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<blockquote data-quote="Jeff Wilder" data-source="post: 4788528" data-attributes="member: 5122">Formulated -- of necessity -- by my friends and me in law school:Discussion -- Talking about things.&nbsp; Can be vague, and include things like preference and weak opinions.&nbsp; There may be no disagreement between parties whatsoever.Argument -- Presentation of the premises supporting a conclusion.&nbsp; The best arguments start with -- or at least quickly come to -- a recognition of which premises the parties hold in common as true, and the argument proceeds from there.Debate -- A formal argument, with some (at least semi-)objective way to score, be it a moderator or &quot;how many times Joe left Bob stammering for a response.&quot;Quarrel -- Heated disagreement, usually with personal attacks and lots and lots of fallacies.&nbsp; Oh, and sarcasm.&nbsp; A quarrel can, and often does, have argumentative content, however.&nbsp; (Those make the most entertaining flames, IMO.)Of all of these, I find argument and quarrel to be the most fun, for almost entirely different reasons.&nbsp; But the important thing, as far as these definitions go, is that I can -- and do, extremely often -- have arguments with my best friends in which nobody feels attacked in the slightest.Anyway, I know it may seem odd to go to such lengths to establish those definitions, but it truly helps.&nbsp; If Joe wants to have a discussion, and Bob wants to have an argument, they can figure out in advance it won't work.&nbsp; Otherwise, Joe thinks they're discussing things, and Bob thinks they're arguing things, and hopefully it's pretty clear how that can go badly.&quot;Argument&quot; is not a negative word.&nbsp; If any reader thinks it is, I urge you to reconsider.&nbsp; You're cheating yourself out of, at the very least, a useful word.(As an aside, I wince everytime I hear someone say something like, &quot;It's his opinion, and we have to respect it.&quot;&nbsp; That's so horribly, horribly wrong it should make your teeth ache.&nbsp; What we should respect is someone's right to have an opinion, not the opinion itself.&nbsp; Oh, and while I'm at it, there's a fundamental difference between an &quot;opinion,&quot; and a &quot;preference.&quot;&nbsp; The difference is truly worth learning.)</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Jeff Wilder, post: 4788528, member: 5122"] Formulated -- of necessity -- by my friends and me in law school: Discussion -- Talking about things. Can be vague, and include things like preference and weak opinions. There may be no disagreement between parties whatsoever. Argument -- Presentation of the premises supporting a conclusion. The best arguments start with -- or at least quickly come to -- a recognition of which premises the parties hold in common as true, and the argument proceeds from there. Debate -- A formal argument, with some (at least semi-)objective way to score, be it a moderator or "how many times Joe left Bob stammering for a response." Quarrel -- Heated disagreement, usually with personal attacks and lots and lots of fallacies. Oh, and sarcasm. A quarrel can, and often does, have argumentative content, however. (Those make the most entertaining flames, IMO.) Of all of these, I find argument and quarrel to be the most fun, for almost entirely different reasons. But the important thing, as far as these definitions go, is that I can -- and do, extremely often -- have arguments with my best friends in which nobody feels attacked in the slightest. Anyway, I know it may seem odd to go to such lengths to establish those definitions, but it truly helps. If Joe wants to have a discussion, and Bob wants to have an argument, they can figure out in advance it won't work. Otherwise, Joe thinks they're discussing things, and Bob thinks they're arguing things, and hopefully it's pretty clear how that can go badly. "Argument" is not a negative word. If any reader thinks it is, I urge you to reconsider. You're cheating yourself out of, at the very least, a useful word. (As an aside, I wince everytime I hear someone say something like, "It's his opinion, and we have to respect it." That's so horribly, [I]horribly[/I] wrong it should make your teeth ache. What we should respect is someone's right to [I]have an opinion[/I], not the opinion itself. Oh, and while I'm at it, there's a fundamental difference between an "opinion," and a "preference." The difference is truly worth learning.) [/QUOTE]

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