Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Begging the Question

clipped from en.wikipedia.org

Begging the question in logic, also known as circular reasoning and by the Latin name petitio principii, is an informal fallacy found in many attempts at logical arguments. An argument which begs the question is one in which a premise presupposes the conclusion in some way. Such an argument is valid in the sense in which logicians use that term, yet provides no reason at all to believe its conclusion.

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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Despite having (sadly) probably lost this one, in general there's still value in a few dogged pedants slowing linguistic change by persistent carping. Somebody said even if all the world uses a chisel as a screwdriver, it's still better used as a chisel. The unenlightened using "beg" when they mean "raise" should be fought to the last breath (yes, mine, it won't be all that long, and then the world can spiral further down into verbal incoherence).