Stipulative definition
A stipulative definition is a type of
For example, in the riddle of
On stipulative definitions
Stipulative definitions of existing terms are useful in making theoretical arguments, or stating specific cases. For example:
- Suppose we say that to love someone is to be willing to die for that person.
- Take "human" to mean any member of the species Homo sapiens.
- For the purposes of argument, we will define a "student" to be "a person under 18 enrolled in a local school".
Some of these are also
Many holders of controversial and highly charged opinions use stipulative definitions to attach the emotional or other connotations of a word to the meaning they would like to give it; for example, defining "murder" as "the killing of any living thing for any reason". The other side of such an argument is likely to use a different stipulative definition for the same term: "the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought" or "the premeditated killing of a human being". The lexical definition in such a case is likely to fall somewhere in between.
When a stipulative definition is confused with a lexical definition within an argument there is a risk of equivocation.
See also
References
- About.com. Archivedfrom the original on 2012-01-04. Retrieved 2017-01-10.
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