What's the difference between nameless and obscure?

Nameless


Definition:

  • (a.) Without a name; not having been given a name; as, a nameless star.
  • (a.) Undistinguished; not noted or famous.
  • (a.) Not known or mentioned by name; anonymous; as, a nameless writer.
  • (a.) Unnamable; indescribable; inexpressible.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) He has a fixation with islands (Cyprus, Sicily, The Tempest 's nameless "isle").
  • (2) But whereas the earlier book was set in a nameless African state, here the location is explicitly South Africa, where revolution has driven a white, liberal family out of Johannesburg into the protection of their servant, July, in a small village riven with its own conflicts which is none too happy to shelter them.
  • (3) In fact, I think critics have missed the point about Kafka's talking beasts: like the nameless ape in the story "Report to the Academy", they are absolutely human, and the means by which Kafka asserts that it is our inclinations to the political and the transcendent that must always be provisional, while our physicality cannot be brooked.
  • (4) This weekend the very accomplished Rona Fairhead, former FT chief executive and now the government’s choice to be the new chair of the BBC Trust, was described namelessly in a Telegraph headline as “mother of three.” It was decidedly reminiscent of that Sunday Times front page headline in April, “Grandmother, 71, tackles slave traffickers for the Pope” , sparking condescending mental images of a sweet little ol’ granny pummelling evil-doers with her cane.
  • (5) A 26-year-old resident of Jaffa who preferred to remain nameless said he had never voted before because it “wasn’t interesting.
  • (6) Celtic are in their traditional green and white hoops – a friend, she shall remain nameless, once tried to argue that Celtic's jersey was in fact stripes and not hoops – and Shakhter are clocking and rocking a natty orange number.
  • (7) The select committee said it was told by Sir Simon Jenkins "that he could remember very well a certain chancellor of the exchequer, who shall be nameless, inquiring as to what his memoirs might be worth and the answer was: 'A quarter of a million tomorrow, £100,000 next week, £10,000 two months from now.
  • (8) The Sun sought to have the gagging order lifted, arguing that Thomas's right to freedom of expression, covered by article 10 of the European convention on human rights, outweighed the footballer's right to remain nameless under article 8, the right to privacy.
  • (9) Another time, I interviewed an actor – who shall remain nameless – who made me cry because it had gone so horribly wrong.
  • (10) Euro 2016: the complete guide to every squad and every player in France Read more The character was unveiled in November 2014 , then nameless, at a France friendly, as the build-up to Euro 2016 began.
  • (11) According to one reader, who for the sake of his career shall remain nameless, ecstasy tablets on Merseyside at the time owed their nickname to a piece of rhyming slang derived from the former Liverpool defender Gary Ablett.
  • (12) The nameless man is the "perennial open mic act – frustrated and angry at the world, he blames women, minorities, everything for his lack of success".
  • (13) Dead African bodies are the nameless placeholders for ( unwarranted , racist ) “ panic ”, a conversation topic too heavy for the dinner table yet light enough for supermarket aisles.
  • (14) Sometimes, being nameless becomes tedious for the musicians themselves, as it has done for Swedish metal band Ghost.
  • (15) And don’t blame No 10 Downing Street or nameless advisers, blame me.
  • (16) The Good, The Bad & The Queen, by Damon Albarn's officially nameless band, was the company's first album available in the new format, along with the band's single Green Fields.
  • (17) The Time Inc vet has been in the mix all along and is now one of the candidates for CEO of the nameless venture being announced this morning.
  • (18) ON MY LAST DAY IN CULIACAN, I WANDER into a nameless cantina near the market and order a beer.
  • (19) Photograph: Patrick Barkham for the Guardian On a hilltop beyond the Northamptonshire village of Culworth, I stopped to admire the valley formed by a nameless tributary of the River Cherwell.
  • (20) "Now this spying is a more insidious force which has a chilling effect, where people don't use facilities that they could have used because of a nameless fear of something happening to them."

Obscure


Definition:

  • (superl.) Covered over, shaded, or darkened; destitute of light; imperfectly illuminated; dusky; dim.
  • (superl.) Of or pertaining to darkness or night; inconspicuous to the sight; indistinctly seen; hidden; retired; remote from observation; unnoticed.
  • (superl.) Not noticeable; humble; mean.
  • (superl.) Not easily understood; not clear or legible; abstruse or blind; as, an obscure passage or inscription.
  • (superl.) Not clear, full, or distinct; clouded; imperfect; as, an obscure view of remote objects.
  • (a.) To render obscure; to darken; to make dim; to keep in the dark; to hide; to make less visible, intelligible, legible, glorious, beautiful, or illustrious.
  • (v. i.) To conceal one's self; to hide; to keep dark.
  • (n.) Obscurity.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) This diagnosis was obscured by the absence of cutaneous, oropharyngeal, and respiratory involvement.
  • (2) The mechanism of ACTH action on brain catecholamine metabolism is still obscure, however, an increased release of the NA to ACTH peptides is very likely in the light of the present observations.
  • (3) However, peptide bonds between 193 and 194, and 194 and 195 were cleaved in the presence of mAb 1C3 as easily as in the presence of mAb 31A4, suggesting that the region of residues 200 to 202 was obscured by, or within the antibody binding site, but that the region of residues 193 to 195 was not.
  • (4) The physician's approach to the differential diagnosis of obscure, atypical pneumonias has changed.
  • (5) The thigh and hip manifestations can obscure the primary intra-abdominal process either due to the obvious emphysema or to the obtunded abdominal signs secondary to associated neuropathy.
  • (6) While tonic pupil and reduced sweating can be attributed to the affection of postganglionic cholinergic parasympathetic and sympathetic fibres projecting to the iris and sweat glands, respectively, the pathogenesis of diminished or lost tendon jerks remains obscure.
  • (7) It is found that generic averages obscure some rather substantial differences at the species level for both Cercopithecus and Cercocebus.
  • (8) Although the pathophysiology of the pancreatic injury is obscure, the lack of other etiological factors and temporal association of the pancreatitis with acetaminophen-induced hepatic and renal toxicity suggest a causal relationship.
  • (9) Because reticulocytes contain a pool of uncombined alpha chains which might have obscured the demonstration of an alpha chain-dependent mechanism for beta-chain synthesis, subsequent studies were done with bone marrow cells.
  • (10) However, the mechanism by which Ag II is able to modulate anterior pituitary secretion still remains obscure.
  • (11) Other causes were 20 (13%) with cerebrovascular diseases, 30 (20%) hepatic failure and 11 (8%) were of miscellaneous and obscure causes.
  • (12) In such a case with a large hematoma, the presence of a tumor may be obscured on CT scan and angiography.
  • (13) However, the difficulty still remains that the latter may be obscured by differences not related to thermostability etc.
  • (14) The activating mechanism of the condition still remains obscure.
  • (15) Its language is “archaic and obscure”, the commission says.
  • (16) Clofibrate, an antilipidemic drug that acts by a still obscure mechanism, is known to specifically increase up to 30-fold the activity of the hepatic cytochrome P-450 isozyme that omega-hydroxlates lauric acid.
  • (17) On the electron microscopy, the sarcomere was shortened and Z-line was partly obscure.
  • (18) Photographs of 82 boys from the Harpenden Growth Study were measured at ages 5 to 18 years, in an order that obscured which photographs were of the same boy at different ages.
  • (19) Although the K+ concentration of the contents of the GI tract as well as the K+ transport by the portal vein were increased, the source of the excess K+ remains obscure.
  • (20) The effects of long-term exposure of humans to formaldehyde, however, are more obscure.