Standard Lemma guide
Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.
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noun
The practice of engaging in excessively subtle, pedantic, or specious argumentation; the use of overly fine or trivial distinctions in reasoning .
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: derogatory, uncountable
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
History
From the phrase chop logic, attested from the early 16th century . The element chop originally meant "to bandy, exchange" (as in chop logic, i.e., to exchange logical arguments) . Later chop was wrongly understood as "to cut, split" .
