Dictionary Definition
ostensible adj
1 appearing as such but not necessarily so; "for
all his apparent wealth he had no money to pay the rent"; "the
committee investigated some apparent discrepancies"; "the
ostensible truth of their theories"; "his seeming honesty" [syn:
apparent(a),
seeming(a)]
2 represented or appearing as such; pretended;
"His ostensible purpose was charity, his real goal popularity"
[syn: ostensive]
User Contributed Dictionary
English
Etymology
, from ostensus, past participle of ostendere to show, from obs- in front of; akin to ob- in the way; akin to Greek epi on, at, besides, after; akin to Old English eofot crime + tendere to stretch, Greek teineinAdjective
- meant for appearance; apparent
- having an intention that is possibly but not obviously true
Derived terms
Translations
meant for appearance; apparent
- Finnish: näennäinen
having an intention that is possible but not
obviously true
- Finnish: näennäinen
- ttbc Chinese (simplified): 表面的 (biao mian de)
- ttbc Chinese (traditional): 表面的 (biao mian de)
- ttbc Dutch: schijnbaar
- ttbc French: apparent
- ttbc German: scheinbar
- ttbc Greek: φαινομενικός
- ttbc Italian: apparente
- ttbc Japanese: 表面上
- ttbc Korean: 외면상
- ttbc Norwegian: tilsynelatende
- ttbc Portuguese: aparente
- ttbc Spanish: ostensible
- ttbc Swedish: skenbar
Spanish
Adjective
Related terms
Synonyms, Antonyms and Related Words
Barmecidal, Barmecide, airy, alleged, apparent, apparitional, appearing, arrant, autistic, avowed, blatant, bold, chimeric, claimed, colorable, colored, conspicuous, deceptive, delusional, delusionary, delusive, delusory, dereistic, dreamlike, dreamy, erroneous, fallacious, false, fantastic, flagrant, gilded, glaring, hanging out, hypocritical, illusional, illusionary, illusive, illusory, imaginary, in name only, in
relief, in the foreground, meretricious, misleading, notable, noticeable, notorious, obtrusive, outstanding, outward, phantasmagoric, phantasmal, phantom, plausible, pretended, pretexted, professed, prominent, pronounced, purported, salient, seeming, self-deceptive,
self-deluding, so-called, specious, spectral, staring, stark-staring, sticking
out, striking, superficial, supposed, supposititious, surface, tinsel, to the eye, unactual, unfounded, unreal, unsubstantial, visible, visionary