begging the question - Wordsmith.org

Hi Group,
I have a burning peeve that I must post here as part of my ongoing campaign to eradicate it.
I hear in conversation, and on television and radio, from ones who ought to know better, misuse of the term "begging the question."
It is the name for a logical fallacy in which the truth of the conclusion is assumed by the premises. A simple example:
"I am not lying, so it follows that I am telling the truth."

Begging the question does not--I repeat--does NOT refer to a question which "begs to be asked," as I hear more and more in common usage. Let's all vow to not succumb to this improper usage and to shoot it down in every instance.

Ah, I feel much better now.
Thanks!
m.

Agree totally -- it drives me to a pitch of fury. But the previous thread on this topic was so long I thought there was some hope for us logicians yet.

Well good luck trying to change anything that takes hold on TV and radio. As you must know, much of the perversion of the language can be traced there. Ever since the evil day, now nearly 40 years ago, when a commercial went on TV that said, "Winston tastes good like a cigarette should," the distinction between like and as has been very blurry for the average person (not people like ourselves, of course) (smirking emoticon). Then there is another of my pet peeves, a construction like "She invited Jane and I." I could go on ad nauseam and no doubt others on this board will have more examples, but you may as well abandon hope. Once one of these atrocities gets on the air, people think they are correct (must be, since someone said it on TV or radio) and repeat it, so others repeat it, etc.

>but you may as well abandon hope<

Would that I could! Hope, my friend, refuses to abandon me.

m.

>Would that I could! Hope, my friend, refuses to abandon me.

Bring her on. She sounds like the steadfast type we want here

� and what about her mates Faith and Charity!

Bobyoungbalt : you may as well abandon hope. Once one of these atrocities gets on the air, people think they are correct (must be, since someone said it on TV or radio) and repeat it, so others repeat it, etc.
Bob! There is light at the end of the tunnel and it's the light of knowledge . Our local supermarket recently underwent renovation and, lo and behold, above several "quick check out" areas appeared the sign : "ten items or fewer ! Hurrah! Now, if we can just get management to change the words on the staff vests to May I help you.
Small steps, small steps...
wow
wow

> appeared the sign : "ten items or fewer !

Gotta disagree here. The English for this is "ten items or less".

misuse of the term "begging the question."...a logical fallacy in which the truth of the conclusion is assumed by the premises

If the logicians were so logical they should have called it "Assuming the Conclusion" instead of giving it a name that doesn't describe it so well.

What? Petitio Principii? Gimme a break!

>What? Petitio Principii? Gimme a break!<

May the break you ask for be given you.

;-)
m.

>>What? Petitio Principii? Gimme a break!<

>May the break you ask for be given you.

isn't that begging the question?
-joe (I'm so confused) friday

I hasve a friend who's an FBI agent here in Denver. The other day there was a bank robbery, witnessed by a panhandler who was sitting on the street corner cadging quarters. Joe spent the whole afternoon questioning the beggar.

Perhaps Faldage is right. "Begging the question" is so unclear, and petitio principii is in another language, for goshsakes! I think we ALL deserve a break from complex or obscure terms which require any effort to understand.
Take "hydrogen peroxide" for instance. How complex and obscure! Why don't we all agree just to call it "bubbly stuff." That's much more logical. And foreign words like "Champagne" don't tell us anything about what the stuff is like. Let's call it "bubbly stuff" too.
And just so we don't get them confused, let's call hydrogen peroxide "bubbly stuff for cuts" and call Champagne "bubbly stuff for parties."
Whew, isn't that better? Now, I've gotta turn off this box that has light coming out of it and get down to that big building where they teach people stuff.
Later,
m.

Metameta notes: And foreign words like "Champagne" don't tell us anything about what the stuff is like. Let's call it "bubbly stuff" too

What do you think most of the population of New Zealand call it? Especially with the French getting uppity about what is and isn't champagne, whether "methode champagnoise" and "methode traditionelle" are also breaching the brand and what have you. "Bubbly". A new brand!

>"Bubbly"

The term used here these days seems to be "fizz" - posh fizz, cheap fizz, it's all fizz.

> appeared the sign : "ten items or fewer !

Gotta disagree here. The English for this is "ten items or less".

Perhaps I don't understand what you mean by "disagree", but fewer is indeed correct. Fewer refers to the number of somethings, while less refers to the amount of something. Basically, less is singular, fewer is plural.

That's what I disagree with. In normal English we say two is less than three, someone with ten apples has got less than someone with twelve, and so on. No count/mass distinction is made with 'more', which functions as comparative of both 'much' and 'many'. The relatively rare word 'fewer' just strikes me as a pedants' revival, an artificial and unnatural distinction gleaned out of some obsolete grammar.

The only notion of "correct" that holds water is "what native speakers naturally say".

To my surprise I find the OED cites less examples than I'd expected. Normally these fictitious rules were routinely broken by people like Dickens, but there are no examples for several centuries before his period.

The first use of less in sense 1.c., as a synonym of fewer, is from King Alfred's translation of Bo�thius:
Swa mid l�s worda swa mid ma
where it's originally an adverb governing the partitive genitive worda.

Then Caxton wrote By cause he had so grete plente of men of hys owne countre, he called the fewer and lasse to counseyll of the noble men of the Cyte.

Then Lyly wrote in Euphues that I thinke there are few Vniuersities that have lesse faultes than Oxford, many that have more.
(And no I'm not putting forward Lyly as an arbiter of elegance.)

Then there are only modern quotations, second half of last century onward; and it looks as if it first got into print in mathematical writing, where naturally you don't want to pronounce the relation in a < b differently depending on what the entities being compared are.

The OED says the synonymy with fewer is 'Freq. found but generally regarded as incorrect'.

To my surprise I find the OED cites less examples than I'd expected.

See, using "less" there is absolutely wrong. It just sounds wrong. You're talking about the number of examples and therefore "fewer" is correct.

I ran that sentence through the Lotus Word Pro grammar check and this was the result:

These rules flag errors of mass/count agreement. An error in mass/count agreement is a conflict between the number of the noun (singular or plural) and the adjectives before the noun that tell how much or how many. For example, one rule in this set will flag a sentence like 'There are less mistakes in this document,' because the adjective 'fewer', not 'less', is the correct one to use with a plural noun.

A lot of what we talk about on this board are commonly misunderstood grammar rules. This is one example. Just because it's commonly misused doesn't make it right.

