Quartz reports
Seven Rhode Island universities, including Brown and Rhode Island College, will move to open-license textbooks [1] in a bid to save students $5 million over the next five years, the governor announced [September 27].
The initiative is meant to put a dent in the exorbitant cost of college and, more specifically, college textbooks. Mark Perry, a professor of economics and finance at the University of Michigan Flint, and a writer at the American Enterprise Institute, estimated last year [Cloudflare protected] that college textbook prices rose 945% between 1978 and 2014, compared to an overall inflation rate of 262% and a 604% rise in the cost of medical care.
That is not the result of a general trend of higher costs in publishing, he notes: the consumer price index for recreational books has been falling relative to overall inflation since 1998.
[...] Open textbooks are defined as "faculty-written, peer-reviewed textbooks that are published under an open license--meaning that they are available free online, they are free to download, and print copies are available at $10-40, or approximately the cost of printing", according to a report by the Student Public Interest Research Groups (PIRGs) (pdf). They are part of the move toward Open Educational Resources, which has roots in the open-source software movement, it says.
Open licenses allow for content to be shared, unlike traditional textbooks which limit the use of their materials. [Richard Culatta, the chief innovation officer for Rhode Island] remembers teaching and replacing a section of a textbook with more relevant information for his class, only to be informed that he was infringing on international copyright law.
[1] A very bloated (webfonts) all-script-driven page.
Note: If you are thinking of using "begs the question" in the same way the state official did, that is a bad idea.
Our previous discussions of student materials and adoption of openness.
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Monday October 24 2016, @09:24PM
Doesn't Rhode Island realize that this will cost desperately poor textbook publishers $5 million per year in sales? Therefore it must, somehow, be bad for the economy, in some undefinable way. Just like if I don't break the main street store owner's front glass window is bad for the economy because the glass maker won't realize the profits of installing the replacement.
Each lost sail is like another attack on expensive textbooks.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 24 2016, @09:54PM
Each lost sail is like another attack on expensive textbooks.
Maybe I should cry for help
Maybe I should kill myself
Blame it on my ADD baby
SAIL!
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Monday October 24 2016, @10:30PM
Sale away, sale away, sale away!
(Score: 2) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Tuesday October 25 2016, @03:49AM
Sale away, sale away, sale away!
Red sales in the sunset
Way out on the sea...
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @05:16AM
Visa and MasterCard accepted!
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Tuesday October 25 2016, @06:06AM
Truely, our abuse of a fellow Soylentil who only made a simple homophobic typo has already been sufficient. Perhaps it is time to just let it go, to sail away on the azure sea propelled by the winds of the clouds. . . Wait, did you say "Azure"? Batten down the hatches! All crew on deck! Man the rigging! (yes, that is terribly sexist, but no immediate substitute comes to mind) We are in for nasty weather!
And, of course, the purpose of textbooks is to give us practice so we do not look like illiterate buffons or jmorris when we post something to SoylentNews. Standards, peoples! That is what makes Free Software! Open and accessible standards, open to all, like, you know, spelling.
[For the less literate among us: Homophone is the proper word: sounding the same. Fear of words that sound the same would be "homophoniphobia". I would hate to be the person who catches that! Just saying. ]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday October 25 2016, @01:41PM
I am not offended by anything I have read here. I am never offended by homophobic remarks directed my way. But did I miss a homophobic typo? Did I make one? Or did someone else make one? Whatever it may be, I seem to be unaware of what it is.
Lost sails are due to piracy!
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Tuesday October 25 2016, @09:48PM
Lost sails are due to piracy!
Arrrrh! That be right. Them sails is the first thing we target with our cannon.
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 2) by e_armadillo on Monday October 24 2016, @10:45PM
Obviously, they didn't read "Economics in One Lesson".
However, I'm not sure the Baker's window analogy applies here. Nothing is destroyed, other than the publisher's revenue, and that isn't destroyed. It is merely diverted to other areas of the economy. i.e. instead of spending that $5M on textbooks, the students will spend that money on other things like pizza, beer, new clothes, music, etc. On the other hand, the change isn't good for authors that would contribute to said texts, discouraging some from writing texts since free doesn't pay their rent. I'd say more analysis would have to be made to understand if the economy as a whole is better or worse off in this case.
