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Explain vs Warn - What's the difference?

explain | warn |

As verbs the difference between explain and warn

is that explain is to make plain, manifest, or intelligible; to clear of obscurity; to illustrate the meaning of while warn is to make (someone) aware of impending danger etc or warn can be (label) to refuse, deny (someone something).

explain

English

(Explanation)

Verb

(en verb)
  • To make plain, manifest, or intelligible; to clear of obscurity; to illustrate the meaning of.
  • *
  • The boy became volubly friendly and bubbling over with unexpected humour and high spirits. He tried to persuade Cicely to stay away from the ball-room for a fourth dance. Nobody would miss them, he explained .
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2012-03
  • , author=, volume=100, issue=2, page=106 , magazine=(American Scientist) , title= Pixels or Perish , passage=Drawings and pictures are more than mere ornaments in scientific discourse. Blackboard sketches, geological maps, diagrams of molecular structure, astronomical photographs, MRI images, the many varieties of statistical charts and graphs: These pictorial devices are indispensable tools for presenting evidence, for explaining a theory, for telling a story.}}
  • To give a valid excuse for some past behavior.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-07, author=David Simpson
  • , volume=188, issue=26, page=36, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= Fantasy of navigation , passage=It is tempting to speculate about the incentives or compulsions that might explain why anyone would take to the skies in [the] basket [of a balloon]: perhaps out of a desire to escape the gravity of this world or to get a preview of the next; […].}}
  • (obsolete) To make flat, smooth out.
  • (obsolete) To unfold or make visible.
  • * (John Evelyn) (1620-1706)
  • The horse-chestnut isready to explain its leaf.

    Synonyms

    * (give a sufficiently detailed report) expound, elaborate

    warn

    English

    Etymology 1

    (etyl) warnian, from (etyl) . Cognate with German warnen, Dutch waarnen.

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To make (someone) aware of impending danger etc.
  • We waved a flag to warn the oncoming traffic.
  • To caution (someone) against unwise or unacceptable behaviour.
  • He was warned against crossing the railway tracks at night.
    Don't let me catch you running in the corridor again, I warn you.
  • To notify (someone) of something untoward.
  • I phoned to warn him of the rail strike.
  • To give warning.
  • * 1526 , William Tyndale, tr. Bible , Galatians II, 9-10:
  • then Iames Cephas and Iohn [...] agreed with vs that we shuld preache amonge the Hethen and they amonge the Iewes: warnynge only that we shulde remember the poore.
  • * 1973 , Thomas Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow , Penguin 1995, p. 177:
  • She is his deepest innocence in spaces of bough and hay before wishes were given a different name to warn that they might not come true [...].
  • * 1988 , Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses , Picador 2000, p. 496:
  • She warned that he was seriously thinking of withdrawing his offer to part the waters, ‘so that all you'll get at the Arabian Sea is a saltwater bath [...]’.
  • * 1991 , Clive James, ‘Making Programmes the World Wants’, The Dreaming Swimmer , Jonathan Cape 1992:
  • Every country has its resident experts who warn that imported television will destroy the national consciousness and replace it with Dallas'', ''The Waltons'', ''Star Trek'' and ''Twin Peaks .
    Usage notes
    * The intransitive sense is considered colloquial by some, and is explicitly proscribed by, for example, the Daily Telegraph style guide (which prefers give warning).
    Derived terms
    * warner * warning * warn off

    Etymology 2

    From a combination of (etyl) wiernan (from (etyl) ; compare Swedish varna).

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (label) To refuse, deny (someone something).
  • *:
  • *:And yf thou warne' her loue she shalle goo dye anone yf thou haue no pyte on her / that sygnefyeth the grete byrd / the whiche shalle make the to ' warne her