JazzO sez: using "less" there is absolutely wrong

What it boils down to is whether the native speaker of the language sees any meaningful difference between the situation in which what is being talked about is measurable and that in which it is countable. If the speaker sees no such difference then it makes no sense to use a different word in one instance than in the other. Less is easier to say than fewer and therefore is preferable to the native speaker.

There are many rules that used to be used, e.g., separate verb endings for each person and number, use of a different pronouns for plural and singular in the second and even different forms of the pronouns for nominative (now usually called subjective) and dative/accusative (now usually called objective) in the second person plural (it's not who do you trust or whom do you trust, it's whom do ye* trust). All these rules were forgotten because they were seen as being unnecessary. I regret the loss of meaningful distinctions such as the difference between virulent and virile or enormity and enormousness but I refuse to mourn the loss of a distinction between less and fewer.

Show me a case where there could be a misunderstanding based on the violation of this rule and I may recant.

*�nigma doesn't even recognize ye.

Faldage wept: *�nigma doesn't even recognize ye.

I hope you're not therefore implying, based on what you said earlier in the same post, that AEnigma can therefore be considered to be a native speaker of English!

I would say "There is less sand on the beach this year", but "There are fewer oranges on the plate".

To me, "less" is used for an indefinable quantity. "Fewer" is used for something which you can enumerate (or would be able to if you needed to). Also note that I use the plural form of "to be" with "fewer".

I'm not trying to say that I'm right and that's that, just pointing out how I was taught to use them.

My at-work dictionary has a use note: "Traditionally few and fewer are used only before a plural noun few books; fewer people and less is used before a mass noun (less sugar)."

This is best exemplified in the story about the minister of this small church in rural Florida who discovered that an addition to his family had strapped beyond repair the ability of his flock to keep him and his family in food. So he looked around for a job, and ended up at the local orange grove. The owner of the orange grove was impressed with his common sense and his ability to follow instructions, and hired him to sort through the oranges to find only the very very best, which would be sent to the White House for use in making orange juice for the President and his family. His job was to take only the top one percent of all the oranges.

A couple of weeks after he started work one of his flock came to the orange grove and was a bit perplexed. "Reverend," said the churchgoer, "I thought you were out doing the Lord's work."

"And I am," responded the preacher, "For did we not learn that truly, many are culled but few are squozen?"

Of course this doesn't at all exemplify the difference between few and less, but it did give me a chance to tell one of my favorite stories.

Yes, yes, yes! (to Faldage and his discourse on the rules..)
Who own English? The hoi polloi in the universities� the writers of grammar books? The high and mighty of the OED?

Or we, the humble speakers� with all our faults? The answer is clear to me.

I own English! And like Shakespeare, I reserve the right to make up words� if there is no word for an idea of mine, well there should be.. Who out there is less than Shakespeare? Was he not a man? Would he be as revered if he has just stuck to the common words, and common phrases, and had not enriched English as he has done?

You own English� Please be my guest and do your best to make your thoughts known, and if there is no word -yet-for what you are thinking� then think up a new one!

Its not that I don't value all the existing words, but I don't see today's lexis as- it- something carved in stone � and to be fair, the high and mighty of the OED agree with me, or why else a new edition? If all the words that to are to be-were then we wouldn't need to be asked and we have been, by the OED, to follow on Dr. Major's footsteps, and provide material for the new OED.

and if i can make up words, why can't i make the rules up too?
Yes- it chaos-- glorious chaos.. moving into math and bordering on philosophy-- chaos is the best place to be. it's were change is still happening-- where things are more like living creatures..

languages die when the rules are more important than the speakers..

The language is reinvented every generation. We learn more about grammar between the ages of zero and three than we ever will in any school and we don't even know we are doing it.

Yes- it chaos-- glorious chaos..

Sure, sure, but if you go lax on the basic core rules of our language, the skeleton that gives it recognizable form and flavor, then if a few generations people will be saying "me is good". Are you then going to accept this?

I have to agree with almost all that's been said in this thread. The speakers of any language own it - even where, as with the Academie Francais, there is an officially-sanctioned attempt to control it. It can't be otherwise.

Lexicographers and grammarians, with the notable exception of Fowler, try to codify the current usage of English. They don't try to direct at all. I've never seen any credible attempt since Noah Webster's little revolution to actually impose one route or another on its direction.

Perhaps, though, we are more in need of a generally accepted base standard for the language than ever. I don't say this through any misguided belief that what I think is right and wrong is what should become the standard, but because the desperate need for clarity of communication between speakers of the same language who come from different cultures.

I am a member of an international organisation which meets two or three times a year, with one representative from each of thirteen different countries. The one language we "share" is English, so all proceedings are carried out in English. The standard of the different representatives' English varies greatly. The constant complaint is that there is no "accepted" English language standard for them to follow, and I spend a good deal of time at those meetings helping representatives with the language in their reports.

None of this is a criticism. It's just a fact of life!

There actually is a sort of controlling body which keeps a language relatively stable without the grammar deteriorating and as free of slang as possible. This body is made up of all the good nuns who have been smacking hands of students, the elementary school teachers who initiate the process and the middle- and highschool teachers who carry it forward, and the college level instructors who fine tune to the utmost level. Sadly, there are few nuns in education any more and the standards in public schools, as well as in many colleges & universities, keep falling all the time. All of us who care about the language need to keep up the pressure on local school boards or other governing bodies, and on any institutions of which we may be alumni/alumnae or on which we may have any influence, to keep standards up.

BYB spoke about applying pressure on educational authorities to keep standards up. The problem is, at least in New Zealand, that when I talk about "standards" I mean one thing. When others talk about standards, they may mean something else entirely ...

JazzO says: but if you go lax on the basic core rules of our language then i[n] a few generations people will be saying "me is good"

Two points: The basic core rules of our language have been almost completley overturned in the last thousand years. The language was one, like Latin, in which relationships between words were indicated primarily by inflectional endings on the words. Adjectives agreed with their nouns in case, number and gender and it was through inflectional endings that these agreements were expressed. We have almost completely lost this feature of the language for nouns and have lost it completely for adjectives. The reputed exception of blond/blonde is sometimes mentioned as an example of the continued use of the gender rule but I doubt if you could honestly document this. If you were to examine the common usage you would probably find that the two spellings are randomly used with no regard to the gender (or even sex) of the noun (or referent of the noun) being modified.

Pronouns are fast falling. The form you was the dative/accusative form; ye was the nominative. When we say you are good (singular, i.e., thou art good) we are, for all practical purposes, saying me is good. I have even heard an elementary school teacher saying, between you and I. It is my belief that we are in an unstable period in which we are dropping all pretense of using case differences in any part of the language.

