Know Tea

Anyone who is going to be in the pulpit, on TV or radio, doing any kind of public speaking (or writing), or (perhaps most importantly) teaching young people, needs to read this right now. Bookmark it. Use it. Love it. It’s so good and so readable.

Some highlights:

Begging the Question
It doesn’t mean what you think. Begging the question — from the Latin petitio principii — is a logical fallacy; it means assuming your conclusion in the course of your argument. If you say “Everything in the Bible must be true, because it’s the word of God,” you’re taking your conclusion for granted. If you say “The defendant must be guilty because he’s a criminal,” you’re doing the same. It’s a kind of circular logic. The conclusion may be true or false, but you can’t prove something by assuming it’s true.

This is very different from raising the question, though people are increasingly using the phrase that way. It’s sloppy, and should be avoided. Here, for instance, is a piece from The Times (London), 30 Nov. 2004:

The behaviour of ministers is a matter for prime ministers, who appoint and dismiss them. But this begs the question of who should find out what has gone wrong on behalf of a prime minister.
No it doesn’t. It raises the question; it prompts the question; perhaps it forces us to ask the question; maybe this question begs for an answer. But it doesn’t beg the question.

Between You and I
Between you and I? — Between you and I? — You should be ashamed of yourself.

First, the technical explanation: between is a preposition; it should govern the “objective case.” (In English, that’s a concern only with the pronouns.) A preposition can’t govern a pronoun in the subjective (or nominative) case, even when there are multiple pronouns after the preposition.

That explanation should be enough for the serious grammar nerds. For the rest of you, think of it this way: when you have two pronouns after a preposition, try mentally placing each one directly after the preposition. “Between you” should sound right to your ear, but “between I” jars: “between me” sounds much more natural. Since it’s “between you” and it’s “between me,” it should be “between you and me.”

Ditto other prepositions, like for, to, from, with, by, and so on. If something is for her and for me, it’s “for her and me,” not “for she and I”; if Akhbar gave something to him and to them, he gave it “to him and them,” not “to he and they.” Try putting the preposition directly before all the following pronouns, and then use the form that sounds right in each case.

The problem probably arises from hypercorrection: it sometimes seems that you and I is “more correct” than you and me. It’s not — at least, it’s not always. Be careful.

On a —— Basis
Often an unnecessarily long way of saying something. “On a daily basis,” for instance, could just as easily be “daily,” which can be both an adjective and an adverb. Instead of “The magazine is published on a monthly basis,” use “The magazine is published monthly.” See Economy.

Oxford Comma
In most house styles, the comma is preferred before the last item in a list: “the first, second, and third chapters.” (This is known as the serial comma or the Oxford comma.) Leaving it out — “the first, second and third chapters” — is a habit picked up from journalism. While it saves a teensy bit of space and effort, omitting the final comma runs the risk of suggesting the last two items (in the example above, the second and third chapters) are some sort of special pair. A famous (and perhaps apocryphal?) dedication makes the danger clear: “To my parents, Ayn Rand and God.”

Good stuff!