It’s a malapropism that one hears fairly often: Someone wants to say “moot point” but instead says “mute point.”  It’s funny because “moot point” is a fancy legal term, so to try to carry it off and then mangle it is all the more embarrassing. 

On the other hand, the mistake is somewhat understandable. A “moot point” is “mute” in the sense that you’re kind of pressing “off.” And after all, “moot,” a word otherwise hardly common in our vernacular, does sound a lot like “mute,” a much more common word.  

Anyway, a “moot point” is a point which has no practical significance, but is rather hypothetical.  The second definition of the adjective form of “moot” listed in Merriam-Webster is “deprived of practical significance; made abstract or purely academic.” This is the most common use of the word. (SEE ALSO: No, Merriam-Webster, “Irregardless” is Not a Word)

Here are some example sentences: 

The fact that you were here first is a moot point–-the store is closed. 

It’s a moot point whether there is a typo in paragraph three because we’re not posting this article anymore.  

The defense attorney’s arguments have become moot because the defendant decided to plead guilty.  

Here’s an example from Mike Tyson’s autobiography, Undisputed Truth, which I happened to be reading at the time of this writing:

"I'm sure Don [King] picked that date because it was the same night as the pay-per-view of the third fight between Riddick Bowe and Evander Holyfield, but it became a moot point when the first fight was postponed because I had fractured my right thumb" (310). 

The coincidence of the dates of the Holyfield-Bowe fight and the Tyson-Mathis fight became moot when Tyson had to postpone; which is to say, it no longer mattered.

Notice how in these situations, the realization that something is moot tends to dawn on people after having previously believed there was some practical relevance. When one hears “moot” or “moot point,” it tends to be that people are just becoming aware that a particular point of contention no longer matters, rather than something that has been moot continuously. In Merriam-Webster, it is defined as “made abstract or purely academic,” which is to say that previously the matter at hand was not thought to be abstract or merely academic.

“Let’s move on, that doesn’t matter.” 

The term originates from British law in which a topic was discussed before a “moot” of law students, which by definition is a hypothetical rather than of real-world importance. 

So the term has evolved as being strictly in a legal sense to a phrase used more informally to indicate that the point (the moot point) is no longer of pressing importance.

In Merriam-Webster, “Moot” (as a noun) is defined as a “deliberative assembly.” To analyze the phrase literally, a “moot point” is something that is only meant for the process of debating, not something in the real world. In any non-academic setting, we generally consider debating theoretical points as not the best use of time; and so a “moot point” is understood as to mean, “Let’s move on, that doesn’t matter.” 

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