How much does this distress us? Are we our language's keeper? (I'm leaning toward Faldage's point, yet shudder at the French Academy)

I flinch when I hear things like Give it to Tom and I or between you and I and probably more than I do things like Me and him went bowling last night, if only because it seems to be the better educated that commit the former transgressions. But we've been dumping this case structure thing for the last eight hundred years or so. We've only got a few of these things left and there's no point in trying desperately to hold on to them.

Can someone do me a favor and use begging the question in a sentence. I really have no idea how you would use this phrase as I have never heard it before.

belMarduk asks someone to use begging the question in a sentence.

OK, let's try: You say he's a liar so we can't believe him when he says anything because it must be a lie. That's begging the question.

the phrase actually comes from another sense of the word beg; that is to take for granted without warrant -- here are a couple of citations:

This was to assert or beg the thing in Question.
Many say it is begging the point in dispute.
The vulgar equivalent for petitio principii is begging the question.

My at-work dictionary has a use note: "Traditionally few and fewer are used only before a plural noun few books; fewer people and less is used before a mass noun (less sugar)."

Not so traditionally. Let's see what God has to say about it. I haven't got this to hand to quote, and it's a bit long, but Fowler s.v. less notes that the word was formerly used very widely to mean 'smaller', 'minor', and so on (the greater light and the less, St James the Less), and the modern tendency is to use a more specific word: 'fewer', 'smaller', or whatever.

He does not mention the existence of a fetish "rule" that you have to use 'fewer'. Normally he vigorously attacks these fetish "rules". This suggests to me it's very recent, post-1930, or was very unimportant before then. All Fowler mildly says is that the use of 'fewer' rather than 'less' is the modern (c. 1930) tendency. Clearly, since then the tendency has foundered, since almost everyone says 'less' these days, and they have all through my life. I never heard of the fetish "rule" in school, though one or two of my teachers might have tried to force their pet fetishes on us. (One insisted that "human" wasn't a noun.)

There is a big difference between a real rule, learnt in infancy, such as plurality agreement or past tense formation, and a fictitious "rule" the existence of which surprises fluent adult speakers. Throwing out the fetishes doesn't change any of the real grammar of English.

NicholasW asserts: There is a big difference between a real rule, learnt in infancy, such as plurality agreement or past tense formation, and a fictitious "rule" the existence of which surprises fluent adult speakers. Throwing out the fetishes doesn't change any of the real grammar of English.

Not so fast with the "fetish" tag, please. My usage of less and fewer was learned from infancy. No teacher I had during my early schooling would have known enough to try imposing such a formation on an unsuspecting pupil population.

My parents probably had their fetishes and ju-jus, but I don't think the usage of less and fewer would have crossed their minds as being one of them!

basic core rules
I've been giving some thought to the very polite argument going on here (not at all polite in other venues) over language changes. It is certainly the case that grammatical features like case are mostly gone and I agree that it doesn't matter a whole lot, since modern English is a distributive language (one depending on word order and placement), not the inflected language that Old English was and Middle English partly was. A sentence like, "Me come too" sounds like something a two-year-old would say; but even if, over the course of another 100 years or so, this should become standard usage, it's meaning is clear even if it's expression is inelegant. So I'm not upset so much by changes as long as a given usage is clear and unambiguous.

What really concerns me is that what we are seeing now is the institutionalization of usages which creep in out of ignorance and illiterate usage; viz., the indiscriminate confusion of lie/lay, infer/imply, and too many others to list. The result is a decrease in precision and clarity in the language. The reason English has more words than any other language is that most of them (not all, of course) have precise meanings which are different from all other words. If we keep on allowing the ignorant and lazy to stop recognizing the differences between certain words and make synomyms indiscriminately, by the start of the next millenium, if humans are still around and speaking English, they'll have to do it with the assistance of their hands, like the Italians, because one word may have 50+ different meanings because all the words with a single or limited number of precise meanings have disappeared.

While I'm on this hobbyhorse, let me also deprecate the vanishing use of the semicolon. We now have sentences with members of a series and subseries all strung out with commas because semicolons are now politically incorrect, thanks to the incessant whining, over the last 30 years, of the ignoramuses (ignorami and/or ignoramae?) who can't or won't take the trouble to learn how to use the semicolon.

NicholasW says: There is a big difference between a real rule, learnt in infancy,... and a fictitious "rule"...

CapK responds: My usage of less and fewer was learned from infancy

I think that the usages that we find objectionable are the ones that violate the rules we learned at our mother's knees. For example, my father used the word irregardless frequently with, I think, humorous intent. In a similar vein the only time I ever heard may used instead of can in the manner drummed into our tiny little heads by our grammar school teachers (e.g., Can I stay up and watch TV? May you stay up and watch TV and the answer is No!) was in the children's game which we knew as Mother May I

Faldage suggested that:I think that the usages that we find objectionable are the ones that violate the rules we learned at our mother's knees. For example, my father used the word irregardless frequently with, I think, humorous intent. In a similar vein the only time I ever heard may used instead of can in the manner drummed into our tiny little heads by our grammar school teachers

Setting aside the shocking way in which you jump to conclusions regarding the sex of the primary parent,

I find myself agreeing with this entirely. Probably because I did learn the "can I/may I rule" at my (grand)mother's knee, or at least at her dinner table. So, as one proud to have been raised by a devoted single father, I do proclaim that you may be excused for your lax attitude toward the misuse of "can."

.. because one word may have 50+ different meanings because all the words with a single or limited number of precise meanings have disappeared.
On closer inspection, I wonder if it is possible to count the number of meanings of an isolated word! A word only acquires its full and unique meaning in context. Even a single complete sentence is a somewhat lossy vehicle for conveying a given message. Words that are used most frequently (like hold, stand, right..)tend to have the widest range of meanings!
And if we limit ourselves to words with fewer meanings, those will also have less meaning or, if any, then to fewer people

.
By the way I wonder where you acquired the conviction that "English has more words than any other language"? In my opinion, what makes English an "advanced" languange is its ability to express a wide range of meanings by combining a relatively small number of words.

Not so fast with the "fetish" tag, please. My usage of less and fewer was learned from infancy.

Okay, for those of you who can't read fast I'll write more slowly.

No, I don't object to 'fewer', and thinks it's a perfectly natural word. I do use it myself, and have been finding more recently that I've been using it where I would formerly have unselfconsciously said 'less', so I've had to examine my thoughts on the matter. It's not a total fetish, you're right, though it can be in some hands.

