Defining Your Terms

As I mentioned in a recent post the one of the first steps in any argument is the defining of relevant terms.  This step can accomplish the most but requires significant effort.  Often arguments that seem to have no resolution occur because participants either have not clearly define the terms they are using OR can't agree on how to define a concept.  For example, what is human life and when does it begin?
For discussion purposes here, term refers to a word the represents a concept.  A concept is a mental label attached to an idea, belief, thing, or feeling.  There will be more on this in a later post but here are some ways to approach the task of defining terms.

One way is to think in terms of categories.  Does a concept belong to category of things that share common characteristics of other things in the category.  Does a tomato belong to the category of fruit?  Of course, we need to set parameters for our category.  This is done by establishing the necessary and sufficient conditions a concept must meet in order to be included in that category.  Is one of the necessary conditions of being a fruit that it have seeds?  Do the seeds alone make something a fruit or are there more conditions that need to be met?

Sometimes we define terms by distinguishing them from other concepts.  A tomato is not a vegetable because its sugar content is too high.  We can then examine the differences to see if the differences are differences of degree or differences in kind.  Is tomato just a sweet vegetable or is it in a completely different category (i.e. fruit)?

Defining terms takes time and effort.  I was teaching a philosophy class a few years ago and we were discussing recycling.  The students spent an hour defining what qualified as tin can or can of pop (some emotions were involved as well).  This step will not resolve every argument but it can help us at least understand what we're arguing about.