While factious and factitious sound like they should have related meanings they do not—not at all. Factious means “relating to, or stemming from disagreement between groups of people with different ideas about some topic.” Factitious means “fake” or “man-made.” Fictitious means “not real”—but not in the same sense as factitious (“fake”). Let’s take a closer look at all three of these […]

These two verbs both have the prefix ex- (meaning “out”) but have very different meanings, though both refer to getting something out of someone—in two different senses. Exhort means to strongly urge someone to do something—to get an action out of them. Extort means to get anything—usually money—out of someone, by threatening them in some way. Some dictionaries […]

Limp and limpid have very different meanings. Limp as an adjective describes a kind of structural (physical) weakness; it means loose or floppy, not stiff or rigid, like a noodle, wet cloth, or a very tired person: After digging all day, his arms hung limp at his sides; they were so worn out. Without wind, the flag hung limp from […]