What's the difference between fail and fault?

Fail


Definition:

  • (v. i.) To be wanting; to fall short; to be or become deficient in any measure or degree up to total absence; to cease to be furnished in the usual or expected manner, or to be altogether cut off from supply; to be lacking; as, streams fail; crops fail.
  • (v. i.) To be affected with want; to come short; to lack; to be deficient or unprovided; -- used with of.
  • (v. i.) To fall away; to become diminished; to decline; to decay; to sink.
  • (v. i.) To deteriorate in respect to vigor, activity, resources, etc.; to become weaker; as, a sick man fails.
  • (v. i.) To perish; to die; -- used of a person.
  • (v. i.) To be found wanting with respect to an action or a duty to be performed, a result to be secured, etc.; to miss; not to fulfill expectation.
  • (v. i.) To come short of a result or object aimed at or desired ; to be baffled or frusrated.
  • (v. i.) To err in judgment; to be mistaken.
  • (v. i.) To become unable to meet one's engagements; especially, to be unable to pay one's debts or discharge one's business obligation; to become bankrupt or insolvent.
  • (v. t.) To be wanting to ; to be insufficient for; to disappoint; to desert.
  • (v. t.) To miss of attaining; to lose.
  • (v. i.) Miscarriage; failure; deficiency; fault; -- mostly superseded by failure or failing, except in the phrase without fail.
  • (v. i.) Death; decease.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Intrathecal injection of zopiclone potentiated morphine antinociception, while the intracerebroventricular injection of zopiclone failed to enhance morphine antinociception and the intracerebroventricular injection of flumazepil to antagonize the intraperitoneal-zopiclone-induced increase in morphine antinociception.
  • (2) However, ticks, which failed to finish their feeding and represent a disproportionately great part of the whole parasite's population, die together with them and the parasitic system quickly restores its stability.
  • (3) The inquiry found the law enforcement agencies routinely fail to record the professions of those whose communications data records they access under Ripa.
  • (4) It is suggested that the normal cyclical release of LH is inhibited in PCO disease by a negative feedback by androgens to the hypothalamus or the pituitary, and that wedge resection should be reserved for patients in whom other forms of treatment have failed.
  • (5) Endoscopic retrograde cholangiography failed to demonstrate any bile ducts in the right postero-lateral segments of the liver, the "naked segment sign".
  • (6) Several efforts to extradite Polanski to California have failed.
  • (7) Administration of aminonucleoside and daunomycin produced proteinuria but did not cause a decrease in lipid P. Anticollagen and anti-lymphocyte sera that attached to the basement membrane but failed to produce proteinuria, also failed to affect the phospholipid content.
  • (8) An official inquiry into the Rotherham abuse scandal blamed failings by Rotherham council and South Yorkshire police.
  • (9) Amid the acrimony of the failed debate on the Malaysia Agreement, something was missed or forgotten: many in the left had changed their mind.
  • (10) Four of the nine patients failed to show any clinical or hematological improvement.
  • (11) In cases in which CT was also performed, it revealed corresponding hypodensities in two infarctions, but failed to reveal the foci of gliosis (or noncavital infarction), demyelination, or brain cyst.
  • (12) Even in the failed cases, 25-42% of subjects considered the treatment as good.
  • (13) Dzeko he has failed to hold down a starting berth since his £27m move in January 2011.
  • (14) Prothrombin isolation on DEAE Sephadex failed to separate the abnormal population (prothrombin Clamart) from the normal one.
  • (15) The starting point is the idea that the current system, because it works against biodiversity but fails to increase productivity, is broken.
  • (16) Other than failing to get a goal, I couldn’t ask for anything more.” From Lambert’s perspective there was an element of misfortune about the first and third goals, with Willian benefitting from handy ricochets on both occasions.
  • (17) In contrast, albino rats and rabbits failed to succumb to overt disease by subcutaneous and intraperitoneal routes of inoculation.
  • (18) It was recently demonstrated that MRL-lpr lymphoid cells transferred into lethally irradiated MRL- +mice unexpectedly failed to induce the early onset of lupus syndrome and massive lymphadenopathy of the donor, instead they caused a severe wasting syndrome resembling graft-vs-host (GvH) disease.
  • (19) In the controlled wound care group, only three ulcers in three patients achieved complete healing; the remaining 24 ulcers in 20 patients failed to achieve even 50% healing in the stipulated 3-month period.
  • (20) The former Stoke City manager Pulis had reportedly been left frustrated by the club failing to push through deals for various players he targeted to strengthen the Palace squad.