"How are we gonna get out of here?" ... "We'll dig our way out!" ... "No, no, dig UP stupid!"
(Score: 5, Insightful) by lentilla on Tuesday October 25 2016, @12:22AM
instead of spending that $5M on textbooks, the students will spend that money on other things like pizza, beer, new clothes, music, etc.
A more likely result:
Students will still spend money on pizza, beer and clothes - it's just that the putative $500 saved on books this semester is unlikely to equate to $500 sales in other stores. Students are more likely to adjust their income accordingly.
From my perspective, the best part about this initiative is that that the world will be more "just". We get students; the intellectual cream of the crop fresh out of school; and the first thing we tell them is that have to work mindless jobs (diverting time from doing what they should be doing) in order to buy textbooks. Textbooks that are exactly the same as last year's versions except that the pages have been renumbered. It's a pretty insulting slap in the face after everything we have taught them at school about playing fair.
(Score: 2) by e_armadillo on Tuesday October 25 2016, @12:30AM
Absolutely agree.
"How are we gonna get out of here?" ... "We'll dig our way out!" ... "No, no, dig UP stupid!"
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Tuesday October 25 2016, @06:05PM
Or, university administrators raise tuition by about the amount that textbook costs dropped. Their pay packages rise accordingly.
I like the move to open textbooks. But I fear that unless we watch very carefully, the savings will be appropriated by others and students won't benefit. Greed is the problem of these times.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Tuesday October 25 2016, @06:10PM
We need a new moderation, "Sigh". I moderated this interesting, but that's not quite right, and neither is insightful. The real mod should mean something like "unfortunately probable, sigh".
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @12:54AM
We get students; the intellectual cream of the crop fresh out of school
What? That doesn't even remotely describe 99% of the people in universities and colleges (or people in general). Only in a delusional paper-worshiping society could this possibly be seen as true.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Tuesday October 25 2016, @02:18PM
Some sort of approximation of the top half of people graduating high school then. I've spent time working in academia, and you can be absolutely sure that good colleges are looking for the smartest people they can get their grubby paws on. I'm not saying that all smart people manage to go to an Ivy League school, but if you got into Brown odds are you're pretty darn good at academics.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Funny) by davester666 on Tuesday October 25 2016, @06:28AM
Basically, if you support this, you also support crushing the skulls of puppies with a brick.
(Score: 1) by Z-A,z-a,01234 on Tuesday October 25 2016, @07:27AM
Why did you moderate the parent Funny? I think it's pretty insightful.
All research papers should also be available on the internet (author's page maybe) free of charge, including code and data. From the abstract it is not possible to discern if the paper is crap or actually contains some interesting result.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Monday October 24 2016, @09:25PM
Instead of promising everyone a free college education the politicians should fund the writing of open source textbooks. Say 3-4 for every class. Then make the things available as free downloads. When I was in college my textbooks cost more than twice tuition and fees.
Next, do the same for K-12.
Cost some money up front to get the things written, save tons of money down the road.
Not to mention how easy it is to update them as needed.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 24 2016, @09:34PM
Good idea, but its not new. Politicians won't do this unless public outcry really moves them, the corruption does run deep.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday October 24 2016, @11:10PM
It's a welcome development that colleges are moving to open-license textbooks. Likewise, open journals. With the latter nobody seems to make money except the publishers, who aren't the ones doing the hard work of the research.
There are people who will feel the pinch of open license textbooks if it really develops into a trend. A good friend of mine ekes out a living as a writer writing questions for them. But given how often he starves he's certainly not the one pocketing the lion's share of the revenue even though he's doing most of the work. Like usual it's the sales guys and CEOs who do.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @03:45AM
Capitalism wooooo!
All hail the new slavery!
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Tuesday October 25 2016, @06:12PM
To be fair, sales is hard work, even if frequently quite immoral.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 24 2016, @11:27PM
For a student and his/her parents, the primary costs of a college education are typically tuition, room and board (and the interest on the student loans of course). The cost of books is significant, but is of an order of magnitude less.
