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Absurd vs Sensible - What's the difference?

absurd | sensible |

As adjectives the difference between absurd and sensible

is that absurd is absurd while sensible is perceptible by the senses.

As a noun sensible is

(obsolete) sensation; sensibility.

absurd

English

Adjective

(en-adj)
  • Contrary to reason or propriety; obviously and flatly opposed to manifest truth; inconsistent with the plain dictates of common sense; logically contradictory; nonsensical; ridiculous; silly.
  • * 1591 , (William Shakespeare), , V-iv
    • This proffer is absurd and reasonless.
  • * ca. 1710 , (Alexander Pope)
    • This phrase absurd to call a villain great
  • * , chapter=17
    • , title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=“Perhaps it is because I have been excommunicated. It's absurd , but I feel like the Jackdaw of Rheims.” ¶ She winced and bowed her head. Each time that he spoke flippantly of the Church he caused her pain.}}
  • (obsolete) Inharmonious; dissonant.
  • Having no rational or orderly relationship to people's lives; meaningless; lacking order or value.
  • * (rfdate) Adults have condemned them to live in what must seem like an absurd universe. - Joseph Featherstone
  • Dealing with absurdism.

    • Usage notes

    * More and most absurd are the preferred or more common form of the comparable, as opposed to absurder and absurdest. * Among the synonyms: ** Irrational is the weakest, denoting that which is plainly inconsistent with the dictates of sound reason; as, an irrational course of life. ** Foolish rises higher, and implies either a perversion of that faculty, or an absolute weakness or fatuity of mind; as, foolish enterprises. ** Absurd rises still higher, denoting that which is plainly opposed to received notions of propriety and truth; as, an absurd man, project, opinion, story, argument, etc. ** Preposterous rises still higher, and supposes an absolute inversion'' in the order of things; or, in plain terms, a "putting of the cart before the horse;" as, a ''preposterous'' suggestion, ''preposterous'' conduct, a ''preposterous regulation or law.

    Synonyms

    * foolish, irrational, ridiculous, preposterous, inconsistent, incongruous, ludicrous * See also

    Derived terms

    * absurdly, absurdity * Absurdistan

    Noun

    (en noun) (Absurdism)
  • (obsolete) An absurdity.
  • (philosophy) The opposition between the human search for meaning in life and the inability to find any; the state or condition in which man exists in an irrational universe and his life has no meaning outside of his existence.

    • Usage notes

    * (philosophy) Absurd is sometimes preceded by the word the .

    Derived terms

    * theatre of the absurd

    References

    * * ----

    sensible

    English

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Perceptible by the senses.
  • * Arbuthnot
    • Air is sensible to the touch by its motion.
  • * 1778 , William Lewis, The New Dispensatory (page 91)
    • The sensible qualities of argentina promise no great virtue of this kind; for to the taste it discovers only a slight roughishness, from whence it may be presumed to be entitled to a place only among the milder corroborants.
  • * 1902 , William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience , Folio Society 2008, page 45:
    • It has been vouchsafed, for example, to very few Christian believers to have had a sensible vision of their Saviour.
  • Easily perceived; appreciable.
  • * Sir W. Temple
    • The disgrace was more sensible than the pain.
  • * Adam Smith
    • The discovery of the mines of America does not seem to have had any very sensible effect upon the prices of things in England.
  • (archaic) Able to feel or perceive.
  • * Shakespeare
    • Would your cambric were sensible as your finger.
  • (archaic) Liable to external impression; easily affected; sensitive.
    • a sensible thermometer
  • * Shakespeare
    • with affection wondrous sensible
  • Of or pertaining to the senses; sensory.
  • (archaic) Cognizant; having the perception of something; aware of something.
  • * John Locke
    • He cannot think at any time, waking or sleeping, without being sensible of it.
  • * Addison
    • They are now sensible it would have been better to comply than to refuse.
  • Acting with or showing good sense; able to make good judgements based on reason.
  • * 2005 , .
    • They ask questions of someone who thinks he's got something sensible to say on some matter when actually he hasn't.
  • Characterized more by usefulness or practicality than by fashionableness, especially of clothing.
  • * 1999 , Neil Gaiman, Stardust (2001 Perennial Edition), page 8,
    • They would walk, on fair evenings, around the village, and discuss the theory of crop rotation, and the weather, and other such sensible matters.

    Usage notes

    * "Sensible" describes the reasonable way in which a person may think'' about things or ''do things: *: It wouldn't be sensible to start all over again now. * "Sensitive" describes an emotional way in which a person may react to things: *: He has always been a sensitive child. *: I didn’t realize she was so sensitive about her work.

    Related terms

    * sense * sensory * sensual * sensuous * supersensible

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (obsolete) Sensation; sensibility.
  • * Milton
    • Our temper changed which must needs remove the sensible of pain.
  • (obsolete) That which impresses itself on the senses; anything perceptible.
  • * Krauth-Fleming
    • Aristotle distinguished sensibles into common and proper.
  • (obsolete) That which has sensibility; a sensitive being.
  • * Burton
    • This melancholy extends itself not to men only, but even to vegetals and sensibles .

    External links

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