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.