What really concerns me is that what we are seeing now is the institutionalization of usages which creep in out of ignorance and illiterate usage; viz., the indiscriminate confusion of lie/lay, infer/imply, and too many others to list. The result is a decrease in precision and clarity in the language.

Yes, this is my objection too. Although I decry rule-based prescriptivism, I am all for good language against bad language. The loss of useful terms is to be deprecated and if possible opposed. Beg the question is useful in its right sense, and the misuse of it has no value of its own, so I'm vigorous in opposing its misuse.

But case-based, not rule-based. The lie/lay distinction doesn't seem so important, because most verbs don't need separate transitive forms. Misuse can sound quite illiterate, but I would be reluctant to impose my class attitudes if it became really widespread.

Semicolons are the bolts in the tracery of my prose; I feel I haven't been working if I don't have a few to give elegance to the thing.

NicholasW expounds: Semicolons are the bolts in the tracery of my prose; I feel I haven't been working if I don't have a few to give elegance to the thing which has nothing to do with this post but is such a beautiful line that I must convey my appreciation to its author.

I'm really responding to the begging the question question. There are many phrases which are misconstrued due to the changing of definitions of key words. A classic example is the exception proves the rule. Presumably we are expected to believe that the more exceptions we have the more the rule is proved. Prove at the time of the coining of that old clich�* had the meaning test. The rule could be proved and found wanting.

*Ha! I thought that would happen; �nigma "corrected" clich� to [cliche].

In reply to:
English has more words...

I thought that the notion that English has more words, by far, than any other language was a generally accepted notion. I've seen it often enough, notably, I believe, in Lincoln Barnett's Treasure of our Tongue. The number of words in the English language is estimated at well above a million, not even counting the arcana of specialized argots and scientific words. To me, what makes English an "advanced language" is the availability of words which have a very precise meaning, which lends clarity and precision when those qualities are wanted, also a large stock of words which can be chosen for beauty of expression. So, although a well-educated person may know 50,000 or more words, he probably does not make use of more than 5,000 max. on a regular basis. The less- and uneducated know and use far fewer, and are more likely to need to resort to grunts and body language to reinforce or interpret what they are saying, which is what you get in other languages with scanty vocabulary.

Your idea that English expresses a wide range of ideas in few words is, IMHO, erroneous. It is true that a sort of Basic English can be taught. During WWII, there were numbers of exiled personnel, including pilots and scholars, from Nazi-occupied countries like Poland, who wanted to offer their services to the Allies, but who spoke no English. The U.S. Army set up a training progrem which included a language school. The language teachers developed and taught this "Basic English" which had a vocablulary of only about 1000 words/expressions (later pared down to about 500), mostly compounds of basic words like come, go, look, give, up, down, so that instead of the students having to learn ascend, arrive, observe, they could use go up, come in, look at, etc.. This worked quite well, and students learned English well enough to function, even if their English often sounded odd and was inelegant. This is the factor which makes English the most popular language in the world: it is relatively easy to learn enough English to communicate. At the same time, English is reckoned to be one of the most difficult languages to master because of the huge number of words and the subtle differences among what seem to be words meaning the same thing; also the huge number of meanings which can never adequately be expressed by a dictionary, but which are in everyday use.

Your explanation of "The exception proves the rule" relieves me of a long-felt, nagging tension about that phrase.

If Faldage's explanation of the "exception proving the rule" is correct - and I believe it probably is - then it comes strictly from scientific/mathematical/statistical hypothesis testing and therefore can't be all that old.

Does anyone have any reference for when it was first used?

Two posts to the one thread - whoa, the Jazz police will be after me!

While I agree with Faldage's facts and figures, he hasn't actually provided an explanation of why English is so easy for foreigners to make themselves understood in with a relatively low level of vocabulary and syntax.

The reason is, I think, that incorrect word order will generally sound wrong but, because of our lack of semantically-important word endings, will be understandable.

I had to sit through a presentation by a fellow from Myanmar in November whose grasp of English word order was pretty damned tenuous (in fact, I think I learned something about Burmese language word order), yet I understood what he was on about. And that's not the first example of the phenomenon.

Are there any other languages (which we know of amongst us) which allow this kind of indiscriminate jumbling up of words without losing the basic meaning?

Cap K asks Does anyone have any reference for when it (prove meaning test) was first used?

The AHD isn't terribly specific here but it does say in its etymology for the word: Middle English proven, from Old French prover, from Latin probare, to test, from probus, good. which would suggest that it had the meaning test. We'll have to look it up in the OED to get the straight skinny and mine is at home.

Perhaps I've misunderstood Cap Kiwi's point, but it seems to me that the word order is more important in languages that don't have variable word endings. In Latin, the word order can vary tremendously and the meaning can still be gleaned from the endings on the words, which make clear which word is the subject, which the direct object, etc. To a lesser degree, in Spanish and Italian you can do this, as there are different pronouns for various things, such as direct vs. indirect object.

As an example (dusting off some long-ago-stashed Latin learning) "Puella agricolam amat" is "The girl loves the farmer" and can only be that because puella is the nominative (i.e. subject of the verb), but "Amat puella agricolam" and even "Agricolam amat puella" also mean that she loves him, not the other way around. This kind of mixing in English would completely change the meaning of the sentence, implying that the farmer also loves the girl, which would be begging the question, no?

Yes, Hyla, you can get away with it in Latin, although I'm sure that the word order conveyed emphasis and other meaning regardless. Also, it's not commonly used at the meetings I attend ...

Perhaps I overstated the case. Of course an attentive native speaker of most languages can eventually untangle a syntactically garbled sentence. We just seem to be able to do it more easily in English due to a lack of alternative verb formations, in particular.

I'm told that in Japanese and Chinese, if you vary the word order from the conventional, the meaning can be completely different. BelMarduk may be able to confirm my impression (gleaned from my long-ago scholastic brushes with the language) that word order is important to meaning in French.

FWIW
What I think I was trying to get across is the notion that anagrams in English are easier to untangle than in other languages.

I'm still not sure I agree - the alternative verb formations give information that can help to understand the sentence.

As an example in a language a little less dated, in Spanish if you say "Ella te ama" it's clearly "She loves you" and if you botch it up and say "Te ama ella" it can be worked out to mean the same. In English, switching the word order thusly would change it to "You love her." It helps a little that the "Te" is a direct object form rather than a subject form, but even if I botched that up the verb would probably make it clear.