However, an excellent textbook can make a substantial difference in learning and enjoyment of a course. It takes a lot more than just coverage of the consensus-basic material. For example, there are probably many physics textbooks that cover mechanics for first-year students, but the book by Kleppner and Kolenkow is regarded as particularly good for those concurrently studying vector calculus.
Eventually I'm sure we'll have plenty of excellent "open source" textbooks, but for now, why tie the professors' hands when assigning textbooks to students who are already paying $20-55K/yr to attend college?
What will probably happen is that professors will start posting massive course notes online, much more detailed than in the past, to take the place of mediocre open source textbooks.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 24 2016, @11:58PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @12:44AM
Would you advise someone to begin their study of any level of mathematics or one of the basic sciences from Wikipedia? That's a committee gone riot.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @12:57AM
I certainly wouldn't advise someone to put their faith in greedy corporations who write textbooks. What are you even thinking?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @01:00AM
Right, greedy is always the other guy. You have never been greedy.
I don't give a fuck about that, I just want a decent textbook. If it costs too much, let's say $150, then I'll log onto Amazon or B&N and look for an older edition that might cost $20 or less.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @02:01AM
I advise people to learn molecular and cellular biology from Wikipedia. There is a lot of terminology that gets in the way of learning higher level concepts and wiki links throughout an article make things much easier.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @02:21AM
(Score: 5, Informative) by Snotnose on Tuesday October 25 2016, @03:54AM
Would you advise someone to begin their study of any level of mathematics or one of the basic sciences from Wikipedia?
Basic sciences hasn't changed for over 100 years. If you're going for a 4 year degree it's a 100% certainty nothing has changed, an MS prolly 80%, and pHD who knows as I never got that far.
There is no reason an Algebra 101 textbook should cost over $100, nor a calculus book over $300. It's bullshit, everybody knows it, but the publishers keep contributing to the right campaigns to keep it so.
/ vote HRC, to keep the status quo
// Vote Trump, to keep who the fuck knows what
/// I'm voting Johnson
//// A pothead who doesn't know what Aleppo is, but he ain't Clinton/Trump
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday October 25 2016, @01:44PM
In the STEM fields you need the very latest textbooks to keep up with all the changes, for example, to how the Cosine function works.
In the humanities, you need the very latest textbooks to keep up with, for example, all the latest changes to Shakespeare.
Those textbook companies can't keep up with these changes for free.
/sarc
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday October 25 2016, @05:43PM
I'm glad you're voting based on your feelings and directly opposed to your actual policy position, in this case.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @04:25AM
Why not? Much of mathematics, even the most recent stuff, is relatively uncontroversial because it's so black and white. Either you proved a theorem true or you did not. The theorems of Euclidean geometry are just as true today as when Euclid and his contemporaries proved them in 300 BC. The derivation of the quadratic formula by completing the square produced by the Babylonians in 2000 BC is still valid today. Calculus has been more or less fixed since the days of Newton and Leibniz, and the stuff they proved about the calculus in the 17th century is as true today as it was then. Even the newer stuff like group theory and algebraic geometry a theorem can be true under the axiomatic system on which it is formulated, it may be false, or it may be undecidable. Only rarely are things in mathematics subject to the kind of controversy you see in other fields where stuff is more mutable, and you usually see that only in graduate-level mathematics, and even there it is rare, and so Wikipedia edit wars of the kind you see in more volatile fields such as politics or with current events are rare in mathematics articles.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @02:30PM
Wikipedia is a horrible place to go for math or science topics because the articles are written to show off, or to be overly pedantic. They are certainly not written to give any kind of useful introduction to the topic that a student needs. Very rarely have any examples to show their usefulness.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Tuesday October 25 2016, @06:17PM
In this case Wikipedia is not a good model. Each text is supposed to be written by a professor, but given the open license he'll be able to include material from prior versions as he sees fit. That *could* work out quite well, though it could also end poorly for any current version. Still, the best versions should remain available and copyable, so the quality should improve over time.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1) by MikeVDS on Tuesday October 25 2016, @12:10AM
Is that a bad thing? Serious question.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @12:47AM
Nothing wrong with it, but it's a makeshift arrangement.
