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Glite Dictionary
to fathom why

to fathom why

4 7.0
To understand the reason for something that seems puzzling
  • phrasal verb
: entender por qué
  • I cannot fathom why so many previous comments are hostile.
  • hard to fathom why
  • difficult to fathom why
  • still can't fathom why

Like, I couldn't fathom why you would want to do that job, right?

Examples

  • Martin couldn't fathom why everything was so complicated.

    Fiction book (1996)

  • At this point, I cannot fathom why that seemed so bad, frankly.

    Blog text (9)

  • None of them could fathom why this should be so.

    Fiction book (1994)

  • It's really not that hard to fathom why this poorly placed sign might pose a risk.

    Blog text (5)

  • I just can't fathom why you did it.

    Charlie Bartlett (2008)

  • I can't even fathom why this happened.

    Blog text (26)

  • Norman couldn't begin to fathom why she would want to start over as a lab tech, but there it was.

    Fiction book (2002)

  • They could not fathom why Defoe was reluctant to turn in people who saved his life.

    Fiction book (2000)

  • I can't fathom why they'd pass up the Smithsonian for the dumpster.

    Blog text (9)

  • I can never quite fathom why he makes those peculiar choices.

Synonyms

to grok
vsto fathom why
  • Jargon
3 9.9

To understand something deeply and naturally

focuses on finding a reason for puzzling or difficult cases

How Understood

to fathom why
4 7.0
to grasp
146 4.1
to understand
∞ 1.0
to think
∞ 1.0
to suspect
925 3.6
to guess
∞ 1.0

Surface Forms

fathom why infinitive
fathomed why past
fathomed why past participle
fathoming why present participle
fathoms why third person singular

Morphology

fathom + why

The meaning is directly compositional: 'fathom' means to comprehend and 'why' refers to the reason, so a learner who knows both words can infer 'to understand the reason for something'. The combination follows a straightforward verb + noun pattern found across languages, making the MWE transparently interpretable.

Etymology

The phrase fathom why comes from old sailors. Sailors used a marked rope called a 'fathom' to measure the sea and find its bottom, so to fathom something came to mean 'reach the bottom' of an idea, and that's why fathom why means 'to understand the reason'.