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

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

Andy: See, this is what I mean: the smooth fox terrier and the wire fox terrier just feels like hairsplitting.

From New York Times • Feb. 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

Though dry and devoted to hairsplitting as orthodoxy no doubt was, it probably was not quite as lifeless as later generations represent it to have been.

From Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark by Aaberg, J. C. (Jens Christian)