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Confidence vs Cocksure - What's the difference?

confidence | cocksure |

As a noun confidence

is passive self-assurance.

As an adjective cocksure is

(informal) too confident; overconfident.

confidence

English

(wikipedia confidence)

Noun

(-)
  • Passive self-assurance.
  • Expression or feeling of certainty.
  • The quality of trusting.
  • Information held in secret.

    • Quotations

    * {{quote-book, year=2006, author= , title=Internal Combustion , chapter=1 citation , passage=But electric vehicles and the batteries that made them run became ensnared in corporate scandals, fraud, and monopolistic corruption that shook the confidence of the nation and inspired automotive upstarts.}} * 1956 — , The City and the Stars , p 39 *: Khedron hesitated for a moment, wondering how far he should take Jeserac into his confidence . He knew that Jeserac was kindly and well-intentioned, but he also knew that he must be bound by the same taboos that controlled everyone on Diaspar.

    Antonyms

    * (self-assurance ): fear

    Derived terms

    * confidence interval * confidence level * confidence trick

    Related terms

    * confidant * confidante * confident * confidential * self-confidence

    cocksure

    English

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • (informal) too confident; overconfident
    • I thought myself cocksure of the horse which he readily promised me. — Alexander Pope.
  • * 1906 , John Galsworthy,
    • The persistence of the Past is one of those tragicomic blessings which each new age denies, coming cocksure on to the stage to mouth its claim to a perfect novelty.
  • *1920 , Sinclair Lewis, The Main Street ,
  • *:These crack specialists, the young scientific fellows, they're so cocksure and so wrapped up in their laboratories that they miss the human element.