I should point out that even as I write this I can see the sense in your point - it feels like English would handle this better - but the logic of the languages I've studied seems to argue the other way. Maybe I just can't get past the fact that English is my first language and thus will always be the most easily comprehended, even when garbled a bit.

I've been basing my viewpoint on direct experience. Mostly South East Asian, admittedly, where there is little in common between the native languages of the locals and English except a smattering of loan-words from English. No matter how badly garbled the word order is, I can generally work out the meaning without any real effort except where the speaker also uses incorrect words.

The other thing is that most of them don't get ALL of the word order wrong. None of them, for instance, would say "Order Different Word in Languages"

Also, I guess, there is an emphasis in most of these countries on learning English, and they do make an effort which you naturally reciprocate.

I enjoy Europe for the fact that you can almost always find someone who speaks enough English to understand you when you have no idea about the local language.

Because of our language issues, two extremely common scenarios are English speakers trying to learn French and French speakers trying to learn English. I know a lot of people on both sides of this equation and know that the English speakers have a much harder time of it than French speakers.

I am told English is easier to learn because you don�t have to worry about attributing every single word properly. �The table is red� in English is easier to learn than the French �La table est brune� because you have to know that a) a table is female and b) the adjective has to be gendered accordingly, so it is not brun but brune.

English speakers say the French use too many words, and that everything has to be attributed and conjugated correctly to be understood.

The word order is important because of all this attribution.

.. Prove at the time of the coining of that old clich� had the meaning test. The rule could be proved and found wanting.
While, at first sight, this explanation has a seductive quality, I am still unconvinced.
First, the corresponding german phrase has the word "best�tigt.." for "proves", and there is no way of interpreting this as "test", it clearly means "confirms".
Second, and more important, your hypothesis would mean that any rule which has a single exception is invalid and is to be discarded! this would, in my opinion, deprive the word rule of its specific meaning: "as a rule, I only cross the street when the light is green..."

.

Wsieber is right. The expression is old, perhaps mediaeval, perhaps ancient, since it occurs in Latin as exceptio probat regulum or exceptio confirmat regulum. Now probat is indeed 'probes, tests', though I don't know (OED please) at what time it took on the modern sense 'proves (conclusively)': did this happen in mediaeval Latin or early modern English?

But confirmat is presumably 'confirms, best�tigt'. There is an alternative explanation for the meaning of the phrase, namely that the need to point out an exception to a rule proves or confirms that a rule exists to make an exception from. The example quoted in Chambers is that No smoking abaft the funnel implies that smoking is allowed before the funnel.

CapitalKiwi:
I've been basing my viewpoint on direct experience. Mostly South East Asian, [...]
The other thing is that most of them don't get ALL of the word order wrong. None of them, for instance, would say "Order Different Word in Languages"

I think it's widespread -- I won't say universal because I don't know -- that languages that don't mark case roles tend to have SVO order, e.g. English, Chinese, Malay/Indonesian. Not rigidly, as OVS is also very common in Malay, but in shifting between them you'd quickly work out that SVO was safe and neutral.

There are near-universals of word order, such as that VSO implies noun-adjective (Welsh, Arabic) but SOV implies adjective-noun (Turkish, Japanese), and so also for prepositions versus postpositions, standards of comparison, etc.

SVO, being in the middle, doesn't have such clear matches, e.g. French N-Adj vs English Adj-N.

NicholasW wrote: The example quoted in Chambers is that No smoking abaft the funnel implies that smoking is allowed before the funnel.

This seems to get us back to the first post in this thread - wouldn't assuming that one could smoke before the funnel be begging the question?

This example also leaves me puzzled. In this example, there seems to be a proscriptive rule, rather than a rule based on standard practice or theory. In other words, "the rule says no" vs. "as I rule I do this" or even the Laws of Thermodynamics as a rule based on observation of the behavior of things. This is not how I had understood this phrase to be used. I understood it to mean that, based on observation, one might derive a rule for the behavior of something (e.g, every day my cat gets up and scratches at the door frame and I rush to open the door before he does further damage to the wood) or the example of earlier "as a rule, I cross at a green light" and that somehow an exception to this rule would prove it. Because of this understanding I was (briefly) very pleased to hear about the other, older meaning of "prove" as "to test" - it made a nice logical package.

Now I must ask - in this saying, are we talking about a rule that dictates behavior (e.g. No Smoking) or a standard practice ("as a rule") or a theory based on observation?

What's the rule here?

NicholasW wrote: The example quoted in Chambers is that No smoking abaft the funnel implies that smoking is allowed before the funnel.

Hyla responded: This seems to get us back to the first post in this thread - wouldn't assuming that one could smoke before the funnel be begging the question?

Certainly in the world of symbolic logic Hyla would be correct but in the real world (if there is such a place) the notion of forbidding some specific action in some specific place would be taken to imply that that action was permitted in other places.

CapK asks, anent prove meaning test: Does anyone have any reference for when it was first used?

OED to the rescue. The first citation, involving only form, is from 1175. The first citation in the section covering the definition is from 1200 and uses it in the sense of test.

Faldage replies: The first citation, involving only form, is from 1175.

... at which time the mathematic proof of the null hypothesis was well known. "As a rule, we Outremerans occupy the Holy Land. This is proven because we still hold Krak des Chevaliers". Which statement would have been true for another 17 years or thereabouts.

Ta, Faldage.

Now I must ask - in this saying, are we talking about a rule that dictates behavior (e.g. No Smoking) or a standard practice ("as a rule") or a theory based on observation?
To the extent that language is ruled by logic, I surmise that the saying is applied to both cases:
If there were no exceptions, nobody would talk about a rule. You don't say: "the rule is for people not to walk through walls."

Apropos of proving, I just found the word eprouvette, an apparatus for testing the strength of gunpowder.

I would like one of those in my oubliette.

Wseeb says: If there were no exceptions, nobody would talk about a rule. You don't say: "the rule is for people not to walk through walls."

Ah, but surely here's another confusion of the two senses of rule. There certainly is a natural rule that people cannot walk through walls. If there were an exception, our rule would be sorely probed indeed.

On the other hand, a prescriptive rule is one regarding moral. or legal. behaviour. Again, in this case, any exceptions do not prove the rule, but violate it (often, in an ideal world, leading to punitive action against the rule-breaker).

