Harmful vs Nefarious - What's the difference?
harmful | nefarious | Related terms |
of a kind likely to be damaging; injurious
Sinful, villainous, criminal, or wicked, especially when noteworthy or notorious for such characteristics.
* 1828 , , The Red Rover , ch. 2:
* 1877 , , The Life of Cicero , ch. 9:
* 1921 , , The Indiscretions of Archie , ch. 26:
* 2009 Oct. 14, Monica Davey, "
Harmful is a related term of nefarious.
As adjectives the difference between harmful and nefarious
is that harmful is of a kind likely to be damaging; injurious while nefarious is sinful, villainous, criminal, or wicked, especially when noteworthy or notorious for such characteristics.harmful
English
Alternative forms
* harmfull (archaic)Adjective
(en-adj)- Wear a hat to protect your skin from harmful sunlight.
Usage notes
* Nouns to which "harmful" is often applied: effect, consequence, impact, influence, emission, chemical, ingredient, substance, gas, agent, additive, drug, radiation, dust, organism, plant, animal, insect, action, act, behavior, component, content, activity, interference, use.Synonyms
* injurious; see alsoAntonyms
* beneficial * harmlessSee also
* harmnefarious
English
Adjective
(en adjective)- "If the vessel be no fair-trading slaver, nor a common cruiser of his Majesty, it is as tangible as the best man's reasoning, that she may be neither more nor less than the ship of that nefarious pirate the Red Rover."
- Mommsen . . . declares that Catiline in particular was "one of the most nefarious' men in that ' nefarious age. His villanies belong to the criminal records, not to history."
- The fact that the room was still in darkness made it obvious that something nefarious was afoot. Plainly there was dirty work in preparation at the cross-roads.
Fact Checker Finds Falsehoods in Remarks," New York Times (retrieved 12 May 2014):
- “I try to let everyone back here in Minnesota know exactly the nefarious activities that are taking place in Washington.”