Many of the textbooks I've kept have lists of acknowledgements in the front of the book with lists of dozens and dozens of colleagues who reviewed and submitted suggestions on different portions of the book. But the author(s) retained editorial control.
When a lecturer posts his/her own course notes online, typically they aren't vetted except by their own students, from the previous year(s)' classes.
(Score: 2) by m2o2r2g2 on Tuesday October 25 2016, @02:32AM
So if they don't mandate open license textbooks, what makes you think that the "good" closed license textbook will be chosen. The relevant institution/person in charge may choose another also mediocre text for other reasons (author from that institution, layout follows existing curriculum more closely,...)
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Tuesday October 25 2016, @02:39AM
Um, no. When I went to college (I was 21 when I started) I had a job to support myself, an apt with a roomie, and the money to pay for college. It was tight, but I hate owing people money. My roomie turned into an asshole, so I moved to live by myself and from then on the money equation went "how can I live by myself" to "how can I pay for school this semester" to "how can I eat" to "do I really have time to have fun?"
/ fun fact: When I moved the lease was in my name
// I didn't tell my roomie I was moving
/// he came home from work one day to a nearly empty apt, and 1 day notice he had to come up with a full month's rent.
//// I still smile when I think of it.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Tuesday October 25 2016, @02:59AM
Reminds me of another big issue. Some instructors would ask if we wanted a test on friday or monday. About 1/3 of my class were like me, working full time and school part time. Weekends were for homework. We wanted the tests on monday. The other 2/3 were being carried by their parent's, they wanted to party all weekend without worrying about a test, they went for friday.
At 58, I don't know how 21-30 y/o me did it. I sure as hell couldn't do it now. Especially considering I graduated with a 3.6 GPA, where I got A's on my core classes (math major, physics and chemistry for electives), and C's on the general ed crap I couldn't be arsed to care about (women's studies, psychology of Science Fiction films are the 2 I remember being the biggest wastes of time).
Fun fact. I used to piss off my Women's studies classmates by not paying attention in class (teacher used attendance as a weapon, miss too many classes and you fail. A tool used by all shit poor teachers). Day of the test I'd show up 10 minutes early, skim the material, and ace the test. I got a C because no matter how well you did on tests, to get a B you had to do something I didn't want to do, and to get an A you had to do something I really didn't want to do.)
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @03:58AM
I like your name, very descriptive.
(Score: 2) by fido_dogstoyevsky on Tuesday October 25 2016, @03:59AM
Eventually I'm sure we'll have plenty of excellent "open source" textbooks, but for now, why tie the professors' hands when assigning textbooks to students who are already paying $20-55K/yr to attend college?
If the professors don't like having their hands tied thay can always release their own detailed course notes, as you suggest below. And any reduction in costs will help pay off the loans needed for the "$20-55K/yr to attend college".
What will probably happen is that professors will start posting massive course notes online, much more detailed than in the past, to take the place of mediocre open source textbooks
so that those notes will become the new textbooks.
It's NOT a conspiracy... it's a plot.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Z-A,z-a,01234 on Tuesday October 25 2016, @07:24AM
Nobody is stopping the students from purchasing the better books. They just don't have to.
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Tuesday October 25 2016, @01:20PM
Note: If you are thinking of using "begs the question" in the same way the state official did, that is a bad idea.
Indeed. If you are an educated person thinking of using "begs the question" under any circumstances, that is probably a bad idea. In fact, one might say that it is begging the question to assume that "begging the question" has only one meaning.
Why? "Begs the question" does NOT mean petitio principii anymore outside of philosophy journals (and occasionally law journals). Actual linguists who have tried to find uses of the "correct" meaning of this phrase in recent years -- even in educated, edited prose from publishers with high reputations -- have basically failed [upenn.edu]. The reality is that something like 95% of the time "begs the question" = "raises the question" for educated speakers and writers (as it does in the TFA). Of the remaining 5% or so, the vast majority of recent citations are not actual USES of the correct meaning, but rather people bitching about how no one uses the phrase right anymore. Grammar girl tried to "fight the good fight" for the "correct" meaning in her original column back in 2008 [quickanddirtytips.com], but when she was researching a book more recently [quickanddirtytips.com] and tried to find real-world examples in THOUSANDS of search results she couldn't find a single "correct" usage. (If you want even more stats and recent links, see here [wordpress.com], which surveys the surveys.)