There are, of course. more general rules in science and other studies, that attempt to outline 'natural laws' but which may, indeed, have exceptions. The simple 'law of averages' for instance, would lead you to believe that if you toss a coin a million times it will come up heads or tails in approximately equal proportions. But if Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are on their way to being dead, it may come up heads only, for as many as a million times in a row. This exception certainly tests, or probes (I like that etymology - thanks Faldage and NickW) the rule, and allows us to be circumspect about its application.

In no circumstances does an exception actually prove (in the modern use of the term) the validity of a natural law.

As to the word 'prove' meaning test - we still have (albeit relatively archaic) terms using that meaning. Proving grounds for armaments are testing centres. And alcohol levels of 'proof' also relate to the alleged practice of 'proving' that a particular liquor contained the requisite levels of alcohol by seeing if it would burn (which it won't at less than about 40% v/v). This is why 40% v/v is 'one hundred degrees' proof - it simply passes the test of being able to be used as a fuel. From there, of course, you can then downgrade the standard and talk about 50 proof - meaning half the alcohol levels that will enable the old proof to be successful. And so on. Of course, in these standardised days, % by volume is more common, and easier to use. But it does raise the interesting point - 250 proof would, presumably, be pure alcohol.

Can anybody confirm or debunk this story of mine (which I seem to recall reading many cycles of the Sun ago) about how HM Customs 'proved' the quality of brandy the French were sending us?

cheer

the sunshine warrior

geez, I have lost my English tonight. Eprouvette is the French term for one of those little glass vials they use in labs (not beakers). The same thingies they use when they take a blood sample. What is it in English?

Test Tubes ("Proof" Tubes)?

In reply to:
I think it's widespread -- I won't say universal because I don't know -- that languages that don't mark case roles tend to have SVO order, e.g. English, Chinese, Malay/Indonesian. Not rigidly, as OVS is also very common in Malay

In Indonesian the relative pronoun (yang = English who/which/that) must be the subject of its verb. If necessary the verb must be made passive. Thus:

Candi bought the shirt = Candi telah membeli baju.

The shirt was bought by Candi = Baju telah dibeli Candi

The shirt which Candi bought = Baju yang telah dibeli Candi .

Thus SVO is preserved. If the agent of a passive verb is a pronoun it comes before the verb, making the sentence SOV

Baju telah saya beli The shirt was bought by me.

I can't think off-hand of an OVS construction.

Bingley

There certainly is a natural rule that people cannot walk through walls
Since Shanks found it worthy of a closer look, I cannot resist taking it one step further: In my view, a rule is very much a man-made thing. The expression "natural rule" does not sound right to me, contrary to "natural law", which is a different proposition. Strictly, a rule cannot be either proved or disproved, but only confirmed or violated. A rule that has been violated in a few cases may still continue to be accepted, again unlike a natural law. I would like also to mention rules of thumb which are very useful inspite of their exceptions

..

I can't think off-hand of an OVS construction.

What is telah? I don't know that word. I presume it's an adverb of simple past, similar to sudah.

What I mean by OVS in Indonesian is in your examples. I would say:

Candi bought the shirt = Candi membeli baju or Baju dibeli Candi.

The mem- marks subject focus and the di- marks object focus. Indonesian has only these two, but in Philippine languages you also get recipient-focus and location-focus with similar distinctions of verb marking.

You could call the di- construction a passive, but it is just as common as the other. In a language that has a passive, the passive is rarer than the active and involves demoting the previous subject to a different case, and the new subject takes on subject marking (such as verb agreement). As Indonesian has no such thing as agreement or cases, I'd prefer to say it has two constructions, SVO and OVS, with the verb marked for actant focus.

This view is undermined by the use of oleh, equaivalent to 'by': Baju dibeli oleh Candi. Since this construction is unlike the usual Austronesian pattern, I suspect it's a recent innovation based on European passives, but I don't know.

I also thought the pronoun prefixing was optional. The way I learnt it, you could say, with the pronouns exactly in parallel with nouns:
Saya membeli baju
or Baju membeli saya
or Baju membeli oleh saya
Or a pronoun-prefixing construction with a form of the older pronoun aku, viz:
Baju kubeli

"Who own English? The hoi polloi in the universities� the writers of grammar books? The high and mighty of the OED?"

Am I the only one who flinched at that reference to "hoi polloi"?

Or was it intentional? It does wonderfully illustrate of troy's point: everybody knew what was meant even though the phrase was used in direct contradiction of the dictionary definition.

Although I largely agree with of troy's comments, surely at some point you have to tell Humpty Dumpty that he can't make words mean whatever he wants them to mean. (Or, in the case of this thread, play fast and loose with grammar.) I guess the trouble is we will never all agree on where that line is to be drawn.

Dear Ms. Stein,
Welcome to you, and your screen name is wonderful!
No, we can't simply decide on our own that words will mean whatever we want them to, she snargled. I'd say that not only "the trouble", but the interesting part is that we'll never all agree on everything!

I, for one, flinched at that usage of hoi polloi, and wondered in what rarified environment the writer must dwell where the hoi polloi are at the universities. Certainly not my town.
Regarding the ownership of the language, I like to believe it is held in common, as in a common trust, and that its speakers have a responsibility to all other speakers of the language--current and potential, present and future--to maintain it in the most rational, educated, and conservative manner possible for each. Linguistic change is inevitable, yet language is larger than the individual, and such change must not be based on caprice, but on the language's own necessary functionality.

Of course, if you really want to be pedantic you'll object to the usage the hoi polloi, since hoi means the. This is a common misuse, possibly from the confusion with hoity toity which connotes a certain fussy precision beyond the pale of reason characteristic of some members of Academia (which I prefer to pronounce [a-cuh-DAY-mee-uh] rather than the more commonly accepted [a-cuh-DEE-me-uh] so that I can make reference to Academia Nuts).

hoi polloi

My my my, sometimes it seems like we talk in circles here, doesn't it?

http://wordsmith.org/board/showthreaded.pl?Cat=&Board=words&Number=3358

In reply to:
My my my, sometimes it seems like we talk in circles here, doesn't it?

My my my, Ohioans have long memories around here don't they? Four months must represent at least 13,000 posts - I wish I had that sort of recall!

Yes, telah is the same as sudah but used in more formal situations. I tend to overuse it, since it's the one I see more often at work.

Yes, if you wanted you could analyse di- and mem- as showing object and subject focus respectively rather than as active and passive verb prefixes; sometimes one analysis is more useful, sometimes the other.

