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Conscientious vs Pragmatic - What's the difference?

conscientious | pragmatic |

As adjectives the difference between conscientious and pragmatic

is that conscientious is thorough, careful, or vigilant; implies a desire to do a task well while pragmatic is practical, concerned with making decisions and actions that are useful in practice, not just theory.

conscientious

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • Thorough, careful, or vigilant; implies a desire to do a task well.
  • He was a thoughtful and conscientious worker.

    Antonyms

    * capricious * impulsive

    Derived terms

    * conscientiously * conscientiousness * conscientious objector

    pragmatic

    English

    Alternative forms

    * pragmatick (archaic) * pragmatique (obsolete)

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Practical, concerned with making decisions and actions that are useful in practice, not just theory.
  • * The sturdy furniture in the student lounge was pragmatic , but unattractive.
  • *
  • Nor indeed are these restrictions pragmatic'' in nature: i.e. the ill-formedness of the ''heed''-sentences in (60) is entirely different in kind from the oddity of sentences like:
    (61)      !That man will eat any car which thinks he?s stupid
    which is purely ''pragmatic
    (i.e. lies in the fact that (61) describes the kind of bizarre situation which just doesn?t happen in the world we are familiar with, where cars don?t think, and people don?t eat cars).
  • philosophical; dealing with causes, reasons, and effects, rather than with details and circumstances; said of literature.
  • * Sir W. Hamilton
  • Pragmatic history.
  • * M. Arnold
  • Pragmatic poetry.

    Synonyms

    * (practical) down-to-earth, functional, practical, utilitarian, realistic

    Antonyms

    * idealistic

    Derived terms

    * pragma * pragmatically * pragmaticism * pragmatics