different between factitious vs spurious

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin fact?tius (“artificial”), alternative form of fact?cius, from facere (“to make, do”). Doublet of fetish.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /fæk?t???s/
• Rhymes: -???s
• Hyphenation: fac?ti?tious

Adjective

factitious (comparative more factitious, superlative most factitious)

1. Created by humans; artificial.
   • 1661, Robert Lovell, a Compleat History of Animals and Minerals, page 351

     [...] if from erosion of the gums, by such things as restore them, strengthen and bind them; if wanting, it may be helped by the factitious; their ?ordes are removed, by washing and cleaning them; and their blacknesse, by dentifrices.

   • 1854, Thoreau, Walden, chapter 1

     Most men, even in this comparatively free country, through mere ignorance and mistake, are so occupied with the factitious cares and superfluously coarse labors of life that its finer fruits cannot be plucked by them.

   • 1860, Emerson, Conduct of life, Behavior

     Manners are partly factitious, but, mainly, there must be capacity for culture in the blood. Else all culture is vain.

2. Counterfeit, fabricated, fake.
   • 1908, Arnold Bennett, The Old Wives' Tale, book 2 chapter 8

     "Well, mater," he said, in a voice of factitious calm, "I've got it." He was looking up at the ceiling.

     "Got what?"

     "The National Scholarship. Swynnerton says it's a sheer fluke. But I've got it. Great glory for the Bursley School of Art!"

   • 2008, Richard L. Hume & Jerry B. Gough, Blacks, Carpetbaggers, and Scalawags: The Constitutional Conventions of Radical Reconstruction, Louisiana State University Press (2008), ?ISBN, page 168:

     Ironically, the most stereotypical myth of Reconstructionism — involving perceived endemic corruption and ruthless exploitation of hapless native whites by freedman and carpetbaggers seeking to gain from black rule — is a factitious story of postwar South Carolina, as told with considerable and lurid exaggeration in two "classic" accounts […]

Derived terms

• factitiously
• factitiousness

Translations

See also

• fictitious

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Late Latin spurius (“illegitimate, bastardly”), possibly related to sperno or from Etruscan.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?spj??.?i.?s/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?spj?.?i.?s/, /?sp?.?i.?s/, /?spj?.?i.?s/
• Rhymes: -???i?s

Adjective

spurious (comparative more spurious, superlative most spurious)

1. False, not authentic, not genuine.

   His argument was spurious and had no validity.

   • 2013, Russell Brand, Russell Brand and the GQ awards: 'It's amazing how absurd it seems' (in The Guardian, 13 September 2013)[1]

     We witness that there is a relationship between government, media and industry that is evident even at this most spurious and superficial level. These three institutions support one another. We know that however cool a media outlet may purport to be, their primary loyalty is to their corporate backers. We know also that you cannot criticise the corporate backers openly without censorship and subsequent manipulation of this information.
2. Extraneous; stray; not relevant or wanted.

   I tried to concentrate on the matter in hand, but spurious thoughts kept intruding.

   Spurious emissions from the wireless mast were causing nearby electrical equipment to go haywire.

3. (archaic) bastardly, illegitimate

Synonyms

• (false): counterfeit, fake, false, bogus
• See also Thesaurus:fake
• See also Thesaurus:illegitimate

Antonyms

• (false): genuine, representative

Derived terms

• spuriosity
• spuriously
• spuriousness

Translations

See also

• specious