different between doubt vs undoubtably

English

Etymology

The verb is derived from Middle English douten (“to be in doubt, feel unsure; to be afraid or worried; to hesitate; to be confused; to have respect or reverence”) [and other forms], from Old French douter, doter, duter (compare Middle French doubter), from Latin dubit?re (“to hesitate”), the present active infinitive of dubit? (“to be uncertain, doubt; to hesitate, waver in coming to an opinion; to consider, ponder”); the further etymology is uncertain, but one theory is that dubit? may be derived from dubius (“fluctuating, wavering; doubtful, dubious, uncertain”), from duhibius (“held as two”), from duo (“two”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *dwóh? (“two”)) + habe? (“to have, hold”) (possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *g?eh?b?- (“to grab, take”)). Although the Middle English form of the word was spelled without a b, this letter was later introduced through the influence of the Latin words dubit?re and dubit?. However, the English word continued to be pronounced without the b sound.

The noun is derived from Middle English dout, doute (“uncertain feeling; questionable point; hesitation; anxiety, fear; reverence, respect; something to be feared, danger;”) [and other forms],from Old French doute, dote, dute (“uncertain feeling, doubt”), from doter, douter, duter (“to doubt; to be afraid of, fear”) (compare Middle French doubter; modern French douter (“to doubt; to suspect”)); see further etymology above.

Displaced Old English tw?o (“doubt”) and tw?o?an (“to doubt”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) enPR: dout, IPA^(key): /da?t/
• (Canada) IPA^(key): /d??t/
• Rhymes: -a?t

Verb

doubt (third-person singular simple present doubts, present participle doubting, simple past and past participle doubted)

1. (transitive, intransitive) To be undecided about; to lack confidence in; to disbelieve, to question.

   Synonyms: distrust, mistrust
2. (transitive, archaic) To harbour suspicion about; suspect.
3. (transitive, archaic) To anticipate with dread or fear; to apprehend.
4. (transitive, obsolete) To fill with fear; to affright.
5. (transitive, intransitive, obsolete) To dread, to fear.

Conjugation

Usage notes

• This is generally a stative verb that rarely takes the continuous inflection. See Category:English stative verbs
• In archaic usage, the phrase after "doubt" is what the doubter worries may be the case; in modern usage, that phrase is what the doubter worries may not be the case. Thus the archaic "I doubt he may be lying" is equivalent to the modern "I doubt he is telling the truth."
• In Scotland the archaic usage is still current but with a meaning boadened beyond worry: to doubt something is to consider it likely, so examples include not just "I doubt he's lying," but also "I doubt we'll arrive before dark."

Derived terms

Related terms

• dubiety
• dubious

Translations

Noun

doubt (countable and uncountable, plural doubts)

1. (uncountable, countable) Disbelief or uncertainty (about something); (countable) a particular instance of such disbelief or uncertainty.
2. (countable, obsolete or India) A point of uncertainty; a query.

Alternative forms

• dout (obsolete)

Derived terms

Translations

References

Further reading

• doubt on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

English

Etymology

From Middle English undoutably, equivalent to undoubtable +? -ly.

Adverb

undoubtably (not comparable)

1. (sometimes considered nonstandard) Without doubt; indubitably, undoubtedly.
   • 1679, Edmund Everard, Discourses on the present state of the Protestant princes of Europe, Dorman Newman, London, p. 20:

     I leave it to all the Protestant Princes of Europe to judge if their safety can be solidly established in their Leagues and Confederations with the Princes of the Roman Communion, as it may be undoubtably effected by their Leagues and Confederations amongst themselves.

   • 1887, Albert Parsons, Autobiography:

     This method would undoubtably strike a wholesome terror into the hearts of the working classes.

   • 1963, Charles Poore, "Books of The Times: The Curtain Speeches of Somerset Maugham," New York Times, 5 Oct., p. 18:

     Maugham suggests that storytelling began when primeval hunters told tales around their fires and turbaned raconteurs held forth in what Sinclair Lewis called the clattering bright bazaars. He's undoubtably right.

   • 2003, M. Van Atten and J. Kennedy, "On the Philosophical Development of Kurt Gödel," The Bulletin of Symbolic Logic, vol. 9, no. 4, p. 431:

     Thus, by analogy, philosophical propositions will involve primitive terms, to be arrived at, undoubtably, by a kind of conceptual analysis.

Usage notes

• "Undoubtably" is considered to be nonstandard English by some authorities (for example, Garner's Modern American Usage (2009)), and the term is seldom found in modern literary writing. The Oxford English Dictionary provides no examples of usage after 1513 and characterizes "undoubtably" as "? Obs.," wondering whether the term is obsolete. Nevertheless, many examples of its usage can be found in 20th- and 21st-century popular English and in contemporary academic journals. Its persistence in use may reflect that some writers wish to draw an epistemic differentiability between the idea of "I don't doubt X" or "hardly anyone doubts X" (undoubtedly) versus "it is impossible or nonsensical to doubt X" (undoubtably), where the latter is a stronger category of dubiousness (this differentiation is analogous to that between, for example, undetected and undetectable). But the desired differentiation is not well established or standard.

Synonyms

• indubitably, undoubtedly, doubtlessly, unquestionably

References