Stipulative Definition - On Stipulative Definitions

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 precising definitions, a subtype of stipulative definition that may not contradict but only extend the lexical definition of a term. Theoretical definitions, used extensively in science and philosophy, are similar in some ways to stipulative definitions (although theoretical definitions are somewhat normative -more like persuasive definitions).

Many holders of controversial and highly-charged opinions use stipulative definitions in order 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 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 there is a risk of equivocation.

The word "quark" is a definiendum where the definiens was stipulated by Gell-Mann.