The Metaphysics of Grammar: The Case for Keeping "To Be" Verbs

     I recently had a graduate student share with me something that was new to her, and indeed it was new to me.  Point in fact, if the article cited below is to be taken seriously, this blog has already received an "F."  You can read for yourself the entire article, but here is my response to the essence of the piece, "How to Elimintae 'To-Be' Verbs".  While the article is not completely muddled, the author provides some rationale for why "to-be" verbs need to be eliminated and the reader should be aware that there is much more at stake than the loss of some words.

     One example is, "the 'to-be' verbs: is, am, are, was, were, be, being, been are state of being verbs, which means that they unduly claim a degree of permanence. For example, “I am hungry.” For most Americans, hunger is only a temporary condition." We should immediately respond that in truth, for many inhabitants of the world, hunger is a temporary condition, and it seems leading that author highlighted the plight of nearly, never hungry Americans.  Not to quibble, as the author of this article does, hunger is always only a temporary condition.  At a point, all hunger will cease.

     Actually, to the metaphysical point, some to-be verbs do necessarily claim a state of permanence while others do not.  If I were to say, all men are mortal, that is a state of permanence.  If I were to add, Socrates is a man, this also is a state of permanence.  If I were to finish by asserting, therefore Socrates is mortal, this would indeed be an accurate state of permanence.  What if I were with Socrates at the local Athenian cafe and just before the food arrived, my friend Socrates said, "I am starving." I would infer, accurately I trust, that hunger is his current state of being, but it is not a permanent state of being.  As a matter of fact, if I inferred that it was a permanent state and suggested as much, no doubt, Socrates would demonstrate my need to better learn the language.

     The next bit of reasoning given in the grammar lesson is that "to-be verbs claim absolute truth and exclude others".  The example provided is, “Classical music is very sophisticated. Few would agree that all classical compositions are always sophisticated." Sadly, Ken Ward must have forgotten (for a second) that in the English language, we have words such as some, few, all, most, much, and many. Use of these terms allow us to keep our to-be verbs and convey a certain specific truth.  So we could assert with some degree of certainty that some classical music is sophisticated and requires attention to undertand it, while most popular music is simplistic and requires little attention to understand its shallow form and content.

     Ward adds, "the 'to-be' verbs are general and lack specificity. Our retort is simple: sometimes we want to be general and sometimes we want to be specific.  Also Ward says, "the 'to-be' verbs often confuse the reader about the subject of the sentence. Indeed, "to-be" verbs may confuse the reader, but a qualifying term often brings clarity to confusion.  On the other hand, there are special occasions one may desire to be vague.

     Reading this post-modern grammar lesson, calling for the death of "to-be" verbs reminded me what was known from the ancient up to the modern world, and that is our language (grammar) reflects a worldview about such realities as permanence and absolutes.  Knowing this truth, I will not be giving up on "to-be" verbs anytime soon.