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Discern vs Desert - What's the difference?

discern | desert |

As a verb discern

is to detect with the senses, especially with the eyes.

As a noun desert is

desert.

As an adjective desert is

deserted.

discern

English

Verb

(en verb)
  • To detect with the senses, especially with the eyes.
  • * {{quote-book
    • , year=1875 , author=Jules Verne , title=The Survivors of the Chancellor , chapter=1 citation , passage=Meanwhile the brig had altered her tack, and was moving slowly to the east. Three hours later and the keenest eye could not have discerned her top-sails above the horizon.}}
  • To perceive, recognize, or comprehend with the mind; to descry.
  • * {{quote-book
    • , year=1842 , author=Charles Dickens , title=American Notes for General Circulation citation , passage=If they discern' any evidences of wrong-going in any direction that I have indicated, they will acknowledge that I had reason in what I wrote. If they ' discern no such thing, they will consider me altogether mistaken.}}
  • To distinguish something as being different from something else; to differentiate.
  • * {{quote-book
    • , year=1651 , author=Thomas Hobbes , title=Leviathan citation , passage=The severity of judgement, they say, makes men censorious and unapt to pardon the errors and infirmities of other men: and on the other side, celerity of fancy makes the thoughts less steady than is necessary to discern exactly between right and wrong.}}
    He was too young to discern right from wrong.
  • To perceive differences.

    • Derived terms

    * discernible * discernment * indiscernible

    Anagrams

    * *

    desert

    English

    Etymology 1

    (etyl) from the (etyl) deserte, from

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (senseid)(usually in plural) That which is deserved or merited; a just punishment or reward
  • * 1600 , (John Dowland), (Flow My Tears)
    • From the highest spire of contentment / my fortune is thrown; / and fear and grief and pain for my deserts / are my hopes, since hope is gone.
  • * 1897 , (Bram Stoker), (Dracula) Chapter 21
    • "Nonsense, Mina. It is a shame to me to hear such a word. I would not hear it of you. And I shall not hear it from you. May God judge me by my deserts , and punish me with more bitter suffering than even this hour, if by any act or will of mine anything ever come between us!"
  • * A. Hamilton
    • His reputation falls far below his desert .
    Derived terms
    * just deserts

    Etymology 2

    (etyl) .

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A barren area of land or desolate terrain, especially one with little water or vegetation; a wasteland.
  • * (Alexander Pope) (1688-1744)
    • Not thus the land appear'd in ages past, / A dreary desert and a gloomy waste.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1892, author=(James Yoxall)
    • , chapter=5, title= The Lonely Pyramid , passage=The desert storm was riding in its strength; the travellers lay beneath the mastery of the fell simoom. Whirling wreaths and columns of burning wind, rushed around and over them.}}
  • (label) Any barren place or situation.
  • * 1858 , William Howitt, Land, Labour, and Gold; Or, Two Years in Victoria (page 54)
    • He declared that the country was an intellectual desert ; that he was famishing for spiritual aliment, and for discourse on matters beyond mere nuggets, prospectings, and the price of gold.
  • * 2006 , Philip N. Cooke, Creative Industries in Wales: Potential and Pitfalls (page 34)
    • So the question that is commonly asked is, why put a media incubator in a media desert and have it managed by a civil servant?

    Adjective

    (-)
  • Abandoned, deserted, or uninhabited; usually of a place.
    • They were marooned on a desert island in the Pacific.
  • * Bible, Luke ix. 10
    • He went aside privately into a desert place.
  • * Gray
    • Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, / And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
    Derived terms
    * desert boot * desert island * desert lynx * desert pavement * desert pea * desert rat * desert soil * desert varnish * desertification * food desert * preach in the desert

    Etymology 3

    From (etyl)

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To leave (anything that depends on one's presence to survive, exist, or succeed), especially when contrary to a promise or obligation; to abandon; to forsake.
    • You can't just drive off and desert me here, in the middle of nowhere.
  • To leave one's duty or post, especially to leave a military or naval unit without permission.
    • Anyone found deserting will be shot.
    Derived terms
    * deserter * desertion * desert or leave a sinking ship

    Anagrams

    * * English heteronyms ----