Message-ID: <Pine.SOL.3.91.970303102518.19254D-100000@fox.ksu.ksu.edu> Date: Mon, 3 Mar 1997 10:35:44 -0600 From: kerry miller <mailto:astingsh@KSU.EDU> Subject: Re: Internet in Africa 2 To: mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU
MArtin,> Several of these nations hav e opposition groups within and outside the
> country, yet they have allowed the Internet to flourish. This begs the
> question: what is so dangerous about the Internet that would elicit this
> blocking from the Abacha administration?
Not to detract from the value of the analysis itself, but this isn't the way 'begging the question' is usually construed. What the writer means here is that it _raises_ the question, and I entirely agree. When a q is begged (beggared), it is left outside the pale, omitted from consideration; thus one might (in a little different context) say that asking what is so dangerous about the Internet begs the question, "Why should it be _danger_ (rather than resource allocation, say) that is the imputed motive?"
kerry, didactically