specious
15
8.7
- adjective
- /ˈspiːʃəs/
- Formal
:
falaz
- And the reasons that you give me for not asking are obviously specious.
- specious argument
- specious reasoning
- specious claim
Well, so I mean, I, why why are you being so specious, right.
- Well, so I mean, I, why why are you being so specious, right.
- Because people can build lies upon specious logic, right?
- I always think, although I hesitate to speculate about what would have happened, that kind of thinking is usually specious, but it's it is a fact.
- So we live in the specious present under the illusion that we experience each moment exactly as it happens.
- And, and I've just been shocked that a number of leaders in the Central Valley continue to want to raise what I think are spurious, specious issues.
- And he says, well, this is specious because the knowledge of this substance would be outside of the complex of experience.
Examples
-
We now consider such reasoning specious; although some people can smoke to excess without harm, smoking is clearly dangerous.
Academic text (2006) -
A Republican congresswoman from New York thinks "it's a specious argument" that affiliating with a political party diminishes officer professionalism.
Academic text (2001) -
The debate about whether schools have internal or external customers is specious because we have too many customers.
Academic text (1993) -
The argument is rhetorically effective but specious, as W. J. T. Mitchell has shown.
Academic text (2013) -
Her main objective was to challenge the specious and widely accepted cultural information disseminated by other anthropologists.
Academic text (2018) -
That whole thing is such a specious argument because, yes, we're every bit as efficient, especially if you plug in all of the inefficiencies of the industrial system.
-
Honest and even enlightened men are sometimes misled by the specious and plausible statements of the designing.
Blog text (12) -
Tied in with this should be tort reform to discourage specious lawsuits, bringing down malpractice and healthcare costs.
Blog text (4) -
Also, the IPCC based their warming theory on a specious non-existent causal correlation between CO2 and temperatures.
Blog text (12) -
Many people were misled by the specious claims made during the debate.
Synonyms
263
2.8
Not real and made to trick people
148
4.4
Giving a wrong idea that makes people believe false things
14
7.9
Not real or true, often made to seem true
13
8.3
Making people believe things that are not true
7
7.5
Seeming to be true but maybe not real
1
9.9
Using arguments that seem true but are meant to trick
1
9.9
Seeming logical but actually wrong and meant to mislead
Seeming believable because it matches feelings rather than real proof
Antonyms
Compounds
How Deceptive
Surface Forms
Morphology
specious = speci + ous
Although the suffix '-ous' is visible, the stem 'speci-' is a Latin combining form that is not a standalone English word and is not recognisable to average learners, so the word's meaning ('deceptively attractive') cannot be reliably inferred from its parts.
Etymology
Specious comes from the Latin speciosus, built on the root spec- meaning 'to look', the same root you see in spectacle. So a specious argument 'looks' good on the outside but is actually false.