What's the difference between fathom and inscrutable?

Fathom


Definition:

  • (n.) A measure of length, containing six feet; the space to which a man can extend his arms; -- used chiefly in measuring cables, cordage, and the depth of navigable water by soundings.
  • (n.) The measure or extant of one's capacity; depth, as of intellect; profundity; reach; penetration.
  • (v. t.) To encompass with the arms extended or encircling; to measure by throwing the arms about; to span.
  • (v. t.) The measure by a sounding line; especially, to sound the depth of; to penetrate, measure, and comprehend; to get to the bottom of.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) But Erik Britton, of City consultancy Fathom, said: "The LTRO [long term refinancing operation] and all those things, all it's done is bought a bit of time, but it hasn't addressed the structural problems, even slightly, even for Greece."
  • (2) Another wonderful thing to do is to take a ferry from Tobermory to Fathom Five national marine park and swim to one of the many underwater wrecks.
  • (3) Fathoming of the vestibule below the central and inferior thirds of the footplate surface has shown that there is no likely danger to the vestibular end organs or cochlear duct if manipulations are carried out no deeper than 1 mm below the surface.
  • (4) Her dystopian imagination fathoms the darker parts of the US.
  • (5) Danny Gabay, director of City consultancy Fathom, says what Europe faces is fundamentally a banking crisis.
  • (6) Erik Britton, of the City consultancy Fathom, says one possibility is that borrowing costs everywhere will rise.
  • (7) Sometimes, even when it is not possible to fathom the direct cause of an event, the context in which it took place offers many clues.
  • (8) Speaking before signing a book of condolence on a lectern in the middle of Seville Place directly facing the church, the ex-prime minister said he could not fathom why the paper's columnist had launched what thousands have condemned as a homophobic attack on the singer's memory.
  • (9) Andrew Brigden, of City consultancy Fathom, said there was a one in three chance of a "double-dip" downturn in the world economy, and warned that with demand at home likely to be depressed as governments and overstretched households sorted out their finances, all the major economies would be pinning their hopes on exporting to foreign markets – but they could not all play that game at once.
  • (10) The relationship suffered, as did many of his other close relationships with family and friends who could not fathom what he had been through.
  • (11) It is impossible to fully fathom the depravity and horror inflicted on innocent people by Nazi terror.” Trump later pledged in the statement “to do everything in my power throughout my presidency, and my life, to ensure that the forces of evil never again defeat the powers of good”.
  • (12) Fathom argues instead for changes that would direct any fresh electronic cash at what it sees as the source of the UK's economic crisis: an overvalued UK housing market.
  • (13) Neither I, nor the CBS commentary team can fathom why the officials waited until Baltimore were just about to snap the ball on the next play, after a Cincinnati time-out, to call for the review.
  • (14) We want you gone.” “I still can’t fathom the thought that that’s me,” Rose told the Guardian.
  • (15) The deeply misjudged anti-nature narrative that has become embedded in political discourse is hard to fathom.
  • (16) Few journalists attempted to fathom the reason for his overwhelming victory in the Labour leadership contest in 2015 and few have sought systematically and impartially to explore the policies he has promoted as leader.
  • (17) Using similar measures the London-based consultancy Fathom estimates China is really growing at 3.1% a year, not 7%.
  • (18) Danny Gabay, of consultancy Fathom, accused the chancellor of encouraging households to take on even more debt, exposing them to the risk of a housing downturn.
  • (19) Cable is also addressing the widespread complaint that remuneration sections in annual reports are all but impossible for private investors to fathom.
  • (20) Right to the end Mobutu could not fathom how it was that tiny Rwanda had toppled his once monolithic regime.

Inscrutable


Definition:

  • (a.) Unsearchable; incapable of being searched into and understood by inquiry or study; impossible or difficult to be explained or accounted for satisfactorily; obscure; incomprehensible; as, an inscrutable design or event.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) A man named Moreno Facebook Twitter Pinterest Italy's players give chase to an inscrutable Byron Moreno, whose relationship with the country was only just beginning.
  • (2) It's hard to think of an artist who has remained quite so inscrutable while releasing quite so much music.
  • (3) Angry demonstrators have noted that Putin's tears are in stark contrast to his usually inscrutable, and even callous-seeming, behaviour on other big public occasions.
  • (4) 10.40am: Meanwhile this from the Guardian's football correspondent Kevin McCarra Capello's inscrutable when you try to work out his thoughts on team selection.
  • (5) The reign of Pius XII began in the month of Czechoslovakia's rape and ran its course through the terrible years of war and the inscrutable years of uncertain peace and technical revolution which followed.
  • (6) At the booth in between the never-was of Windsor and the has-been of Detroit, the officer I happened to draw had a gruff belly and the mysterious air of intentional inscrutability, like a troll under a bridge in a fairytale.
  • (7) On previous visits, the city had presented a rather inscrutable face.
  • (8) The words “power front row” conjure images of an inscrutable Anna Wintour, but in 2014 there are a lot of globally important front rows she doesn’t sit on.
  • (9) China’s anti-hegemonic aim, expressed in almost inscrutable prose, is to secure “tolerance among civilisations” and respect for the “modes of development chosen by different countries”.
  • (10) It is rather about the abuses of power elites, in government, academia, media, the judiciary and so forth, whose agendas are often opaque even to locals, and all the more inscrutable to unsuspecting foreigners.
  • (11) The camera cuts to Algeria manager Vahid Halilhodzic, who is sitting on his bench looking most inscrutable.
  • (12) The former Arsenal goalkeeper Jens Lehmann, up in the crowd, looked inscrutable but he surely approved.
  • (13) What they have in common is a tendency towards pragmatism, the ruthlessness common in national leaders and degrees of inscrutability which make it difficult to gauge where they will bend and where they will refuse to compromise.
  • (14) Another was the sight of the Queen, with trademark inscrutable expression, listening politely in the Radio 1 Live Lounge to a performance by singer Danny O'Donoghue, of the BBC talent show The Voice, and his band the Script, as they sang a cover version of David Bowie's song Heroes.
  • (15) The inscrutability of Garland – along with widespread accolades even from many conservatives – likely made him a particularly appealing candidate to Obama, as he challenges Republicans to lift their commitment to blocking any nominee to the supreme court during an election year.
  • (16) Comey entered the room at 10.02am to a chorus of clicking cameras, shook hands with chairman Richard Burr and sat behind a table, staring ahead inscrutably, his hands pressed together.
  • (17) There are campaign photographs of him, emerging from a motorcade in inscrutable shades, that ooze JFK panache.
  • (18) Opacity creates ample opportunities to hide anti-competitive, discriminatory, or simply careless conduct behind a veil of technical inscrutability.
  • (19) Exactly when and why this happened is uncertain, since Hill was always notoriously inscrutable about discussing his personal life.
  • (20) Its workings are inscrutable – near the end of this novel, Zakalwe is commanded to lose a war that he has been rather brilliantly winning on behalf of the Hegemonarchy, and he rather regretfully complies.