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Dictate vs Obligate - What's the difference?

dictate | obligate |

As verbs the difference between dictate and obligate

is that dictate is to order, command, control while obligate is (transitive|north america|scottish) to bind, compel, constrain, or oblige by a social, legal, or moral tie.

As a noun dictate

is an order or command.

As an adjective obligate is

(biology) able to exist or survive only in a particular environment or by assuming a particular role.

dictate

English

Noun

(en noun)
  • An order or command.
    • I must obey the dictates of my conscience.

    Verb

    (dictat)
  • To order, command, control.
  • * 2001 , Sydney I. Landau, Dictionaries: The Art and Craft of Lexicography , Cambridge University Press (ISBN 0-521-78512-X), page 409,
    • Trademark Owners will nevertheless try to dictate how their marks are to be represented, but dictionary publishers with spine can resist such pressure.
  • To speak in order for someone to write down the words.
    • She is dictating a letter to a stenographer.
    The French teacher dictated a passage from Victor Hugo.

    Derived terms

    * dictation * dictator

    obligate

    English

    (wikipedia obligate)

    Verb

    (obligat)
  • (transitive, North America, Scottish) To bind, compel, constrain, or oblige by a social, legal, or moral tie.
  • (transitive, North America, Scottish) To cause to be grateful or indebted; to oblige.
  • (transitive, North America, Scottish) To commit (money, for example) in order to fulfill an obligation.

    • Usage notes

    In non-legal usage, almost exclusively used in the passive, in form “obligated' to X” where ‘X’ is a verb infinitive or noun phrase, as in “'''obligated to pay”. Further, it is now only in standard use in American English and some dialects such as Scottish,''Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage,'' p. 675 having disappeared from standard British English by the 20th century, being replaced by obliged (it was previously used in the 17th through 19th centuries).''The New Fowler’s Modern English Usage (1996)

    Synonyms

    * See also:

    Derived terms

    * obligation * obligatory

    References

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • (biology) Able to exist or survive only in a particular environment or by assuming a particular role.
    • an obligate''' parasite; an '''obligate anaerobe.
  • Absolutely indispensable; essential.

    • Related terms

    * oblige * obligee * obligor ----