phantasm
4
9.9
- noun
- /ˈfænˌtæzəm/
- Literature
:
fantasma
- But then the beauty that you're seeing in the viewfinder is so astounding that you have to check for real to make sure you're actually seeing it, and it's not just some phantasm of shadow and light.
- an intelligible phantasm
It doesn't make sense, but phantasms aren't supposed to.
- It doesn't make sense, but phantasms aren't supposed to.
Examples
-
Ethics is a dream, and tenderness a daytime phantasm, lost when night comes.
Fiction book (1998) -
In his dream, he encountered a phantasm that seemed all too real, but vanished upon waking.
-
The eyes of the small phantasm behind it appeared to search for someone in the crowd.
Fiction book (1991) -
Are they looking for Morocco or are they looking for this phantasm?
-
I'm miserable until I realize it is only the phantasm, and I am free.
Fiction book (1995) -
Did you see the way the old man's phantasm fought against returning to this corrupt form of life?
Fiction book (1991) -
In her phantasm, searching for her one true love, she encountered my son, Todor.
-
People use phantasms to avoid cognitive dissonance in the face of anxiety.
-
There is the striking sense that the entire monument announces its status as a phantasm or simulacrum.
Academic text (2002) -
"The old man's phantasm writhed, rippled in a wind that only it could feel."
Fiction book (1991)
Synonyms
319
4.6
A false idea or appearance that makes you think something is true
140
7.5
A false experience in which you see or hear something not there
81
6.7
A ghost or spirit that people think they see
56
8.6
A ghost that people say appears and frightens them at night
33
6.4
Something made up in your mind that is not real
19
8.9
A ghost that people see suddenly
1
7.9
Seeing things that are not really there because the brain sends wrong signals
1
9.9
A ghost-like figure that seems real but is not
1
9.5
A spirit without a body that appears to people or stays near places
Ghostly images that appear in dreams or in the mind
A ghost that appears to people
Antonyms
How Real
- Literature
19
8.9
- Literature
4
9.9
140
7.5
848
3.8
33
6.4
Surface Forms
Etymology
Phantasm comes from a Greek root phant- meaning 'to appear' or 'to show', and you can see the same root in the familiar word phantom. So a phantasm is something that seems to be there but is not, like a ghost or an image from the imagination.