So, the usage of the phrase has changed. That ship sailed a long time ago. But pedants don't care, and thus educated folks are stuck in a quandary: if you use the phrase to mean "raise the question," you know that EVERYONE will understand you (even pedants, though they will grit their teeth and mutter stuff under their breath), but if you use the phrase to mean petitio principii, probably 99% of your audience will be confused, unless you're writing for a philosophy journal.
My 11th-grade English teacher already taught me how to deal with such situation: you just avoid the problematic usage. I had asked him about some "technically correct" but weird-sounding grammar -- maybe something like "The person responsible is HE" rather than "him" -- and my teacher's response was, "Language is about communication. If you are trying to showcase your grammar skills but lose most of your audience who think you sound weird or confusing, then you're not communicating effectively. So, if you're thinking about using a construction in a way that your audience won't understand or will think 'sounds weird,' simply rephrase the sentence to avoid it." Usage expert Brian Garner calls such things "skunked" terms or phrases or uses. They're caught in the nether world where educated folks mostly speak or write one way while pedants think they should be used a different way.
And really, "begs the question" is simply a terrible phrase. It was bound to "slip" meanings, since it barely made sense when it was coined in English as a bad translation of a Latin phrase which itself was a bad translation of the original Greek fallacy. Usage guides will tell you that "begs the question" meaning "raising the question" dates back to at least the late 1800s in educated prose. But when I got into an argument about this phrase a couple years ago, a few Google books searches brought up "bad" uses much earlier in the 19th century. I even found a use in the 1820s of a government official in the House of Commons or something actually punning on the two uses already, saying something like, "The learned gentleman 'begs the question' only to have his argument beg the question." It's clear from context that "raises the question" was intended for the first use, and that the "incorrect" use was common enough even ~200 years ago that people could knowingly joke about it.
Despite my English teachers advice, I was a pedant for many years, though mostly a silent one, accumulating collections of pet peeves which I'd complain about knowingly with like-minded grammatical wackos. But in the past few years I've read a lot more about the history of English usage, and I've realized that maybe 70-80% of the "distinctions" that pedants make usually aren't even "correct" historically -- they're often just distinctions that were made up anywhere from 75 to 200 years ago by some other pedant who didn't like a particular use and created a new "problem" that never existed before.
And thus I came to realize that pedantry is the real enemy, since I'm forced to avoid dozens of perfectly good words and phrases because of a tiny number of folks who stoically hold to these often arbitrary "rules" passed around by pedantic 8th-grade English teachers... but meanwhile the rest of the educated population has moved on and accepts the "new" (sometimes quite "old" or even "original") meaning.
Bottom line: If you mean "raises the question," say "raises the question." If you mean petitio principii, say "assumes the conclusion" or some other perfectly normal English phrase that means the same thing. (Or, if you're writing for a technical audience, use the Latin.) And if uses of "begs the question" like this Rhode Island official causes you to grit your teeth and trot out internet links to show how awesome you are and how everyone else the world is a moron... well, maybe you might consider a different hobby.
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Tuesday October 25 2016, @01:31PM
Just to say one more thing -- I wrote the preceding quickly and did not edit thoroughly. Upon re-reading, I'm aware of several places where I missed a word or punctuation or things like that. If anyone wants to disagree with what I've said, please let's make it about the content of the argument, rather than "Ahh... gotcha! You screwed up the grammar there too!"
(Score: 1) by Z-A,z-a,01234 on Tuesday October 25 2016, @02:25PM
Your English teacher was a visionary. The language is a living thing. What most people are using every day is THE LANGUAGE, in spite of the grammar books and the academy.
