”

There are plenty of other phrases that are not misused, but butchered altogether. While it’s understandable to say that you couldn’t care less about something, saying that you could care less defeats the purpose by implying that you do, in fact, care.

The same goes for “hone in on,” a malapropism that has managed in recent years to permeate the language pool with alarming virulence. To “home in” on something is to zoom in or pinpoint; to “hone” is to sharpen or refine.

And, of course, there’s “literally,” which apparently now means its exact opposite. How this one managed to take off is anyone’s guess, but it’s figuratively driving some of us nuts.

Even as I type this, I can imagine those who will reel from my pedantry. Isn’t it obnoxious to correct people on their relatively innocent mix-ups? Besides, language is meant to change and evolve — think of Humpty Dumpty, who insisted to Alice that every word “means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.”

The debate over who “owns” language is nothing new. Most of us have actually been familiar with it since childhood, when we read Andrew Clements’s award-winning novel about a boy who incites a nationwide uprising by renaming his pen a “frindle.” The book sums the schism up nicely — the eager classmates and supportive parents stand opposite the crotchety formalism of the stern and patriarchal teacher who punishes her students for disgracing the long and precious history of the word “pen.”

The easy relativism is appealing. If the People want to modify language and use words or phrases differently, who are an elite few (read: philosophers) in the Ivory Tower to tell us otherwise?

But it doesn’t take a fetish for grammar to be irked by these malapropisms. It would be one thing for laypeople to use plain English, to say exactly what they mean and nothing more. But when “beg the question” is used incorrectly, it’s typically invoked for its air of sophistication — “beg” sounds like a charmingly old-fashioned change of pace from the more mundane “raise.” Is it really their lack of understanding that pushes our buttons, or is it the fact that they’re putting on airs? Perhaps by trying to sit high up above the rest of us, Humpty Dumpty is actually setting himself up for a fall.

Of course language is supposed to change — it should always be evolving with the ideas of its speakers. But being eager to create new uses of language doesn’t necessarily excuse us from stomping on old ones. When we scramble, garble or generally maim language with reckless abandon, we risk burying important concepts alive.

“Beg the question” bears a unique meaning that most people would benefit from understanding. In a society that undervalues rhetoric and logic, a powerful analytical tool is humbled to a cheap catchphrase.

Even when particular concepts aren’t being discarded, a moment of reflection is all it would take for a speaker to realize that what they’re saying doesn’t actually make sense. If a speaker knows what it means to “hone” and “hone in on,” respectively, then they’re failing to notice that “hone in on” is a nonsensical expression. They’re not paying attention to what they’re saying — there’s a sense in which they (literally?) don’t know what they’re talking about.

While it’s inevitable that languages evolve, the flow of change often lends itself to entropy and atrophy instead of complexity. Sometimes it helps to stop and think — to direct the flow of change to prevent mindless erosion.

William Safire put it nicely when he explained that “I welcome new words, or old words used in new ways, provided the result is more precision, added color or greater expansiveness.” The implication rings clear: If the newer usages produce less clarity or more confusion, then perhaps it’s the old ways that we should home in on.

Jonathan Iwry is a 2014 College graduate from Potomac, Md. His last name is pronounced “eev-ree.” His email address is jon.iwry@gmail.com. “The Faithless Quaker” usually appears every Monday.

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