In my experience object-focus sentences are certainly more common than passive verb sentences in English, but they're not as common as subject-focus ones. Of course sentences with di- are not exactly the same as an English passive verb sentence, but in taking isolated examples they work well enough as equivalents.

oleh is obligatory when the agent is separated from the verb, e.g., Candi dibelikan baju oleh kakaknya. (Candi was bought a shirt by his sister), but optional where the agent immediately follows the verb, e.g., Baju dibeli Candi (the shirt was bought by Candi).

Baju membeli saya (The shirt bought me???) I ran this by a native speaker of Indonesian (in fact, the Candi who is becoming so familiar to our readers),who rejected it as not being a sensible utterance.

The most usual way to say what I assume you mean would be: Baju yang saya beli (the shirt (which/that) I bought). First and second person pronouns and pronoun substitutes come immediately before a passive verb (with or without being attached to the verb) and the di- prefix is not used. Third person pronouns can come after the verb, in which case the di- prefix is retained. baju yang dibelinya. (the shirt (which/that)he/she bought).

Bingley

If the logicians were so logical they should have called it "Assuming the Conclusion" instead of giving it a name that doesn't describe it so well.

Sorry to hark back to such an ancient (my, how fast things move here!) post. I got really excited by Faldage's comment and hoped to find some follow up on the etymology of the expression. It seems untenable to me that the logicians express proprietary rights over it when they haven't proven that they are entitled to ownership. Talk about begging the question!

The real premise that I want to see examined is: what does the phrase mean, or what did it mean when it was first invented. And why that particular construction which, as Faldage points out, apparently defies logic.

BTW apologies if this has been dealt with. I find the threads so labyrinthine and the digressions and tangents so impenetrable (though utterly fascinating) that I'm not sure I will live long enough to check all the posts.

Baju membeli saya (The shirt bought me???) I ran this by a native speaker of Indonesian (in fact, the Candi who is becoming so familiar to our readers),who rejected it as not being a sensible utterance.

Aargh! That was a typo. I meant to transform Saya membeli baju into Baju dibeli (oleh)saya.

But last night I read through my book (it's been many years since I was familiar with this) and discovered what you have also said: 1st and 2nd person subjects precede (not just the fused pronouns, as I had thought).

Another exception to this is with the ter- form, which has to use oleh for the agent.

Phyllisstein says: Sorry to hark back to such an ancient (my, how fast things move here!) post. I got really excited by Faldage's comment and hoped to find some follow up on the etymology of the expression. It seems untenable to me that the logicians express proprietary rights over it when they haven't proven that they are entitled to ownership. Talk about begging the question!

I wouldn't say that anyone thinks they "own" it. They only define it. A quick google search comes up with umpty-six very similar definitions with very similar examples. As a matter of fact, no one claims ownership of it at all, more's the pity ...

The real premise that I want to see examined is: what does the phrase mean, or what did it mean when it was first invented. And why that particular construction which, as Faldage points out, apparently defies logic.

The meaning doesn't appear to have shifted (and has been expressed very clearly among the mess of this thread). However, here's a good reference: http://www.drury.edu/faculty/Ess/Logic/Informal/Begging_the_Question.html. But almost any of the others explain it as well.

The etymology is obscure - I haven't been able to track down anything reliable, but from the structure of the expression I would expect that it became entrenched in the language during the 17th or 18th centures, although it probably has much earlier origins. Finding explanations for the origins of expressions is not easy. They are just "accepted". Someone else on the board may be able to find something definite.

I find the threads so labyrinthine and the digressions and tangents so impenetrable (though utterly fascinating) that I'm not sure I will live long enough to check all the posts.

We were all trained in obfuscation and sewing genteel-ish confusion by the Byzantine civil service during the 13th century. We can send you back for some instruction in the art if you like!

In reply to:
Another exception to this is with the ter- form, which has to use oleh for the agent.

But only if the agent is a pronoun. It's optional if the agent is a noun and immediately follows the verb, or at least that's what my grammar book says. I'll check with some native speakers and get back to you.

Bingley

The meaning doesn't appear to have shifted (and has been expressed very clearly among the mess of this thread).

Sorry! I expressed myself very sloppily. What I meant was: when you dissect it (word by word) what does the phrase mean? What is the sense of the word "beg" in this case? And is the "question" in question the hypothesis that is supposedly being proven? etc...

We were all trained in obfuscation and sewing genteel-ish confusion by the Byzantine civil service during the 13th century. We can send you back for some instruction in the art if you like!

"Sewing confusion" sounds very genteel indeed! Thanks for the offer but I don't think fine needlework is really for me. But time travel to Byzantium in the 13th C: now that's a tempting thought!

to link or to quote; another question begging to be asked...

<<the phrase actually comes from another sense of the word beg; that is to take for granted without warrant -- here are a couple of citations:

This was to assert or beg the thing in Question.
Many say it is begging the point in dispute.>>

by the way, those [<< >>] were guillemets just then, quotation marks in some of the Romance languages.

Are we referring to individual items? If so, "fewer" is correct, as in "She ate fewer than ten wolverines during her vacation."

Are we referring to a quantity? Then "less," as in "He avoided prison by driving at 50 miles an hour or less."

I lean toward the items, rather than the quantity.

Well, if the thread is messy we can only blame the sewing confusion!

Tapi, saya orang bodoh saja!

In reply to:
Another exception to this is with the ter- form, which has to use oleh for the agent.

Yes, the people I asked said Baju saya terbawa oleh adik saya and Baju saya terbawa adik saya (My little brother/sister took my shirt by mistake) are both acceptable, but the form without oleh is more colloquial.

Bingley

Sewing confusion" sounds very genteel indeed! Thanks for the offer but I don't think fine needlework is really for me. But time travel to Byzantium in the 13th C: now that's a tempting thought!

At least you got the context, PS. It was quite intentional. Byzantium wouldn't have been all that great, really. Especially if it was in 1453. Not a good year for them, actually. Unless you were an Ottoman, of course.

BTW, I love the play on words in your handle ...

>quotation marks in some of the Romance languages

<<Not inverted commas, then?>>

In reply to:
<<Not inverted commas, then?>>
states Jo

beating me to the punch!

Thanks Tsuwm! when the thread about quote marks started, i was wondering if the inverted comma's had always been used, or just used since type face was around.
"Inverted comma's" sounds like a printers/typesetters term-- and since there are so many technical terms that have been around for so long--mechanical technology has really been around for so long--term are old..clutch-- as a mechanical device-- has been around since the 13c... and printing presses almost as long... that we just don't even think about them.
It seem logical to me that there was always a way of saying quote in a notational short hand-- but the only way i know how to do it is " " and i wondered how it was done before printers started using inverted comma's!

