What's the difference between absurd and preposterous?

Absurd


Definition:

  • (a.) Contrary to reason or propriety; obviously and fiatly opposed to manifest truth; inconsistent with the plain dictates of common sense; logically contradictory; nonsensical; ridiculous; as, an absurd person, an absurd opinion; an absurd dream.
  • (n.) An absurdity.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) But Steven Brounstein, a lawyer for one of the officers, said: 'For the DA to be equating this case to a drive-by shooting is absurd.
  • (2) Historically, what made SNL’s campaign coverage so necessary was its ability to highlight the subtle absurdities of the election and exaggerate the ridiculous.
  • (3) In any halfway-awake western nation, and, to be frank, in many reaches of British national life, this would be considered an amateurish absurdity, a guarantee of eventual failure.
  • (4) But the same court also just refused to hear an appeal of a Minnesota woman who's been ordered to pay more than $220,000 for downloading two-dozen songs – a testament to Congress' gift to Hollywood and its allies in the form of absurdly stiff penalties for minor infringement.
  • (5) I think the heart of good comedy really lives in truth and reacting to the absurdities, hypocrisies, abuses of power in the world.” Late night television is a no longer a glass of warm milk before bed, it’s a lunch buffet And as TV viewership declines and internet virality becomes as important as real-time eyeballs, cable networks might find that topical comedy is a smart, cost-effective way to grab cross-platform attention.
  • (6) It might seem absurd, but she also fretted about the horrendous poll tax bills received by people she knew, people she knew couldn't pay.
  • (7) He would have seen the absurdity in a chancellor admitting that his sums are so badly out that Britain will borrow more than double this year than the £37bn he originally promised – and claiming that as a triumph.
  • (8) The idea that opposition to the renewal of Trident is an extreme policy confined to the British left is absurd.
  • (9) SC, Manchester Spark Energy, one of Britain's smaller electricity suppliers, failed to notice that your bill was absurd.
  • (10) British officials said it was absurd that at one point Merkel seemed to want to remove most references to the eurozone crisis from the communique.
  • (11) Harry Kane, reminding everyone how absurd it was to think his confidence might be broken, may just have to accept this will not be a night that is remembered for his goal.
  • (12) Karl Habsburg-Lothringen supported his cousin's action: "The Habsburg law is absurd, there's nothing else to be said about it.
  • (13) In fact, the body of evidence about how much it matters is mushrooming, so that it seems almost absurd to anyone who knows anything about children's development that we still think that a baby's physical health at the birth is all that matters.
  • (14) Iain Duncan Smith and Chris Grayling breached all those, absurdly calling objectors 'job snobs'.
  • (15) Last month, along with Slovenia, Croatia and non-EU members Serbia and Macedonia, Austria – which has rejected Brussels’ criticism of its policy as “absurd” – imposed strict new restrictions, including a daily cap on the number of asylum seekers and migrants they would allow to enter their territory.
  • (16) Absurdly, the shops lack local staples – sugar, milk, flour – but are well stocked with subsidised imports such as single-malt whisky and Italian panettone.
  • (17) The idea that human breastmilk may not be good enough for human babies is clearly absurd.
  • (18) The woman snaps out of bed and opens her eyes, absurdly conscious and alive, wonderfully lucid.
  • (19) We are talking here about the absurd.” Ah, the absurd.
  • (20) Each sentence seems more absurd than the last until you are finally and irredeemably overwhelmed by its relentless meaningful meaninglessness.

Preposterous


Definition:

  • (a.) Having that first which ought to be last; inverted in order.
  • (a.) Contrary to nature or reason; not adapted to the end; utterly and glaringly foolish; unreasonably absurd; perverted.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Reading these latest statistics, it’s crucial that our generation – millennials, Gen Y, whatever we want to call ourselves – abandons this preposterous narrative.
  • (2) You could understand why the Met was frantic to find who had stabbed Rachel Nickell 49 times on Wimbledon Common while her screaming child looked on, but the case against Stagg was preposterous.
  • (3) Preposterous claims by ministers that cutting tax credits means “cultural change” for people already in work show how far this is from being the “workers’ party”.
  • (4) The league looks more preposterous still, however, if you simply ignore Muresul Deva for a moment.
  • (5) China's foreign ministry called the allegations preposterous and accused the US of double standards.
  • (6) So I said: "Isn't it preposterous that you're so cheap?"
  • (7) Most preposterous has been the British prime minister David Cameron lecturing Greeks on their responsibilities from outside the eurozone .
  • (8) This is why, preposterously, America is able to confirm plans to send four shiny F-16 fighter jets to Egyptian military on Thursday, while still talking democracy and inclusion for Egypt's transitional process.
  • (9) "It is perplexing and preposterous to hear human rights complaints from the US, where torture and kidnapping are legal in the 21st century."
  • (10) But the State Department's indignation over the leaks of allegedly valuable secrets was, and remains, preposterous.
  • (11) There's the pot that presidential hopefuls admit to having smoked in a youthful-experiment-type way, and there's the pot criminals currently serving life sentences under preposterous three strikes legislation were caught with.
  • (12) In common usage, “myth” is at best the word we use to refer to amusingly preposterous urban legends – tales about albino alligators in the Manhattan sewers or the Holy Grail’s hiding place under the floor of a Paris shopping mall.
  • (13) What happens, we’ve seen as a case study, is what happened in Greece.” He added: “I think she was suggesting if Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party got the chance to impose its fiscal policies on the United Kingdom that is a very real threat.” A spokesman for Corbyn described the claims as “preposterous”.
  • (14) The notion that it might start with another body on another beach seemed preposterous if not a little cheapening of what went before.
  • (15) That the LMA has sought to criticise the club for the timing of the report to the FA is preposterous, because the offensive communications have been in the knowledge and possession of the LMA for many months.
  • (16) Miliband, as I observed some time ago in a piece for ConservativeHome , should have dismissed as a preposterous anachronism the Tory attack on the trade union link.
  • (17) A nurse who faces being struck off over a botched Ebola screening at Heathrow airport has said it is “preposterous” that she would have concealed knowledge that Pauline Cafferkey was unwell.
  • (18) The size of the hole that Iran is in,” Szubin said, “we’re talking about a hole that could be described in one sense as a $200bn hole, which are the losses that we assess they’ve suffered since 2012 due to sanctions.” However the representatives had little patience for many of Blinken’s arguments, with Democrat Brad Sherman saying it was “preposterous” to believe Iran would adhere to a deal.
  • (19) Barroso's comments provoked a furious response from senior SNP figures, who said his views were "pretty preposterous" and based on a false comparison.
  • (20) Taking aim at a "preposterously over-regulated system," Johnson also claims that "bureaucracy and politial correctness is gradually asphyxiating the BBC".