nonsensical

See also: non-sensical

English

Alternative forms

• nonsensic (very rare)
• non-sensical

Etymology

From nonsense +‎ -ical.

Adjective

nonsensical (comparative more nonsensical, superlative most nonsensical)

1. Without sense; absurd.

   Synonyms: meaningless, unmeaning, absurd, foolish, irrational, preposterous

   Antonyms: comprehensible, commonsensical, logical, rational, sensible, sensical

   • 1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “Prudence in Politics”, in Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 179:

     Well, her very foolish grandmother has mixed herself up in some nonsensical correspondence with the court of St. Germains; or, rather, has let herself be made a tool by Mr. Trevanion, who, I am happy to say, is not Ethel's husband; they arrested him just in time.

Usage notes

• The form non-sensical is much less common while nonsensic is extremely rare.^[1]
• Webster 1828 defined this as "Unmeaning; absurd; foolish." Webster 1913 defined this as "Without sense; unmeaning; absurd; foolish; irrational; preposterous."

Related terms

• nonsense
• nonsensible
• senseless

Collocations

Nouns often used with "nonsensical"

words, things, idea, notion, results, question, language, way, talk, statement, situation, story, argument, reasons, stuff, books, jargon, theory, assumption, interpretation

Translations

without sense

Armenian: անիմաստ (hy) (animast) Bikol Central: daing hawong Bulgarian: глупав (bg) (glupav), безсмислен (bg) (bezsmislen) Czech: nesmyslný (cs) m Danish: absurd Dutch: betekenisloos (nl), zinloos (nl), onzinnig (nl) Esperanto: sensenca Finnish: järjetön (fi), tolkuton (fi), mieletön (fi), järjenvastainen (fi) French: absurde (fr), sans queue ni tête (fr) Galician: absurdo (gl) m German: sinnwidrig, unsinnig (de), widersinnig (de) Hebrew: שטותי (shtutí), אבסורדי (absúrdi) Hungarian: képtelen (hu), abszurd (hu), nonszensz (hu), értelmetlen (hu) Japanese: 意味不明な (imifumeina) Latin: nūgax Manx: meecheeallagh Maori: nenekara Plautdietsch: onsennich Polish: nonsensowny, bezsensowny (pl) Russian: бессмы́сленный (ru) (bessmýslennyj), неле́пый (ru) (nelépyj) Thai: ไร้สาระ (th) (rái-sǎa-rá) Turkish: saçma (tr), saçma sapan (tr), abes (tr), abuk sabuk (tr), abidik gubidik (tr), absürt (tr)

References

1. nonsensical,([non - sensical*100),(nonsensic*10000)] at the Google Books Ngram Viewer.

Further reading

• “nonsensical”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• “nonsensical”, in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th edition, Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016, →ISBN.
• “nonsensical”, in Collins English Dictionary.
• “nonsensical” (US) / “nonsensical” (UK) in Macmillan English Dictionary.
• "nonsensical" in WordNet 3.1, Princeton University, 2011.