>Unless you were an Ottoman, of course.

Well, I'm bigger than that not quite big enough to be a davenport -- sort of prefer to think of myself as a love seat.

...sort of prefer to think of myself as a love seat

You're pretty phat but.
(Couldn't resist again.)

Helen postulates that "inverted commas" was a printer's term. 'Fraid not. I was a printer for fifteen years and never ran across the term "professionally". I had a quick flick through my apprenticeship notes, which I still treasure, along with the paper's style book this morning, and although they are shown, they are not dignified with any term other than "quotes". Interestingly enough, "single quotation mark" is mentioned, as is apostrophe, but one is not shown as a synonym for the other.

Jackie

I'm the only one looking for a disposable batchelorperson but. Off my patch!

I'm the only one looking for a disposable batchelorperson but

You go, girlfriend! Whatcha want him for, murder for hire?
Shoot, might as well let one of 'em take the fall--everything that goes wrong is their fault anyway!

we can only blame the sewing confusion
To me, the confusion lies in the weaving rather than the sewing

At least you got the context, PS. It was quite intentional.

I didn't doubt it for a second.

BTW, I love the play on words in your handle ...

Oh, you are too kind.
Actually I've been waiting to debut Phyllis somewhere appropriate for years now; I can't believe my luck in finding the perfect party to introduce my ingenue to the world.

Wsieber wrote; To me, the confusion lies in the weaving rather than the sewing

I'm not sure who first used "threads" in the context of electronic notice boards. But its origins probably aren't interesting since the metaphor isn't strikingly original or clever. But with all this talk of sewing and weaving it occurred to me that there is another allusion which probably wasn't thought of at the time but is even more appropriate: lace-making! All those bobbins of thread intricately intertwined to make a fine and filigreed, sophisticated fabric. Or an unholy mess if you get your bobbins mixed up.

even more appropriate: lace-making!

That's it! Not chatting, but tatting!

Not chatting, but tatting!

My family used "tat" for useless stuff or rags,etc. Glad to see OED agrees!
Tra laaa
wow

In reply to:
not chatting but tatting

Are you sure that won't make things a bit tatty?

Wonder if/how tatty is related to the verb tat.

Please see "functionality" on another thread...

Language is "never" larger than the individual! The context in which it resides may be. Usually not.

... but clearly, only if it's necessary.

>I'm not sure who first used "threads" in the context of electronic notice boards.

Someone between Arachne and a hard drive?

Surely "threads" just comes from "the thread of conversation"?

Musick asserted that:
Language is "never" larger than the individual!

But how can it not be? Can you say that there are no places where language is that you are not?
The language of the individual (at any moment) cannot be greater than the individual(granted by definition,) but surely the language per se is greater than any individual, being, as it is, a thing common to all. Do you see where we may be misunderstanding each other, and can you elaborate on that and your assertion?
Thanks,
mm

My assumption exactly. And the metaphor has now been extended to bulletin boards.

One form of tat might be useless, rags, etc., but tat is a back form of tatting-- a form of lace making-- Cap't kiwi might know about it, since tatting is done with a shuttle, and has three basic forms, threads (straight pieces) loops, and mesh-- and tatted mesh is almost identical to "fish net"-- except the thread and mesh is much, much finer. but the mesh is formed the same way one makes a fish net.

The threads are just a bit heaver than sewing thread-- silk buttonhole thread would be too thick-- and the mesh is very fine. but the process is the same.. Meshing is the hardest tatting to do, since you need to work with a shuttle not much thicker than a sewing needle.

Thread and loops shuttles are small, about the size of a small/medium tube of women's lipstick and the size doesn't effect your work, but with mesh, the finer your shuttle the finer your mesh.

So any of you guys who have ever repaired a fishing net--you know the basics of tatting.
Thread and loop tatting is all done with hitches and half hitches, similar to netting.. but close together, in miniture, "picot's "(Pee co's) are created by leaving an excess of thread between stitches to form a single thread loop...

when my son became a boy scout and had to learn knots--he was flabbergasted by how many i knew, and how fast i could tie them! (when i was totally crazy-- i tatted lace for a dolls underwear!--then i looked for something more productive to do with my time.. and took up computers. fine choice i made there!

curiously, bones knit -- but our threads cross, (so we are embroidering our language?)

We are both watching the same river from opposite banks. You assert the pure logic to prove my point (even though I reserve the reason for using quotes for the next response), and you claim, as did I, that it is within the context of all languages that one person's understanding of language resides. Language is always part of the individual who uses it, yet usually not part of how we understand it (with the happy

exception of what most seek to do so thorough a board such as this.)

" ...is "never" larger than the individual". This is for the same reason that - when Billie Holiday starts singing, I will know it is her within a note or two!!!

I whole heartedly assert that... per se

I think I'm getting needled.

Every once in a while you have to break your thread, tie it off, and start again. (I see this "thread" throughout)

I just got here..! I'm still spending the time it takes to at least patch the quilt on the worn side that is missing certain 'spec's. Yous guys already are efficient (or have learned what to ignore)...........I take that back!

HOT declares: Cap't kiwi might know about it, since tatting is done with a shuttle, and has three basic forms, threads (straight pieces) loops, and mesh

Helen, I'd love to know the logic that got you to the point where you decided I might know about it!

But funnily enough - my dear old Mum taught us all, boys and girls, to knit, crochet and tat. If I'd shown the slightest interest, I'd probably also know how to operate a sewing machine, but I'm not as green as I'm cabbage-looking.

As a matter of fact, I taught SWMBO the basics of tatting.

But dolls' underwear?

as this is one of the [many] recurring themes hereabouts, I thought that the following might be of some interest to folks: [from alt.english.usage]

the the "hoi polloi" debate
---------------------------

Yes, "hoi" means "the" in Greek, but the first 5 citations in the
OED, and the most famous use of this phrase in English (in Gilbert
and Sullivan's operetta _Iolanthe_), put "the" in front of "hoi".
This is not a unique case: words like "alchemy", "alcohol",
"algebra", "alligator", and "lacrosse" incorporate articles from
other languages, but can still be prefixed in English with "the".
"The El Alamein battle" (which occurred in Egypt during World War
II), sometimes proffered as a phrase with three articles, actually
contains only two: _alamein_ is Arabic for "two flags" (which is
appropriate for a town on the border between Egypt and Libya), and
does not contain the Arabic article _al_.