hairsplitting
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
But Oedipus is in no mood for academic hairsplitting.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 13, 2025
These arguably hairsplitting thoughts nagged at me thanks to my job as a congressional correspondent focused on federal spending.
From New York Times ● Jan. 17, 2024
But such hairsplitting is far beyond the remit of Lindelof and Cuse, who have crafted “The Hunt” less as a polemic than as an infantile, pox-on-both-your-houses rant.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 11, 2020
This is a strange time to be debating the merits of truth in journalism on the stage—and it is journalism that John is practicing here, regardless of his genre hairsplitting.
From The New Yorker ● Oct. 22, 2018
One likes to meet now and again a book which forsakes the eternal sex question, or the hairsplitting discussion of ethical or psychological problems, and treats us to simpler and more satisfying fare....
From Ringan Gilhaize or The Covenanters by John Galt
