Specious

3 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Specious \Spe"cious\, a. [L. speciosusgood-looking, beautiful,
     specious, fr. species look, show, appearance; cf. F.
     sp['e]coeux. See {Species}.]
     1. Presenting a pleasing appearance; pleasing in form or
        look; showy.
        [1913 Webster]


  
              Some [serpents] specious and beautiful to the eye.
                                                    --Bp.
                                                    Richardson.
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              The rest, far greater part,
              Will deem in outward rites and specious forms
              Religion satisfied.                   --Milton.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     2. Apparently right; superficially fair, just, or correct,
        but not so in reality; appearing well at first view;
        plausible; as, specious reasoning; a specious argument.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              Misled for a moment by the specious names of
              religion, liberty, and property.      --Macaulay.
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              In consequence of their greater command of specious
              expression.                           --J. Morley.
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     Syn: Plausible; showy; ostensible; colorable; feasible. See
          {Plausible}.
          [1913 Webster] -- {Spe"xious*ly}, adv. --
          {Spe"cious*ness}, n.
          [1913 Webster]

From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  specious
       adj 1: plausible but false; "specious reasoning"; "the spurious
              inferences from obsolescent notions of causality"-
              Ethel Albert [syn: {spurious}]
       2: plausible but false; "a specious claim"
       3: based on pretense; deceptively pleasing; "the gilded and
          perfumed but inwardly rotten nobility"; "meretricious
          praise"; "a meretricious argument" [syn: {gilded}, {meretricious}]

From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:

  85 Moby Thesaurus words for "specious":
     Barmecidal, Barmecide, airy, alleged, apparent, apparently sound,
     apparitional, autistic, avowed, beguiling, casuistic, chimeric,
     claimed, colorable, colored, conceivable, deceptive, delusional,
     delusionary, delusive, delusory, dereistic, disingenuous,
     dreamlike, dreamy, empty, erroneous, fallacious, false, fantastic,
     gilded, hollow, hypocritical, idle, illogical, illusional,
     illusionary, illusive, illusory, imaginary, in name only,
     inaccurate, incorrect, insincere, jesuitic, likely, meretricious,
     misleading, nugatory, ostensible, overrefined, oversubtle,
     phantasmagoric, phantasmal, phantom, philosophistic, plausible,
     possible, presumable, presumed, pretended, pretexted, professed,
     purported, seeming, self-deceptive, self-deluding, so-called,
     sophistic, sophistical, spectral, spurious, superficial, supposed,
     supposititious, tinsel, unactual, unfounded, unreal, unsound,
     unsubstantial, untrue, vain, visionary, wrong