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Articles

Money Talk

“Loan”? “Borrow”? “Growth”? “Seed money”? Michael Philips finds such talk hard to credit.

Philosophy encourages us to question our linguistic habits. Our ordinary ways of talking about the world may conceal and obscure as well as reveal and clarify. A good example of linguistic obfuscation is the way we talk about money.

The language of money so misrepresents reality in favor of bankers and brokers that it’s hard to imagine how a public relations firm in their employ could have done better. Consider the use of the term ‘loan’ in the sentence “Banks loan money.

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