If one does not want to be metaphorical, the answer is "No," since only people,
and not -isms can beg the question -- on occasion.
By the same token, to say that Popper, in postulating a criterion of
falsifiability to demarcate science from metaphysics, begs the question
(whatever Popper expands on what that question was -- vide Bartley and his
argument against Popper).
On the other hand, Aristotle never begged the question, but then his method was
what Grice calls "Athenian dialectics," as opposed to "Oxonian dialectics," and
a dialectician would rather be seen dead than begging the (or, a, as I prefer)
question.
McEvoy's remarks on 'narrow' and 'broad' "senses" of 'question-begging' are
tangential, I would think, to what I would call the McEvoy paradox, which he
formulates as "as to whether loss of a linguistic sense based on a specific
logical distinction leads to loss to attunement to that underlying distinction,
this of course begs the question."
In his John Locke Lectures on Aspects of reason and reasoning, H. P. Grice
dedicates a section to 'fallacies'. His point being that an approach like his
might help to understand what they are --. On the other hand, some (other)
philosophers have claimed that 'question-begging' is _not_ a fallacy, so one
has to be careful.
McEvoy notes:
"This usage has been going on for years. Michael Parkinson may be largely
responsible. Growing up I thought it meant "raises the question", with "begs"
being used as in "asks" and "asks" being used as in "raised" (is this how it
widened sense?). Only later did the narrower, stricter meaning become known to
me - i.e. of something that assumes what is being is disputed e.g. to say God's
miracles prove God's existence begs the question of God's existence (unless
their provenance can be proved independent of any assumption of God's
existence, which appears not the case)."
As I say, the issue of a broad/narrow alleged 'sense' of the expressions
involved, may be approached by understanding that 'question-begging' is a
mistranslation of 'petitio principi,' which is a mistranslation of some
Aristotelian jargon involving at least TWO Greek verbs for 'beg' or the verb
from which the Latin 'petitio' is a a nominal derivative, and 'arkhe',
'principle'.
It may do to wonder if this can be formalized in merely propositional logic,
since Grice was enamoured with FIRST-order PREDICATE calculus.
McEvoy goes on:
This I refer to as the McEvoy paradox. Since it is formulated in terms of
'sense' (rather than propositional content, logical form, entailment, and
implicature), it may be difficult for a Griceian to cope with it.
To be reminded again of S. G. Schreiber's apt points in "Aristotle on false
reasoning" -- or as I would preferred, 'incorrect reasoning' -- Aristotle uses
as labels for this fallacy he is anaysing as
τὸ ἐν ἀρχῇ αἰτεῖσθαι
to en arkhe aiteisthai
and
τὸ ἐν ἀρχῇ λαμβάνειν.
to en arkhe lambanein.
Note that Aristotle is using the infinitive version of the verb, and using the
neutral article 'to' to label what he thinks is a fallacy. The 'en arche'
appears as an apposition (He was a master of labelling).
Literally these two labels would be rendered, respectively, as
"asking the principle" and
"assuming the principle"
Now, Liddell and Scott gloss αἰτέω as
"A. 1. ask, beg; 2. ask for, demand; 3. ask one to do; 4. beg of; 5. in Logic,
postulate, assume",
-- suggesting that "postulating" might be a better translation than "asking".
For λαμβάνω Liddell and Scott have "I. take, 1. take hold of, grasp, seize; …
II. receive, 1. have given one", which in Aristotle's use seems to be like the
English take of "I take it that …".
So in both forms of Aristotle's label for this alleged fallacy, he is talking
(alas, in Greek) about arguments that assume or postulate the 'principle' to be
proved, in some indirect or disguised form. Since with the fall of the
Byzantine empire, Greek became only of antiquarian interest, while Latin became
the lingua franca, some medieval translator (or other) decided to translate
Aristotle's pair "to en arkhe aiteisthai" and "to en arkhe lambanein" as,
simpliciter, "petitio principii."
The translator chose to turn the nominalized infinitive (the 'to' forms in
Aristotle) into a noun, 'petitio'; and change the appositional 'en arche' into
a genitive form of 'principium', following the noun 'petitio'. I thought he was
very clever, this translator, whoever he was.
In classical Latin -- say, Virgil, Aeneid, petitio means "an attack, a blow; a
requesting, beseeching; a request,", or if you must, a "petition".
However, as the Kneales possibly found out in their seminal lectures on the
growth of logical theory, in post-classical Latin petitio was also used to mean
"a postulate", in its logical use of "a fundamental principle to be used as a
basis for reasoning."
Specifically, 'petitio', even if a noun, was used as a loose translation of
Aristotle's infinitive "αἰτεσθαι," to mean something like "postulating".
"Principium" of course means "a beginning, commencement, origin" — here
translating Aristotle's appositional phrase ἐν ἀρχῇ, and means something like
"the start of the argument", or "the original point".
So back to McEvoy's paradox:
"For me, the problem may be that question-begging in the stricter sense is a
detectible argumentative flaw, and replacement of the narrower sense for the
wider therefore diminishes attunement to whether the flaw is present. I say
that from a logical, argumentative point of view. But, as to whether loss of a
linguistic sense based on a specific logical distinction leads to loss to
attunement to that underlying distinction, this of course begs the question."
One might rephrase that, very loosely: to prove that question-begging is
question-begging, or fallacious, is fallacious, or question-begging.
McEvoy is restricting his point to an alleged change of 'sense', but I'm not!
The alleged fallacy of petitio principii can occur in a number of different
conversational ways, which amused Grice.
One of them is when the proposition one is trying to establish is unwittingly
assumed. For example:
Grice has all the virtues.
One of the virtues is benevolence.
So, Grice is benevolent.
The analysis of this fallacy is that the general premise could not be known to
be true unless the conclusion was known to be true; so, in making the argument
the conclusion is assumed true from the beginning, or in an older mode of
expression, the arguer has committed the fallacy of begging the question.
Whately (1875 III §13) gave a different example:
“to allow everyman an unbounded freedom of speech must always be, on the whole,
advantageous to the State; for it is highly conducive to the interest of the
Community, that each individual should enjoy a liberty perfectly unlimited, of
expressing his sentiments.”
This argument begs the question because the premise and conclusion are the very
same proposition albeit expressed in different words.
Some versions of begging the question are more involved and are called circular
reasoning.
They include more than one inference -- hence Grice's pluralising, "Aspects of
reason and reasoning" --.
Descartes illustrated this kind of fallacy with the example of our belief in
the Bible being justified because it is the word of God, and our belief in
God’s existence being justified because it is written in the Bible
("Meditations on first philosophy," 'Dedication').
The two propositions lead back and forth to each other, in a circle, each
having only the other for support.
Nowadays many people—even educated people—ignite the ire of some philosophers
(even ordinary-language philosophers like H. P. Grice is, only he would never
get anger by a 'linguistic point', which were his 'bread and butter' -- by
using ‘begs the question’ to mean ‘raises the question’.
And so on.
Cheers,
Speranza
