This issue is easy to blow off as "you know what I mean" but it's an important signal that someone has formed an opinion without being fully educated on the topic.
Climate scientists would prefer to debate global warming with people who have actually read a few papers and know the actual implications of global warming (as opposed to uneducated people on either side of the argument that say that it either doesn't matter or that it will be the end of humanity).
Doctors would prefer to debate vaccinations with people who have read up and learned that the chance of a negative reaction to a vaccine is very tiny compared to the chance of people dying from a disease in an unvaccinated society (see polio) as opposed to listening to people who swear that their child got paralyzed because of a flu shot (maybe they did, but they don't make a convincing argument).
And gun owners would prefer to debate gun control with people who actually understand guns as opposed to people who have only seen their children firing 900 rounds/min death machines in video games.
Using the proper terminology is an easy way to say, "I've done enough homework to understand how guns work in a general sense and have at least considered that I should know about something before I make a decision on it."
Climate scientists would prefer to debate global warming with people who have actually read a few papers and know the actual implications of global warming (as opposed to uneducated people on either side of the argument that say that it either doesn't matter or that it will be the end of humanity).
Doctors would prefer to debate vaccinations with people who have read up and learned that the chance of a negative reaction to a vaccine is very tiny compared to the chance of people dying from a disease in an unvaccinated society (see polio) as opposed to listening to people who swear that their child got paralyzed because of a flu shot (maybe they did, but they don't make a convincing argument).
And gun owners would prefer to debate gun control with people who actually understand guns as opposed to people who have only seen their children firing 900 rounds/min death machines in video games.
Using the proper terminology is an easy way to say, "I've done enough homework to understand how guns work in a general sense and have at least considered that I should know about something before I make a decision on it."