Re: Finding Filenames that contain a certain string
Re: Finding Filenames that contain a certain string
- Subject: Re: Finding Filenames that contain a certain string
- From: "Mark J. Reed" <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2007 15:31:59 -0400
On 7/20/07, Bill Briggs <email@hidden> wrote:
>> Actually, it doesn't "beg the question", because "beg the question" doesn't mean "beg or demand that the question be asked", which is how most people use it these days (incorrectly).
>>
>
>I had thought that it meant "avoids the question".
I think "avoids the question" has that one covered nicely. ;-)
It's certainly succinct. :)
This is completely off-topic at this point, but as you say, it's
Friday. So here goes.
My understanding of "begs the question" is "appears to answer the
question, but really just alters its context". To be sure,
tautological answers fit the question-begging bill, but I think there
is a grey area between that and the modern ("incorrect") meanings of
the phrase, whose existence serves to explain the shift in meaning.
A classic example is the old question of what the Earth is resting on.
If you answer, as some once did, that it is on the back of a giant
turtle, you have only raised a new question: what is the turtle
resting on? (the traditional answer - "Ha, it's turtles all the way
down!" - of course raises the question of "down to what?") Thus, in
a sense, you have not answered the question at all (which is the
original meaning of "begs the question"). But in another sense, you
have technically answered the original question, albeit in a way that
automatically raises a new, related question, without answering it.
If you refer to that as "begging the question", you get an
interpretation is a sort of middle ground between the old and new
meanings. (The new meaning seems to be fundamentally equivalent to
"raises the question", without necessarily requiring any of the
caveats and implicature I just gave).
--
Mark J. Reed <email@hidden>
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