 The disputers’ focal activity appears to have been a form of public debate or persuasion called “disputation” or “distinction drawing” (bian), which often took place in the court of a regional lord or a state sovereign. Disputation appears to have been rooted partly in the practice of litigation, partly in the rhetoric used by court advisors in the “explanations” (shuo, also “persuasions”) through which they tried to influence political policy. Primarily a type of analogical argumentation, disputation, like much legal rhetoric, often took the form of citing a precedent, analogy, or model (fa, also “law”) and explaining why the case at hand should be treated similarly or  not.[3]