Retort vs Confute - What's the difference?

As verbs the difference between retort and confute

is that retort is to say something sharp or witty in answer to a remark or accusation or retort can be to heat in a retort while confute is to show (something or someone) to be false or wrong; to disprove or refute.

As a noun retort

is a sharp or witty reply, or one which turns an argument against its originator; a comeback or retort can be (chemistry) a flask with a rounded base and a long neck that is bent down and tapered, used to heat a liquid for distillation.

retort

English

(wikipedia retort)

Etymology 1

From (etyl) retortus, from .

Noun

(en noun)

A sharp or witty reply, or one which turns an argument against its originator; a comeback.

Verb

(en verb)

To say something sharp or witty in answer to a remark or accusation.

*{{quote-book, year=1905, author=

, title= , chapter=1 citation , passage=“It is a pity,” he retorted with aggravating meekness, “that they do not use a little common sense. The case resembles that of Columbus' ?egg, and is every bit as simple. […]”}}

To make a remark which reverses an argument upon its originator; to return, as an argument, accusation, censure, or incivility.

to retort the charge of vanity

* Milton

And with retorted scorn his back he turned.

To bend or curve back.

a retorted line

* Southey

With retorted head, pruned themselves as they floated.

To throw back; to reverberate; to reflect.

* Shakespeare

As when his virtues, shining upon others, / Heat them and they retort that heat again / To the first giver.

Synonyms

* (sharp reply) comeback, rejoinder, back answer

Etymology 2

From (etyl) retorte.

Noun

(en noun)

(chemistry) A flask with a rounded base and a long neck that is bent down and tapered, used to heat a liquid for distillation.

:* 1893', A large curved ' retort was boiling furiously in the bluish flame of a Bunsen burner, and the distilled drops were condensing into a two-litre measure. — Arthur Conan Doyle, ‘The Naval Treaty’ (Norton 2005, p.670)

A container in which material is subjected to high temperatures]] as part of an industrial manufacturing process, especially during the smelting and [[forge, forging of metal.

Verb

(en verb)

To heat in a retort.

Anagrams

* English reporting verbs

confute

English

Verb

(confut)

To show (something or someone) to be false or wrong; to disprove or refute.

* 1593 , (Henry Peacham), The Garden of Eloquence :

Procatalepsis is a forme of speech by which the Orator perceiving aforehand what might be objected against him, and hurt him, doth confute it before it be spoken .

* 1644 , (John Milton), Aeropagitica :

bad books [...] to a discreet and judicious Reader serve in many respects to discover, to confute , to forewarn, and to illustrate.