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Sensible vs Terrible - What's the difference?

sensible | terrible |

As adjectives the difference between sensible and terrible

is that sensible is perceptible by the senses while terrible is dreadful; causing alarm and fear.

As a noun sensible

is (obsolete) sensation; sensibility.

sensible

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • Perceptible by the senses.
  • * Arbuthnot
  • Air is sensible to the touch by its motion.
  • * 1778 , William Lewis, The New Dispensatory (page 91)
  • The sensible qualities of argentina promise no great virtue of this kind; for to the taste it discovers only a slight roughishness, from whence it may be presumed to be entitled to a place only among the milder corroborants.
  • * 1902 , William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience , Folio Society 2008, page 45:
  • It has been vouchsafed, for example, to very few Christian believers to have had a sensible vision of their Saviour.
  • Easily perceived; appreciable.
  • * Sir W. Temple
  • The disgrace was more sensible than the pain.
  • * Adam Smith
  • The discovery of the mines of America does not seem to have had any very sensible effect upon the prices of things in England.
  • (archaic) Able to feel or perceive.
  • * Shakespeare
  • Would your cambric were sensible as your finger.
  • (archaic) Liable to external impression; easily affected; sensitive.
  • a sensible thermometer
  • * Shakespeare
  • with affection wondrous sensible
  • Of or pertaining to the senses; sensory.
  • (archaic) Cognizant; having the perception of something; aware of something.
  • * John Locke
  • He cannot think at any time, waking or sleeping, without being sensible of it.
  • * Addison
  • They are now sensible it would have been better to comply than to refuse.
  • Acting with or showing good sense; able to make good judgements based on reason.
  • * 2005 , .
  • They ask questions of someone who thinks he's got something sensible to say on some matter when actually he hasn't.
  • Characterized more by usefulness or practicality than by fashionableness, especially of clothing.
  • * 1999 , Neil Gaiman, Stardust (2001 Perennial Edition), page 8,
  • They would walk, on fair evenings, around the village, and discuss the theory of crop rotation, and the weather, and other such sensible matters.

    Usage notes

    * "Sensible" describes the reasonable way in which a person may think'' about things or ''do things: *: It wouldn't be sensible to start all over again now. * "Sensitive" describes an emotional way in which a person may react to things: *: He has always been a sensitive child. *: I didn’t realize she was so sensitive about her work.

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (obsolete) Sensation; sensibility.
  • * Milton
  • Our temper changed which must needs remove the sensible of pain.
  • (obsolete) That which impresses itself on the senses; anything perceptible.
  • * Krauth-Fleming
  • Aristotle distinguished sensibles into common and proper.
  • (obsolete) That which has sensibility; a sensitive being.
  • * Burton
  • This melancholy extends itself not to men only, but even to vegetals and sensibles .

    terrible

    English

    Adjective

    (en-adj)
  • Dreadful; causing alarm and fear.
  • Formidable, powerful.
  • * 1883: (Robert Louis Stevenson), (Treasure Island)
  • and there was even a party of the younger men who pretended to admire him, calling him a "true sea-dog," and "real old salt," and such-like names, and saying there was the sort of man that made England terrible at sea.
  • Intense; extreme in degree or extent.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
  • , chapter=18 citation , passage=‘Then the father has a great fight with his terrible conscience,’ said Munday with granite seriousness. ‘Should he make a row with the police […]? Or should he say nothing about it and condone brutality for fear of appearing in the newspapers?}}
  • Unpleasant; disagreeable.
  • * , chapter=12
  • , title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=To Edward […] he was terrible , nerve-inflaming, poisonously asphyxiating. He sat rocking himself in the late Mr. Churchill's swing chair, smoking and twaddling.}}
  • Very bad; lousy.
  • * {{quote-news, year=2012, date=April 26, author=Tasha Robinson, work=The Onion AV Club
  • , title= Film: Reviews: The Pirates! Band Of Misfits , passage=The openly ridiculous plot has The Pirate Captain (Hugh Grant) scheming to win the Pirate Of The Year competition, even though he’s a terrible pirate, far outclassed by rivals voiced by Jeremy Piven and Salma Hayek.}}

    Synonyms

    * See also