h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

BTW, I used
http://facweb.furman.edu/~mmenzer/gvs/seehear.htm
for the vowel shift sounds.

>>Playing with the language is as, perhaps more, important than rules of grammar and syntax.

"Playing with" is the ideal, right and proper application of rules. As Wittgenstein pointed out, there cannot be a rule for "how to follow a rule"; so rule-following is always (or at least, can always be) creative.

Can't let ~jwf~ away with misuse of "begging the question" though: slap on ~wrist~

>> And I assume you mean that the word 'boy' - which we now use generally to mean a young male human without being conscious of any attendant assumption of servitude or lesser social rank - is from that same source.<<

It's OED's guess but it doesn't seem unreasonable.

The Anglo-Saxon words it replaced, cnafa/cnapa (cf knave) and cniht (cf knight) all meant both boy-child and servant.

Even "lady" derives from hlafdige (literally "loaf maid" - one who kneads the dough).

And "maiden" seems to share a route with the Old Irish word for slave ("maug"). One Anglo Saxon word for slave was "wealh" (cf Welsh). Slave itself refers to the enslavement of the Slavs. The Slavic words for slave (rab/rob/rabu) seem to come from the same route as "orphan".

Old words for children, conquered tribes and servants are difficult to separate.

"OED however prefers a derivation from O.Fr. "boie" (fetter, chain) that via influence of slave and servant gave us also the modern word "boy". "

I was pondering this the other day and wondered if it could also be the origin of the use of the word 'boo' as a racial insult (similar use to the 'n' word and sometimes the 'p' word although I've only ever heard it from scousers)? Could it have come from the 'boo' pronunciation of 'boy'?

If it's confined to Liverpool, perhaps it's a transatlantic import.
Shortened form of jigaboo, maybe.

I was going to suggest that - or similar words relating to boogie.

Can't say I've heard it in Liverpool myself - but than we never had black people in my day.

(This is an ironic remark, btw. Liverpool's black community was established some 200 years ago by Somali sailors - and until recently was rigidly ghettoised in Liverpool 8).

[ME. boi, boy, of obscure origin: app. identical with E. Frisian boi, boy ‘young gentleman’; considered by many to be identical with Du. boef (bu:f) ‘knave’, MDu. boeve, prob. (according to Franck) adopted from MHG. buobe (in mod.G. bube ‘knave’, dial. ‘boy, lad’).
It has been proposed to explain bo-y as dim. of bo, and this short for *bobo the W.Ger. type of buobe, bube. The latter is actually found in MHG. only from about the 14th c. Its Teutonic standing is doubtful: see Grimm, Schade, Kluge. (The original sense being uncertain, the order of senses here observed is only provisional.)]

The above is by way of celebration; I have got access to the OED online back. Since I stopped being a student a few years ago I thought I would have to start paying for it, but I just found out I can get home access through the Dublin Institute of Technology where I teach the viola da gamba.

What a bonus! I was considering paying £300+ a year for it.

Congratulations!

I have a pocket OED in my pocket organiser, along with a pocket Encyclopaedia Britannica.

>> ...how do those who say "boo-ee" pronounce "buoyant"? <<

Illogically (and I am one of them) it's 'boy-yant'.
Sometimes maybe 'boy-int'.

~jwf~

>> ...Can't let ~jwf~ away with misuse of "begging the question" though: slap on ~wrist~ ...<<

Typical. They tell ya you're wrong, slap ya around a bit. But do they explain? Do they offer guidance or correction? Never. Damn pedants.


~jwf~

according to a snippet I heard on radio 4 this morning, 'time' is the most used noun in the English language. Anyone any thoughts on this?

Hmmm. Could well be true.

What time is it? (clock time) - I'd wager this makes up a good lot of the occasions it's used.
The last time I saw him...(meaning occasion)
time and a half (work time)
Time for (_insert political demand here_)
Then there are all the metaphors, cliches, proverbs.

Time and tide wait for no man
Time is a great healer
Time imemmorial
Time out

Not at this time but when I have time I'll spend some time thinking about it.

