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From wikipedia:

Begging the question is a type of circular reasoning, and often occurs in an indirect way such that the fallacy's presence is hidden, or at least not easily apparent.

Is that statement true? If so, it means all begging the questions are neccessarily circular reasoning. However, I know loaded question can also be a type of begging the question fallacy. But loaded questions are not neccessarily types of circular reason. So, how that can be true? For example,

Have you stopped beating your wife?

This is of course a loaded question and also it begs the question but obviously not circular reasoning.

Anything wrong in my understandings?

Sazzad Hissain Khan
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  • "Have you stopped beating your wife?" is not an argument... The issue is that in an argument with one or more premises and the conclusion, the conclusion is included (sometime camouflaged) among the premises: this is the "circularity". – Mauro ALLEGRANZA Aug 30 '23 at 12:23
  • @MauroALLEGRANZA how about "I think therefore, I am" ? I think it begs the question regarding what it meant by "I", but can we call it circular reasoning in anyway? – Sazzad Hissain Khan Aug 30 '23 at 12:26
  • Perfet... original cogito is not an argument. See also this post. – Mauro ALLEGRANZA Aug 30 '23 at 12:36
  • A one-line argument is by definition "circular" because the single statement is both the premise and the conclusion. – Mauro ALLEGRANZA Aug 30 '23 at 12:37
  • Given that, person A agreed that 'all human are mortal' and then asks person B 'If you are mortal, why?'. If person B now replies, a single sentence, "I am a human therefore, I am mortal", you want to say its a circular reasoning? @MauroALLEGRANZA – Sazzad Hissain Khan Aug 30 '23 at 12:44
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    Wikipedia's statement is correct, your reasoning is not. It goes like this: begging the question is circular, loaded question can beg the question, therefore, loaded question is circular. Do you see the problem? You are switching "can" to "is" in the conclusion, this is called modal fallacy. The correct conclusion is that loaded question can be circular. This said, if you want to interpret "beating your wife" question as an 'argument' then its implied 'conclusion' (that the beating took place) is presumed as a premise, so it is circular. – Conifold Aug 30 '23 at 13:25
  • @Conifold "begging the question is circular, loaded question begs the question, therefore, loaded question is circular." - now? All loaded questions always inherently beg the question. No? – Sazzad Hissain Khan Aug 30 '23 at 13:45
  • No. This is another fallacy, called equivocation. If you want to call any insinuated claim "begging the question" then the second premise is true, but the first one is false, if you want something more like the original meaning in Aristotle then vice versa. And generally, both expressions are used so ambiguously and loosely today (and this is compounded by the confusion between questions and arguments) that you shouldn't take any syllogisms with them very seriously. – Conifold Aug 30 '23 at 14:27
  • @Conifold do you consider "cogito, ergo sum" a non-circular reasoning? If yes, why? – Sazzad Hissain Khan Aug 31 '23 at 12:02
  • Cogito, ergo sum is not reasoning, according to Descartes' considered position, it just expresses an intuition. If we do take it as an argument, according to its surface grammar, then the premise is an intuition (perception of thinking) and the conclusion is an abstraction (existence), so it cannot possibly be contained in the premise. But the "I", inferring a thinker, is a non-sequitur if inferred from mere perception of thinking, or circular, if blatantly inserted into the premise, see Could 'cogito ergo sum' possibly be false? – Conifold Aug 31 '23 at 12:21

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The article on question-begging in Wikipedia is not particularly good as it currently stands. In fact the first paragraph contradicts itself. The lede for the article on circular reasoning is better.

Originally, what is translated into English as begging the question, refers to a fault in a dialectical argument in which the speaker assumes some premise that has not already been demonstrated to be true, or is not accepted as true by the other party. One form of question-begging involves using a premise that is so similar to the conclusion that in effect it assumes the conclusion itself. It is therefore closely related to circular reasoning.

A common definition is that a question-begging argument is one in which an argument's premises assume the truth of the conclusion. This is problematic because in any deductively valid argument, one might say that the premises always include the conclusion, albeit maybe indirectly. But we would not want to say that all valid arguments beg the question.

A better account would be to say that in a persuasive argument, one has better reasons or grounds to accept the premises than one has for accepting the conclusion. Therefore there is a flow of justification from the premises towards the conclusion. The premises support the conclusion. In a question-begging argument there is no such flow: there is no better reason to accept the premises than one already has to accept the conclusion.

Question-begging is not a formal fallacy, but an epistemic failing. In fact, question-begging or circular arguments are valid, since if the premises hold, the conclusion follows by necessity.

Bumble
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  • If so, "I think therefore, I exist" - in that case "I think" part is more persuasive than that of "I exist" thus, "I think therefore, I exist" should be considered a valid and non-circular argument. No? – Sazzad Hissain Khan Aug 30 '23 at 13:48
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    I would consider it non-circular. According to Descartes it is indubitable that I think, and on that basis I may reasonably draw the inference that I exist. Of course the argument can be criticised, but it is not circular. – Bumble Aug 30 '23 at 14:38