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Liar vs Disingenuous - What's the difference?

liar | disingenuous |

As a noun liar

is one who tells lies.

As an adjective disingenuous is

not noble; unbecoming true honor or dignity; mean; unworthy; fake or deceptive.

liar

English

Noun

(en noun)
  • One who tells lies.
  • *{{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
  • , chapter=15 citation , passage=She paused and took a defiant breath. ‘If you don't believe me, I can't help it. But I'm not a liar .’ ¶ ‘No,’ said Luke, grinning at her. ‘You're not dull enough!

    Anagrams

    * ----

    disingenuous

    English

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Not noble; unbecoming true honor or dignity; mean; unworthy; fake or deceptive.
  • Not ingenuous; not frank or open; uncandid; unworthily or meanly artful.
  • * 1726 , , The Poems of Alexander Pope: The Odyssey of Homer. Books XIII-XXIV , edited by Maynard Mack, Methuen, 1969, volume 10, page 378:
  • I am not so vain as to think these Remarks free from faults, nor so disingenuous as not to confess them:
  • Assuming a pose of naivete to make a point or for deception.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2012-03
  • , author=William E. Carter, Merri Sue Carter , title=The British Longitude Act Reconsidered , volume=100, issue=2, page=87 , magazine= citation , passage=But was it responsible governance to pass the Longitude Act without other efforts to protect British seamen? Or might it have been subterfuge—a disingenuous attempt to shift attention away from the realities of their life at sea.}}

    Usage notes

    * Nouns to which "disingenuous" is often applied: attempt, argument, statement, conduct, people, excuse, question, assertion.

    Derived terms

    * disingenuously * disingenuousness