Who Will Debunk the Debunkers?
The totalitarian subjugation, debasement, and enslavement of language foreseen by prophets of dystopia such as George Orwell is in full flower. I need not point out recent examples like "peaceful protest", "court-packing", and the like to show how many previously clear and serviceable expressions have been made to mean something other than what they purport to mean, sometimes even their exact opposite.
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| Blaise Pascal |
One such term with a long history of abuse is "debunk". This word originally meant to disprove, to show that a particular statement or argument was "bunk", i.e., nonsense. For some time now, however, I've seen certain people employ the term when they have made no serious effort to refute something, but have simply stated their disagreement. They often seem to think that if they simply invoke the word without actually making an argument, debunk will, through some numinous power of its own, refute an unwelcome assertion.
Debunk has become something of a red flag for me because of this history of abuse. It's what caught my attention a few years back when I saw a reference to an article claiming to debunk Pascal's Wager. When I looked at the article in question I found that, to their credit, the authors did in fact make the effort to present arguments in support of their positions; the problem was, their arguments were themselves largely bunk. But don't take my word for it: I make my case below in an article I first published six years ago this month, "Has Pascal's Wager Really Been 'Debunked'?" . . .
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