Fault


Definition:

  • (n.) Defect; want; lack; default.
  • (n.) Anything that fails, that is wanting, or that impairs excellence; a failing; a defect; a blemish.
  • (n.) A moral failing; a defect or dereliction from duty; a deviation from propriety; an offense less serious than a crime.
  • (n.) A dislocation of the strata of the vein.
  • (n.) In coal seams, coal rendered worthless by impurities in the seam; as, slate fault, dirt fault, etc.
  • (n.) A lost scent; act of losing the scent.
  • (n.) Failure to serve the ball into the proper court.
  • (v. t.) To charge with a fault; to accuse; to find fault with; to blame.
  • (v. t.) To interrupt the continuity of (rock strata) by displacement along a plane of fracture; -- chiefly used in the p. p.; as, the coal beds are badly faulted.
  • (v. i.) To err; to blunder, to commit a fault; to do wrong.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) If Cory Bernardi wasn’t currently in a period of radio silence as he contemplates his immediate political future he’d be all over this too, mining the Trumpocalypse – or in our domestic context, mining the fertile political fault line where Coalition support intersects with One Nation support.
  • (2) The most common seenario was a vehicle-vehicle collision in which seat belts were not used and the decedent or the decedent's driver was at fault.
  • (3) The venture capitalist argued in his report, commissioned by the Downing Street policy guru Steve Hilton, in favour of "compensated no fault-dismissal" for small businesses.
  • (4) As he told us: 'Individual faults and frailties are no excuse to give in and no exemption from the common obligation to give of ourselves.'
  • (5) Whatever their other faults, most Republicans running for office this year do not share Trump’s unwillingness to condemn the Ku Klux Klan.
  • (6) There could be no faulting the atmosphere or the football drama.
  • (7) People think it must be your fault that you’re in this position; it isn’t.
  • (8) Defense Mechanism Test applied to a subgroup of 20 patients suggested that high perceptual defense may be related to injury occurrence in patients at fault for the accident.
  • (9) Yes, if it helps kill the idea that autism is somebody's "fault".
  • (10) The SEM photographs demonstrated the faults which can be eliminated by the use of a stereomicroscope and showed also those which derive from the physical and chemical properties of the amalgam.
  • (11) He said the incident happened after Hookem told Woolfe it was his own fault he did not get his nomination papers in on time.
  • (12) The result is a very satisfactory isolation of the wound, eliminating faults in aseptic technique but requiring fresh sterilisation for each new procedure.
  • (13) Another issue that deserves attention is the impact on future generations, because biological faults introduced by the technique could be handed down from one generation to the next.
  • (14) I’m not someone to gloss over the BBC’s faults, problems or challenges – I see it as part of my job to identify and pursue them.
  • (15) Despite all these fault lines, China is not going to collapse; it is far too resilient for that.
  • (16) Proper provision of ground-fault circuit interrupter protection, particularly at temporary work sites, could have prevented most of the deaths from 110-volt AC.
  • (17) These achievements, and faults, will find stark contrast with Trump’s administration; certainly Trump’s nominations for key positions in his cabinet that relate to climate change have prompted alarm by experts and campaigners.
  • (18) Cameron did give ground by saying that "no fault dismissal" would only apply to micro companies and not to every employer in the country.
  • (19) The failures were mostly related to technical faults.
  • (20) These more complex units call for new methods of fault detection and diagnosis.