Imagine that Alice and Bob go into a room and Alice explains an interesting idea to Bob. They leave the room together after time t.
If a method exists, whereby Alice and Bob can instead leave the room in t-x time, with Bob knowing the same information, then this method of communicating can be said to yield a time savings of x compared to the previous method.
It’s not an answer to my question about the purpose, it’s a restatement of another aspect of it efficiency.
(Maybe you mean “stopping an argument is sometimes in order”? I agree, but that an argument didn’t proceed still doesn’t warrant you to assume as settled in the conversation things that your interlocutor doesn’t agree with.)
Time Savings.
Imagine that Alice and Bob go into a room and Alice explains an interesting idea to Bob. They leave the room together after time t.
If a method exists, whereby Alice and Bob can instead leave the room in t-x time, with Bob knowing the same information, then this method of communicating can be said to yield a time savings of x compared to the previous method.
It’s not an answer to my question about the purpose, it’s a restatement of another aspect of it efficiency.
(Maybe you mean “stopping an argument is sometimes in order”? I agree, but that an argument didn’t proceed still doesn’t warrant you to assume as settled in the conversation things that your interlocutor doesn’t agree with.)