different between debase vs sophisticate

English

Etymology

From de- +? base, from Old French bas, from Latin bassus. Cognate with Spanish debajo (“under, beneath, below”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /d??be?s/
• Rhymes: -e?s

Verb

debase (third-person singular simple present debases, present participle debasing, simple past and past participle debased)

1. (transitive) To lower in character, quality, or value; to degrade.
   • 1961 May 9, Newton N. Minow, "Television and the Public Interest":

     And just as history will decide whether the leaders of today's world employed the atom to destroy the world or rebuild it for mankind's benefit, so will history decide whether today's broadcasters employed their powerful voice to enrich the people or to debase them.

2. (transitive, archaic) To lower in position or rank.
3. (transitive) To lower the value of (a currency) by reducing the amount of valuable metal in the coins.

Synonyms

• (lower in character, quality, or value): abase, adulterate, degrade, demean

Derived terms

Translations

References

Anagrams

• e-based, sea bed, seabed

English

Etymology

attested about 1400 in the sense "make impure by admixture", from Medieval Latin sophisticatus, past participle of sophisticare (see sophistication). From about 1600 as "corrupt, delude by sophistry"; from 1796 as "deprive of simplicity". Related: sophisticated, sophisticating. As a noun meaning "sophisticated person" from 1921.

Pronunciation

• Noun and adjective:
  • IPA^(key): [s??f?st?k?t]
• Verb:
  • IPA^(key): [s??f?st?ke?t]

Noun

sophisticate (plural sophisticates)

1. A worldly-wise person.
   • 2001, SpongeBob SquarePants, episode Sailor Mouth, written by Walt Dohrn, Paul Tibbitt, and Merriwether Williams

     Patrick: Because classy sophisticates like us should not stain our lips with cursing.

     SpongeBob: Yea verily!

Verb

sophisticate (third-person singular simple present sophisticates, present participle sophisticating, simple past and past participle sophisticated)

1. (transitive) To make less natural or innocent.
   • 1956–1960, R.S. Peters, The Concept of Motivation, Routledge & Kegan Paul (second edition, 1960), chapter ii: “Motives and Motivation”, page 38:

     Psychologists have developed quasi-causal theories to explain the directedness of behaviour, to answer the question ‘Why are certain sorts of reasons operative?’ and these theories may well have insinuated themselves into ordinary language as part of the meaning of “motive”. It might well be, therefore, that people who are slightly sophisticated by psychological theories assume some such necessary connexion [between giving the motive for an action and making any assertions of a causal kind about a man’s emotional state].

2. To practice sophistry; change the meaning of, or be vague about in order to mislead or deceive.
   • 1791, Ann Radcliffe, The Romance of the Forest, Penguin 1999, p. 151:

     The benevolence of her heart taught her, in this instance, to sophisticate.

   • 1829, Robert Southey, Sir Thomas More; or, Colloquies on the Progress and Prospects of Society

     to sophisticate the understanding

   • December 1873, Matthew Arnold, "Bishop Butler and the Zeit-Geist" in The Contemporary Review Volume 27

     Yet Butler professes to stick to plain facts, not to sophisticate, not to refine.

3. (transitive) To alter and make impure, as with the intention to deceive.
   • 1639, James Howell, "To my Lord Clifford, from Edenburgh" in Epistolæ Ho-Elianæ

     to mingle or sophisticate any Wine here

   • 1678, John Dryden, Epilogue to Mithridates, King of Pontus by Nathaniel Lee

     They purchase but sophisticated ware.

4. (transitive) To make more complex or refined.

Translations

Adjective

sophisticate (comparative more sophisticate, superlative most sophisticate)

1. Not genuine; not pure; adulterated.