David Graeber has a very nice piece on this in his "The Utopia of Rules" book.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @09:07PM
Visionary? Maybe, but the "language evolves" is the biggest cop-out for the illiterate. Caught using a malapropism? No worry, "language evolves". There are no wrong uses because "when I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less." Alanis Morissette can write a popular song that purports to demonstrate to everyone what is ironic through a bunch of examples, but ironically none of her examples are actually examples of irony. But who cares? Let's just say that language evolves end it there.
I am forever thankful that the fields of physics and engineering aren't dominated by frustrated and failed humanities majors. "Hey Joe, that model of a bridge you made is horrible. It's going to fall over!" "Don't you know Steve, physics evolves. Don't be so closed minded."
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Wednesday October 26 2016, @02:31PM
There are no wrong uses because "when I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less."
That's pretty much the complete opposite of the English teacher's argument. Rather than saying, "I know what my word means and to heck with the rest of you!" the English teacher was arguing that language is fundamentally about communicating with an audience. There are all sorts of words that Shakespeare or Chaucer or whatever historical writer used that now mean different things. If I try to use them the way Chaucer would in front of a modern audience, I might be greeted with blank stares and confusion. Communication has failed. Language has failed.
So, the English teacher's argument is -- in such a case, rather than confusing your audience with something that sounds archaic and weird (even if, by some arbitrary standard, it's still "technically correct" for some people), instead choose a DIFFERENT word or phrase that better communicates your meaning.
Nobody here is arguing that educated speakers should adopt incorrect usage. Only when usage is disputed and changing, it's best to find a word or phrase that communicates your meaning clearly.
"Don't you know Steve, physics evolves. Don't be so closed minded."
Actually, um, physics DOES evolve. Physics is a science created by humans and is thus limited at any time to current understanding. Ptolemaic systems gave way to Copernican and Tychonic systems, which gave way to a Newtonian understanding of the solar system, which then evolved as Einstein clarified things further, etc. Insisting that a word still means the same thing as in Shakespeare's time when no educated speakers use it that way anymore is like claiming that Ptolemy is still right and the planets really DO go around the earth.
(And please note that this whole discussion is focused on educated speakers, not pop stars or rednecks or Cockney slang. There is a "standard" English used in most formal writing, but when most of the people educated and familiar with that style don't adhere to a meaning anymore, then the meaning has shifted.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @09:15PM
So the best course of action when facing adversity is to suck it up, shut up, and fit in with the common masses. Go grab a Bud, watch some reality TV and pretend to like it, and above all, don't do anything to stand out from the crowd. It is far better to fit in than to be right.
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Wednesday October 26 2016, @02:12PM
So the best course of action when facing adversity is to suck it up, shut up, and fit in with the common masses.
Given that members of parliament were using this "incorrectly" 200 years ago (and you can find a number of citations in good writers of the late 19th-century), I don't really think this has anything to do with "the common masses."
Go grab a Bud, watch some reality TV and pretend to like it, and above all, don't do anything to stand out from the crowd.
Actually, I didn't argue that an educated person should USE this "incorrect" use. I said that there's no way to use the phrase without offending or confusing some segment of your audience. The answer is not to "grab a Bud" but rather to find a better beer that works better, to use your analogy. (i.e., pick a phrase which is uncontroversial and actually clearer to your audience, regardless of what you mean)
It is far better to fit in than to be right.
As I mentioned, my skepticism toward pedantry started when I realized that something like 70-80% of supposed usage "rules" that people have pet peeves about were actually not reflections of historical real usage (i.e.,the only "correct" form among educated speakers), but rather were just made up by some second-rate author of a grammar guide in 1875 who didn't actually know what he was talking about, but just wanted to complain that something he heard "didn't sound right" to him. The "begging the question" thing is NOT one of those cases, since it actually did have a prior usage that meant one thing and its meaning subsequently migrated.
But again, language is about communication. It's not a "game" that you win if you score all the "correct" grammar and usage points. If >90% of educated speakers (not just "the common masses") won't understand you if you use a phrase in its old meaning, then the meaning has changed. It's not a matter of who's "right" or "wrong" -- it's just what happened.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 25 2016, @09:25PM
Who would have thought that there are seven universities in Rhode Island?