Sophistry
['sɒfɪstrɪ] or ['sɑfɪstri]
Definition
(n.) The art or process of reasoning; logic.
(n.) The practice of a sophist; fallacious reasoning; reasoning sound in appearance only.
Inputed by Antonia
Synonyms and Synonymous
n. Paralogy, paralogism, false logic, fallacious reasoning, flaw in the argument, inconclusive reasoning, reasoning in a circle, begging the question.
Editor: Tess
Synonyms and Antonyms
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Checker: Pamela
Unserious Contents or Definition
n. The controversial method of an opponent distinguished from one's own by superior insincerity and fooling. This method is that of the later Sophists a Grecian sect of philosophers who began by teaching wisdom prudence science art and in brief whatever men ought to know but lost themselves in a maze of quibbles and a fog of words.
Checked by Lemuel
Examples
- It presented itself to her, with no sophistry upon it, in its own plain nature. Charles Dickens. Little Dorrit.
- Humphrey, that is all sophistry, and you know it, said his wife. George Eliot. Middlemarch.
- I may feel--nay, know--that in uniting herself to Mr Rokesmith she has united herself to one who is, in spite of shallow sophistry, a Mendicant. Charles Dickens. Our Mutual Friend.
- This I believe in; but this court should also contain at least two scientific men, who would not be blind to the sophistry of paid experts. Frank Lewis Dyer. Edison, His Life and Inventions.
- For him the teachings of Adam Smith and Turgot were idle sophistries. Walter Libby. An Introduction to the History of Science.
- Duty is duty, John, and no amount of sophistries may change it. Edgar Rice Burroughs. Tarzan of the Apes.
Inputed by Leila