E-Prime and Metaphysics

[Trevor Salyzyn]

I present to you English Prime, or E-Prime. E-Prime transforms the English language by removing every instance of the verb "to be" from discourse. This includes be, was, is, are, am, exists, becoming, et cetera. It forces one to use stronger, more precise words than "to be" (otherwise known as both the most over-used and the vaguest concept in our language).

Above and beyond the necessary changes one must make to write or speak in E-Prime resides one major concern. Ontology, or the question of what it means to be, appears to lose the plot when you try to defend any ontological position in E-Prime. We cannot say that something exists, so questions about whether or not a Deity exists have no relevance. Instead, we need to limit ourselves to what appears.

Also, questions about identity and predication depend on the verb "to be". For instance, to say that "whatever is, is" or to say that "all bachelors are unmarried men" both no longer express anything meaningful. Descartes' famous maxim, cogito ergo sum, no longer remains simple. Expressing what the "sum" actually means challenges our lazy notions of "what existence is".

I find E-Prime fascinating, and have been playing with it for the last couple weeks. I still have yet to find a way around the ontological conundrum, but would definitely like to hear from someone more clever than I.

[jufa]

What is the purpose for omitting linking actions and enhancing visions of word pictures, which e-prime does?

Never give power to anything a person believes is their source of strength - jufa

[Trevor Salyzyn]

Robert Anton Wilson wrote a brief informative essay about the advantages of E-prime. I’ll link it here as a starting point.

https://www.nobeliefs.com/eprime.htm

[jufa]

Trevor Salyzyn, thank you for the link which I reviewed, but yet, found no answer to my question

What is the purpose for omitting linking actions and enhancing visions of word pictures, which e-prime does?

Perhaps, in phasing it differently, excluding 'is', a better comprehension of the question would be had, and an answer forthcoming. What purpose for omitting linking actions and enhancing visions of pictured words does e-prime have upon the mind?

Never give power to anything a person believes is their source of strength - jufa

[Trevor Salyzyn]

As I understand it, “to be” comes with conceptual luggage that only recently philosophers have addressed. Heidegger laid the groundwork in “Being and Time”, where he essentially defined the verb to be. I find it a monumental accomplishment. With no English Heidegger forthcoming (as in, someone willing to dissolve the verb in its entirety), it makes epistemological sense to remove the verb prematurely.

We lose ontology to epistemology, but how much does that matter? A careful writer can probably reconstruct metaphysics, but why would we want to? I suppose if you are committed to avoiding a new empiricism, then a motivation appears. I do not know if one can be an idealist; God no longer exists because existence no longer lingers in our baggage from centuries of lazy philosophers.

[jufa]

Trevor, I understand all you've stated, but what is the purpose of excluding any part of a language when it is language which makes all things relative? That is the question.

Never give power to anything a person believes is their source of strength - jufa

[Trevor Salyzyn]

There are several words that I have learned not to use (a teacher criticized me for using them). I don't use the verb "to say" or the adjective "nice". One can always find a better way to express one's true meaning. I classify "to be" as a word like that. People use it automatically, and too much. It has far too much ambiguity.

If someone uses it sparingly, it might not bother me; however, in the writing of absolutists especially, every sentence contains some form of being. Call me prejudiced, but E-Prime feels better in the noggin. The inability to parse ontology remains the only thing that even begins to bug me about E-Prime. Ontology, the science of the verb to be, requires Standard English.

Even before E-Prime, I had pretty much given up trying to categorize existence anyway. No harm, no foul.

So, as to your question, the use of E-Prime is fundamentally aesthetic. If you don't find being to be an overused concept, and you generally like talking about existence and what it is to exist and not exist, then it is perfectly understandable not to be swayed by arguments for rationing your beings and is's. There's no imperative here; however, I cannot imagine a theist (or any person who likes absolutes) to enjoy something that kills God so absolutely. If ontology dies, so does the existence of things, including God.

[jufa]

Thank you Trevor for your assessment, and although it does not surround the question indelibly it will suffice.

Touching respectfully on what you have stated concerning 'to be'. It does not bother me it's overused, or underused by people. I am tolerant, for I realize there are uneducated people in this world, such as myself, who have no other way to communicate other than the way our educational system has taught them. Moreover people have a God given right - I say God given right realizing the produce of Source cannot do away with that which is its substance and essence - to live the only way they know how, and utilize their education as honest and the best way they can without hindering others. To me, attempting to stifle anything which is free tells me the students (which we all are) of life does not recognize they are also the teacher of life. And to stop the freedom of that which has been given unconditional, and I might add constitutionally, means, to me, one has not been freed from the chains of intellectual slavery.

Atheist quote Nietzsche use of the term "God is dead" as it was a direct statement from him, it was not. I point your attention to this to put you on notice that religious people says the same about the term "God is dead" as you say

I classify "to be" as a word like that. People use it automatically, and too much. It has far too much ambiguity.

. Sure you have a right to express what you think about 'to be', but does that make way for constrainment or a movement to clutter the mind further with an ideology which imprison the freedom of speech? Just a thought to be considered.

Never give power to anything a person believes is their source of strength - jufa

[Trevor Salyzyn]

It just seems that a sense of poetry would convince someone to value overused words less. Shakespeare hit the pinnacle of meaning for the verb.

A philosopher would, on top of a poet, see how much we predicate from “to be”, and the tall order I make.

An academic, thirdly, would see that one loses nothing of value.