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Conform vs Ensure - What's the difference?

conform | ensure |

As verbs the difference between conform and ensure

is that conform is (intransitive|of persons|often followed by to) to act in accordance with expectations; to behave in the manner of others, especially as a result of social pressure while ensure is to make a pledge to (someone); to promise, guarantee (someone of something); to assure.

conform

English

Verb

(en verb)
  • (intransitive, of persons, often followed by to) To act in accordance with expectations; to behave in the manner of others, especially as a result of social pressure.
  • * 1822 , , Peveril of the Peak , ch. 1:
  • [H]e had a dispensation for conforming in outward observances to the Protestant faith.
  • * 1839 , , The Voyage of the Beagle , ch. 4:
  • [B]y conforming to the dress and habits of the Gauchos, he has obtained an unbounded popularity in the country.
  • To be in accordance with a set of specifications or regulations, or with a policy or guideline.
  • * 1919 , , The Camp Fire Girls Do Their Bit , ch. 11:
  • In height and breadth it conformed to the prescribed measurements laid down by the rules of the contest.
  • * 2006 22 Dec., " Judge Cuts Amount of Vioxx Award ," New York Times (retrieved 7 June 2011):
  • A judge in a Texas widow’s lawsuit over the Merck drug Vioxx reduced a $32 million jury award to about $7.75 million on Thursday so that it conformed to state law.
  • To make similar in form or nature; to make suitable for a purpose; to adapt.
  • * , "Vanbrugh's House" in The Poems of Jonathan Swift (1910 edition):
  • There is a worm by Phoebus bred,
    By leaves of mulberry is fed,
    Which unprovided where to dwell,
    Conforms itself to weave a cell.
  • * 1836 , , Nature , ch. 6:
  • The sensual man conforms' thoughts to things; the poet ' conforms things to his thoughts.

    Synonyms

    * (act in accordance with expectations) acquiesce, comply, go along to get along, knuckle under, submit

    ensure

    English

    Verb

    (ensur)
  • To make a pledge to (someone); to promise, guarantee (someone of something); to assure.
  • *:
  • *:Thenne he cryed hym mercy and sayd Faire knyght for goddes loue slee me not / and I shall ensure the neuer werre ageynst thy lady / but be alwey toward her / Thenne Bors lete hym be
  • To make sure or certain of something (usually some future event or condition).
  • :
  • *{{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-10, volume=408, issue=8848, magazine=(The Economist), author=Lexington
  • , title= Keeping the mighty honest , passage=British journalists shun complete respectability, feeling a duty to be ready to savage the mighty, or rummage through their bins. Elsewhere in Europe, government contracts and subsidies ensure that press barons will only defy the mighty so far.}}

    Anagrams

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