>Natural language philosophy constitutes legitimate dialectics, not pedantry. In the former you add precision by first synthesizing an agreement of terminology and introducing relevant definitions.
What you describe is not the only view of language. If you are not being pedantic, you might consider the Wittgenstien's view on how language is like a game.
So there are different classes of language games, and one can argue that legal one is not the one being played out in a internet forumn. Legalism is language of courts, derives its meaning from its use to resolve disputes. So deriving the meaning of ethics as used in normal conversation language game from legal grounds is being pedantic.
What you describe is not the only view of language. If you are not being pedantic, you might consider the Wittgenstien's view on how language is like a game.
So there are different classes of language games, and one can argue that legal one is not the one being played out in a internet forumn. Legalism is language of courts, derives its meaning from its use to resolve disputes. So deriving the meaning of ethics as used in normal conversation language game from legal grounds is being pedantic.