Thank you for the cue ~jwf~ and here goes (not for the first time, but others please skip):

"Begging the question" is the logical fallacy of assuming a result in the course of establishing it. It is the commonest fault in students' geometrical proofs. A trivial example is "I'm glad I don't like porridge, because if I liked it I'd eat it every day and it's yucky."

A serious example would be the taking of a referendum to adjudicate on the governmnent's treatment of a minority group; the assumption is that the majority are going to give the right answer.

This is a very specific logical term, and it should not be relaxed into a synonym for "raising" or "propmting" a question. Why should it?

That's right, bring logic into it why don't you.
How do German logicians work if they don't have a word for "IF"?

>> ...should not be relaxed into a synonym for "raising" or "prompting" a question. Why should it? <<

I could understand your objection if there was some reasonable fear that such relaxation would detract from or diminish its normal potentials as a 'specific logical term'.

But since any and every use or exposure of English idiomatic expressions makes more persons aware of their 'proper' use I see no reason not to use it in the way that I did. (ie: as a relaxed synonym for prompting)

Perhaps the difference in our attitudes here has more to do with our residual attitudes toward begging. In my case the frame of reference rises out of a real 'necessity'; the supplementary question has become essential and should never have been left unanswered in the first place. You on the other hand may see all beggars as simply a nuisance.


~jwf~

>But since any and every use or exposure of English idiomatic expressions makes more persons aware of their 'proper' use . . .

Don't follow you there I'm afraid. You can't mean to say abuse confirms accuracy?

I understand your desire for an urgent word like "begs", but "raises" looks sufficient to me. Alternatively you could say "drags in" or "calls up" or "immediately summons". You can improve on these, I'm sure; but misusing the logical term can't (as I see it) improve its health.

And no, nobody is "simply" anything.

Aha! So they are difficultly a nuisance then.

German logicians (or, at least, Germans in general) do so have a word for 'If'. In an 'if....then' statement, it would be 'wenn...dann'. It's just that 'wenn' doesn't quite correspond exactly to the English 'if'

However, just to mildly chide Recumbentman, while a giant like Wittgenstein might have been very precise and constrained in his use of English (or German), it has to be remembered that, in general, language is *not* a logical notation. It's what people speak. Notations merely *borrow* from language as a convenience.

(Where's Jack Naples when we need him? I'm sure he'd be keen to jump in, inna anti-Chomskyan stylee)

I know that Ed, and I know I'm swimming against the tide but . . . isn't that what this thread is about?

I know that 'presently' once meant 'now' and then morphed into meaning 'soon' and that we are silly if we regret that it is returning to the meaning 'now' --

*BUT* I still think this case is worth pushing.

>> You can't mean to say abuse confirms accuracy? <<

I can see where you might not want to follow my logic. But just as every drunk driving hit and run reminds us that we shouldn't drink and drive, and every shooting reminds us that guns are dangerous, so too will every use of an idiomatic expression cause someone to rush to their dictionary. Or, there's no such thing as bad publicity.


The trouble begins with associations of beget, begat, beguile, begone, and others including beggary which is itself such a value laden concept in our post-charitable world.

I do thank you for my new understanding - which I hope you will correct if I'm still missing the point - that 'begging a question' is when a question is framed in such a way as to anticipate an expected answer. For example the word 'when' might be considered a common beggar. With it one can direct attention to temporal factors which deflect the import of the real question:

Let's imagine a group of early Briton warriors on a hillside. One asks, "When shall we attack the Roman camp?"

This use of 'when' negates the basic question 'Shall we attack?' by putting emphasis on the timing of the event in such a way as to render any consideration of not attacking somehow irrelevant. It is not unlike the old reporters' joke question, "When did you decide to stop beating your wife?"

How-some-ever...

I shall continue to maintain that many questions - also designed to create limited response options - also beg a question by making many supplementary questions necessary. But perhaps it would be better to say they 'beggar' the question.


~jwf~