5/12/14 Flashcards
Bumble
Noun: 1) a humming noise; a bluster.
2) A confusion; a jumble.
Verb: 1) a. intr. To boom, as a bittern; to buzz, as a fly. Also transf.
b. To speak ramblingly, to drone on (in some examples influenced by).
- You can quite happily bumble on without too much trouble if that’s what you want.
- His style of oratory is peculiar, as he bumbles along like a metaphysical farmer.
- If you are listening to speech and at the same time envisioning it in print, you can ask your question again, and again, until the repeated reply will be clear in print…Reporters call that creative bumbling.
2) a. intr. To blunder, flounder.
-We bumble, we misrepresent. At a point in history when invasions of electronic privacy are mostly the product of corporations and governments, and when online privacy seems ever more likely to become a luxury good that we’ll have to pay for, it can be helpful to lay claim to our own culpability, too.
b. trans. To bungle over; to do in a bungling manner.
**Thes: **Blunder, boggle, muff, muddle, botch, mar, butcher, gaffe
Innumerate
Adj: 1) Unacquainted with the basic principles and ideas of mathematics and science.
- It alleges that one student in every four entering colleges has had no sixth form experience, and that up to one-fifth are ‘practically innumerate’.
- In the course of writing, you really find out what you don’t know, and yo read in an attempt to get it right. Nonetheless, you get it wrong, especially if you are an innumerate English major and you are writing about science.
Noun) One who is innumerate; freq. (with the) in pl. sense.
Exoscopic
adj. viewing from the outside; having regard to external appearances or relations.
-Rawalt was talking petrology, mineralogy, crystallography, the solubility of quartz, and the exoscopic study of sands.
Impregnable
1) 1. Of a fortress or stronghold: That cannot be taken by arms, incapable of being reduced by force; capable of holding out against all attacks.
I called a couple of times a day–day after day after day–and tha calls were not returned, by company people in Omaha who had earlier given me a week of invaluable orientation, including visits to the Union Pacific rail yard in Council Bluffs, Iowa, and to the “bunker,” an impregnable building in Omahawhere dispatchers control everything that is happening on nineteen thousand miles of track.
2. fig. That cannot be overcome or vanquished; invincible, unconquerable, proof against attack.
- In a television interview given in Kharkiv on Saturday after protesters hadtaken control of his offices, his palatial residence outside Kiev and other once-impregnable centers of power, Mr. Yanukovych complained indignantly that the events in Kiev had prevented him from attending a Soviet-style congress in Kharkiv of politicians and dignitaries from eastern and southern Ukraine.
- who made Barcelona the best club side on earth also helped to make Spain seemingly impregnable in international competitions since 2008.
Thes: inpenetrable, unassailable, insuperable, indomitable, unyielding, avalanchine
Fetid
Having an offensive odor; stinking.
-Aerial shots depict this slum as a fetid, desiccated wasteland, in which the pickings are thin, even for scavengers.
** b. fig.**
-The fetid atmosphere of a court.
**Malodorous: **asphyxiating (to suffocate); fetor; effluvium/ia; fusty; fecal; fulsome; halitosis; mephitic; musty; miasmal (*freq. Fig); niff and pong; *noisome; noxious; rancid; rank; reeky.
**Filthy: **putrid; scuzzy; sordid; squalid.
**Offensive: coarse; crude; **odious; repugnant; uncouth
Obviate
1. to circumvent, do away with, remove (a difficulty, need, etc.); to prevent or avoid by anticipatory measures.
- This internal funding will obviate the need for subsidies.
- But technology has infinite capacity to obviate even the tiniest of life’s inconveniences. All you need now is an app and a few dollars.
- So I suppose my research methods haven’t changed all that much, though the Internet is faster, easier and (obviating library trips and the lugging around of heavy books) burns fewer calories, sadly.
**THES: **Avert; parry; deflect; thwart; preclude;
Verbiage
** 1. Wording of a superabundant or superfluous character, abundance of words without necessity or without much meaning; excessive wordiness.**
-That’s a hop, skip and a jump from South Bend. I’m sure it is the same seller. I recognize the verbiage. I don’t recall for certain but it’s probably the same car.
2. Diction, wording, verbal expression.
Beget
verb
**1. (especially of a male parent) to procreate or generate (offspring). **
2. to cause; produce as an effect: a belief that power begets power.
Specious
1) apparently good or right though lacking real merit; superficiallypleasing or plausible: specious arguments.
The Koch brothers’ Americans for Prosperity applauded the Ohio bill, naturally, making the specious claim that that the renewable requirement would have cost consumers money.
2) pleasing to the eye but deceptive.
Gloze
1) to explain away; extenuate; gloss over (usually followed byover ).
2. trans. To veil with specious comments; to palliate; to explain away, extenuate. Frequently with over; †also with out.
Strident
**1. making or having a harsh sound; grating; creaking: strident insects; strident hinges. **
2. having a shrill, irritating quality or character: a strident tone in his writings.
b. Phonetics. Of the articulation of a consonantal sound: characterized by friction that is comparatively turbulent. Also as n., a consonant articulated in this way.
Epithet
1) a. An adjective indicating some quality or attribute which the speaker or writer regards as characteristic of the person or thing described.
2) A significant appellation.
Peremptory
1) Leaving no opportunity for denial or refusal; imperative: a peremptory command.
2) Imerious or dictatorial.
** I. Admitting no debate; decisive, conclusive. 1. Law. Thesaurus » Categories » **
**a. That precludes further question or debate; admitting no refusal; spec.that quashes or ends an action if upheld, **
3. b. peremptory challenge n. an objection to a potential juror made by counsel without obligation to give a reason.
simulacrum (a)
1. A slight, unreal, or superficial likeness or semblance
2. An effigy, image, or representation: **A simulacrum of Aphrodite.
Unwonted
not customary or usual; rare.
Unwonted kindness
