to listen to reason
18
4.1
- idiom
- /ˈlɪsən tə ˈrizən/
:
entrar en razón
- Despite his initial anger, he eventually chose to listen to reason and agreed to compromise.
- refuses to listen to reason
- just listen to reason
- never listen to reason
Is he saying, well, some anger's OK and you know, it's just if you go too far and aren't listening to reason.
- Is he saying, well, some anger's OK and you know, it's just if you go too far and aren't listening to reason.
Examples
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She just won't listen to reason.
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For the sake of the country, please listen to reason.
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Yeah, I finally got them to listen to reason.
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But none of you will listen to reason.
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Finally someone who will listen to reason.
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Please... just listen to reason.
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You know, he just might listen to reason.
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Why don't you listen to reason?
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The problem with the GOP, apart from their policies, is that they won't listen to reason.
Blog text (18) -
We all know him as a man of his word—a modest man—he'll always listen to reason.
Blog text (31)
Synonyms
∞
1.0
Pay attention to advice or warnings and act on them
Antonyms
How Reasonable
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'to be willing to consider sensible advice or arguments' is directly derivable from combining 'listen' (attend to) with 'reason' (sensible argument); the preposition 'to' simply links the verb to its object. This is a straightforward compositional V + to + N pattern found across many languages, so a B1 learner who knows the constituents will very likely understand the expression.
Etymology
The phrase listen to reason comes from a simple image: imagine a calm voice called reason speaking to you and you listen to it. That's why it means 'to accept sensible advice' and stop being stubborn.