eristical

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e·ris·tic

(ĭ-rĭs′tĭk) also e·ris·ti·cal (-tĭ-kəl)

adj.

Given to or characterized by disputatious, often specious argument.

1. One given to disputation or argument.

2. The art or practice of disputation and polemics.

[Greek eristikos, from erizein, to wrangle, quarrel, from eris, erid-, strife.]

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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Adj.

eristical - given to disputation for its own sake and often employing specious arguments

eristic

argumentative - given to or characterized by argument; "an argumentative discourse"; "argumentative to the point of being cantankerous"; "an intelligent but argumentative child"

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References in periodicals archive ?

As he puts it in Plato's Apology, these investigations - his famous (or infamous) eristical challenges to received opinion which we find captured so memorably in dialogues such as the Republic, the Gorgias, and the Euthyphro - were his business, not his leisure (Apology 23b-c).

The challenge of Plato's 'Menexenus.'

questioner were someone wise, eristical and combative, I would

'Republic' 467d6-e2: Plato's dialectical requirement

The other, however, or the principle of participation, makes it possible for something to be said of something, for otherwise, as the eristical say, man would be only man and good only good.