Ask Dr. Ink

Dear Readers:

Please do Dr. Ink a favor. Please stop using the phrase "begs the question." Why? Because you are using it incorrectly. How does Doc know? Because he's been using it incorrectly for years.

Some journalist or commentator misuses the term every day. Something like, "Doesn't the Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action beg the question of whether or not we will ever see a time when we won't need race-based remedies?"

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What the speaker means is "invite the question" or "inspire the question" or even "raise the question." All of these provide the remedy for our problem. Which invites the question: Where did we get "beg the question," and why does Dr. Ink now think it is incorrect?

The people who misuse this phrase probably heard it in college. It turns out to be a technical term in the study of logic and describes a specific type of logical fallacy, a form of circular reasoning.

Logical arguments comprise premises and conclusions. If your conclusion is hiding in your premise, then you have begged the question. You have stated as fact the thing you are trying to prove.

In his "Skeptic's Dictionary," Robert Todd Carroll offers a number of examples of begging the question, including this one: "Abortion is the unjustified killing of a human being and as such is murder. Murder is illegal. So abortion should be illegal."

The problem with this argument, writes Carroll, is the assumption in the premise that abortion is murder.

Here's another example: "Paranormal phenomena exist because I have had experiences that can only be described as paranormal."

Dr. Ink is not a member of the prescriptive language police. He is of the descriptive school. He believes that, over time, words undergo semantic shifts and, in the end, usage rules.

Just as there is no longer a reason, except nostalgically, to use "gay" as a synonym for "merry," so there is no reason to use "beg the question" at all. If you are referring to the rules of logic, you'll have to explain what you mean anyway. And if you use it in common parlance, you'll be trying to transplant a tree that just will not grow, no matter how much fertilizer you spread.