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Quack vs Quacky - What's the difference?

quack | quacky |

As adjectives the difference between quack and quacky

is that quack is falsely presented as having medicinal powers while quacky is (of a voice or sound) that resembles the quack of a duck.

As a noun quack

is the sound made by a duck or quack can be a fraudulent healer or incompetent professional, especially a doctor of medicine; an impostor who claims to have qualifications to practice medicine.

As a verb quack

is to make a noise like a duck or quack can be to practice or commit quackery.

quack

English

Etymology 1

From (etyl) *.

Noun

(en noun)
  • The sound made by a duck.
    • Did you hear that duck make a quack ?

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To make a noise like a duck.
    • The more breadcrumbs I threw on the ground, the more they quacked .
    Do you hear the ducks quack ?
    Derived terms
    *

    References

    Etymology 2

    (wikipedia quack) c 1630, shortening of quacksalver, from (etyl)

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A fraudulent healer or incompetent professional, especially a doctor of medicine; an impostor who claims to have qualifications to practice medicine.
    • That doctor is nothing but a lousy quack !
    Polly (to security guard, referring to Dr. Feingarten): Are you going to let that shyster in there?
    Dr. Feingarten': I could sue you, Polly. A shyster is a disreputable lawyer. I'm a ' quack .
    - From the motion picture
  • * 1662 : Rump: or an Exact Collection of the Choycest Poems and Songs Relating to Late Times, Vol. II , by ‘the most Eminent Wits’
    • Tis hard to say, how much these Arse-wormes do urge us, We now need no Quack but these Jacks for to purge us, [...]
  • * 1720 : William Derham, Physico-theology
    • After ?ome Months, the Quack gets privately to Town, [...]
  • * 1843 , '', book 2, ch. 8, ''The Electon
    • ‘if we are ourselves valets, there shall ‘exist no hero for us; we shall not know the hero when we see him;’ - we shall take the quack for a hero; and cry, audibly through all ballot-boxes and machinery whatsoever, Thou art he; be thou King over us!
  • A charlatan.
  • Carlyle
    • Quacks political; quacks scientific, academical.
  • (slang) A doctor.
    • Synonyms
    * See also
    Derived terms
    * (l)

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To practice or commit quackery.
  • (obsolete) To make vain and loud pretensions; to boast.
  • * Hudibras
    • To quack of universal cures.

    Adjective

    (-)
  • falsely presented as having medicinal powers.
    • Don't get your hopes up; that's quack medicine!

    quacky

    English

    Adjective

    (quackier)
  • (of a voice or sound) That resembles the quack of a duck.
  • * 1907 , Le Grand Kerr, Diagnostics of the Diseases of Children , page 177,
    • With progressive prostration (which is more marked in young infants) and with a tone to the cry which is a sort of a thin, crowing, quacky sound, points to the existence of retropharyngeal lymphadenitis.
  • * 2011 , Minrose Gwin, Wishing for Snow , unnumbered page,
    • Suddenly I hear a roar like a lion then a gagging sound like someone is getting choked to death then high-pitched voices little quacky voices like the Chipmunks on the radio calling back and forth to one another Christmas Christmas time is here time for joy and time for cheer.
  • Fraudulent; characterised by or using the methods of quackery.
  • * 1919 , Oral Hygeine , Volume 9, page 921,
    • The Doctor says that some of the quackiest of the quacks are in the army.
  • * 1998' September 9, , interview quoted in '''2003 , Alan Hecht, ''Polio , page 72,
    • I know this sounds real quacky but they did some mysterious good to the problem and I feel fine.
  • * 2003 , Wayne Besen, Anything but Straight: Unmasking the Scandals and Lies Behind the Ex-Gay Myth , unnumbered page,
    • Although some of the moments surrounding my coming out may seem humorous in retrospect, the underlying harsh fact is that thousands of desperate people are willing to embrace the quackiest of measures to cure homosexuality in themselves or in loved ones, and this is anything but funny.
  • * 2008 , John Hayes, Primate Wars , page 115,
    • David's expression changes. A quack? All this act is about some quacky , pseudo science, right on, I know something you don't cult thing.
  • * 2010 , Herb Schultz, Double Blind Test , page 37,
    • Dr. Torrent described the signs and symptoms of RP,[retinitis pigmentosa] surveyed the established research into causes of the disease, and summarized the failed attempts to develop a cure, including a barbaric method pioneered in the USSR involving the injection of quacky medicine directly into the patient's eyeball.
  • * 2010 , Margie Hinkle, Sherry Hatchett, Bonnie Holmes (editors), I Walk with God: The Autobiography of Marjorie Clevenger Hinkle , page 21,
    • The housemother was a relief housemother, and she was quacky , and we didn't think she knew anything.
  • (US, of land or a crop) Infested with quackgrass.
  • * 1859 , The Cultivator , Volume 7, 3rd Series, page 54,
    • After the first hoeing of a quacky crop, it is often well to go over it lightly in the middle of a hot day, just skimming the surface of the soil, and cutting off the young grass.
  • * 1890 , Ontario Legislative Assembly, Sessional Papers - Legislature of the Province of Ontario , Volume 1, page 14,
    • Always work quacky land when it is driest.
  • * 1914 , New York (State) Department of Agriculture, Annual Report , Volume 1, Part 2, page 544,
    • When would you advise plowing sandy soil that is quacky for beans?