What's the difference between stubborn and wilful?

Stubborn


Definition:

  • (a.) Firm as a stub or stump; stiff; unbending; unyielding; persistent; hence, unreasonably obstinate in will or opinion; not yielding to reason or persuasion; refractory; harsh; -- said of persons and things; as, stubborn wills; stubborn ore; a stubborn oak; as stubborn as a mule.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) It has announced a four-stage programme of reforms that will tackle most of these stubborn and longstanding problems, including Cinderella issues such as how energy companies treat their small business customers.
  • (2) Of course there are some who are stubborn, like Robert Mugabe.
  • (3) The prime minister insisted, however, that he and other world leaders were not being stubborn over demands that the Syrian leader, President Bashar al-Assad, step down at the end of the peace process.
  • (4) It’s clear their relationship is most similar to that of a stubborn son and his long suffering mother.
  • (5) The contrast between these two worlds – one legal and flourishing, the other illegal and stubbornly disregarding of state lines – can seem baffling, yet it may have profound consequences for whether this unique experiment spreads.
  • (6) The causes of failure after acute injury include extensive local soft tissue and bony damage, severe concomitant head, chest or abdominal wounding, stubborn reliance on negative arteriograms in patients with probable arterial injury, failure to repair simultaneous venous injuries, or harvesting of a vein graft from a severely damaged extremity.
  • (7) "It was the character of David Cameron – his stubbornness, his anger and his rush towards war – which was the central cause of his defeat on Thursday night."
  • (8) Rebus, promised the Scottish author, will be "as stubborn and anarchic as ever", and will find himself in trouble with the author's latest creation, Malcolm Fox, of Edinburgh's internal affairs unit.
  • (9) A rising jobless total and an unemployment rate sticking at a stubbornly high 8% overshadowed a better than expected 27,100 fall in the claimant count in April, which compared with analysts' forecasts for a 20,000 drop.
  • (10) But the part of me that resists that, that is stubborn and wants to bulldoze things, gets in my way.
  • (11) One is the stubborn mystery of how a giant of its liberation movements, an intellectual who showed forgiveness and magnanimity years before Mandela emerged from jail, could turn into the living caricature of despotism.
  • (12) Sanctioning is no longer a last resort tactic aimed at the stubbornly workshy, say critics, but a crude way of pushing down claimant numbers and cutting back on the benefits bill.
  • (13) He was only 29 at the time, but nevertheless had that kind of stubborn certainty.
  • (14) They have a sort of stubbornness.” He later deals with hecklers at a Fifa HQ press event : “Listen, gentlemen, we are not in a bazaar .
  • (15) Dombrovskis stubbornly refused, instead pursuing "internal devaluation", depressing wages and conducting what he says was a 17% fiscal adjustment programme (the IMF says 15%).
  • (16) They formed a stubborn line in front of Wojciech Szczesny’s goal even if the statistics showed Arsenal’s pass-completion rate went down from 89% in the first half to 66% in the second.
  • (17) This was the first time a grouping of BME senior managers crossing health and social care had met together to look at barriers to gaining top jobs, and ways of breaking through systems which stubbornly never seem to shift.
  • (18) Broadly defined, this sort of behaviour involves procrastination, stubbornness, resentment, sullenness, obstructionism, self-pity and a tendency to create chaotic situations.
  • (19) At which point – obviously – you reach the stubborn limits of the debate: from even the most supposedly imaginative Labour people as much as any Tories, such heresies would presumably be greeted with sneering derision.
  • (20) A stubborn negativity characterised the insurrection.

Wilful


Definition:

  • (n.) Alt. of Wilfulness

Example Sentences:

  • (1) For 2 of the cell lines (A549 and WIL) 2.2 microM verapamil increased VP16 cytotoxicity (up to 4-fold).
  • (2) According to the document, Rupert Murdoch "did not take steps to become fully informed about phone hacking" and "turned a blind eye and exhibited wilful blindness to what was going on in his companies and publications".
  • (3) The FSA for its part is due to publish its own proposals on banking reform this week, and its recipe wil look less bold than King's speech, possibly reflecting the continuing tensions between the Bank and the FSA.
  • (4) David Cameron suggests that the prospect of giving prisoners the vote makes him feel physically ill. For a man with such an apparently delicate constitution, it is surprising that wilfully ignoring a succession of court rulings appears to have so little effect on him."
  • (5) Can't understand wilful&total destruction of EU expertise, with Cunliffe,Ellam&Scholar also out of loop.
  • (6) We were wilfully blinkered, probably, on the exact details of this last point.
  • (7) Clones resistant to 3-deazaaristeromycin, a potent inhibitor of S-adenosylhomocysteine hydrolase, were selected from a nucleoside kinase-deficient derivative of the WIL-2 human B-lymphoblastoid cell line.
  • (8) I suspect most of these angry Tory MPs are wilfully clueless.
  • (9) Anelay said: “The government believes the most effective way to prevent refugees and migrants attempting this dangerous crossing is to focus our attention on countries of origin and transit, as well as taking steps to fight the people smugglers who wilfully put lives at risk by packing migrants into unseaworthy boats.” The Home Office told the Guardian the government was not taking part in Operation Triton at present beyond providing one “debriefer” – a single immigration officer – to gather intelligence about the migrants who continue to make the dangerous journey to Italy .
  • (10) There now exists a political environment where a government wilfully and seemingly with impunity breaks international treaties, and denies basic human rights to the world’s most vulnerable.
  • (11) However, Downing Street said at the weekend that wilful malpractice by a nurse could lead to a maximum prison sentence of five years.
  • (12) The maim beam wil be directed in the axis of the condyle for sagittal tomography and perpendicularly for frontal tomography.
  • (13) "TWC made continuous use of the unregistered title The Butler in wilful violation of the TRB (Title Registration Bureau) rules," the board said.
  • (14) But she said: "If it's just wilful [lack of water conservation] we can shut the water off."
  • (15) In his first public appearance since his resignation, Clark insisted he had been "meticulous" in following ministerial instructions in a pilot scheme scaling back border checks during the summer: "I introduced no additions to the home secretary's trial, neither did I extend or alter it in any way whatsoever … I have not wilfully or knowingly sanctioned an alteration to border checks that contravened existing Home Office policy."
  • (16) Derivatives of the CEM T and WIL-2 B cell lines showed striking diversity in their responses to the HTLV-IIIB strain of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).
  • (17) Blaming Israel for Gaza’s reconstruction delays is wilful ignorance | Daniel Taub Read more Standard-bearers for the pressure camp routinely claim that a conciliatory approach only reinforces the status quo.
  • (18) Powell maintained that he had "never knowingly or wilfully taken any supplements or substances that break any rules" and said that his team would launch an investigation.
  • (19) The long pilgrimage of pregnancy with its wonders and abasements, the apotheosis of childbirth, the sacking and slow rebuilding of every last corner of my private world that motherhood has entailed – all unmentioned, wilfully or casually forgotten as time has passed.
  • (20) On Tuesday she accused Autonomy of a "wilful effort to mislead".