Quiz On 20 Commonly Confused Words

The adjective incredible means unbelievable or hard to believe. Incredible often applies to statements, actions, or events.
The adjective incredulous means skeptical or expressive of disbelief. Incredulous applies to people and their attitudes.
Examples
All men are prepared to accomplish the incredible if their ideals are threatened.
It may not be amiss to add, for the benefit of incredulous readers, that all the 'improbable events' in the story are matters of fact, taken from the printed narrative.

The adjective adverse means harmful, unfavorable, or antagonistic. Often it refers to conditions or things rather than people.
The adjective averse means having a feeling of opposition, distaste, or repugnance. As Kenneth Wilson points out in the usage notes below, we're most often "averse to (rarely from) things and people we dislike."
Examples:
It is the adverse effect of television viewing on the lives of so many people that makes it feel like a serious addiction.
We have become a risk-averse culture in which our anxieties dictate our decisions in a totally disproportionate way.

Use later when referring to time. Use latter when referring to the second of two persons or things mentioned previously.
Examples:
Though Amy said that she would join me later, I never saw her again.
There are two kinds of worries: those you can do something about and those you can't. Don't spend any time on the latter.

Put simply, a writer or speaker implies (or suggests) something; a reader or listener infers (or deduces).
Examples:
The manager implied that I was a bad risk. I inferred from her remarks that she thought I was lazy.

The adjective stationary means motionless or remaining in one place.
The noun stationery refers to writing materials.
Examples:
"The law is stationary. The law is fixed. The law is a chariot wheel which binds us all regardless of conditions or place or time."
In his suitcase I found a hodgepodge of hotel stationery, postcards, and transit maps.

Use who when a sentence requires a subject pronoun (equivalent to he or she).
In formal English, use whom when a sentence requires an object pronoun (equivalent to him or her).
Example
"Mrs. Branthwaite inhabited the house on the corner. She was a known witch whom we often persecuted after dark by throwing gravel on her roof."

The adjective sheer means fine, transparent, or complete. As an adverb, sheer means completely or altogether.
Examples:
Jerry wore a sheer linen shirt with frilly lace cuffs.
"English usage is sometimes more than mere taste, judgment and education--sometimes it's sheer luck, like getting across the street." (E.B. White)

Complement means "something that completes or brings to perfection."
A compliment is an expression of praise.
Examples:
Mark said that men and women have strengths that complement each other.
Marie did not take his remark as a compliment.

The adjective discreet means prudently self-restrained or tactful.
The adjective discrete means distinct or separate.
Examples:
Invisible hearing aids are becoming an increasingly popular choice for those who want to be discreet about their hearing loss.
The average person can hold seven discrete bits of information in his or her head at a time.

The noun temerity means daring or recklessness. In contrast, the noun timidity means fearfulness.
Examples:
A great deal of talent is lost to the world for want of a little courage. Every day sends to their graves obscure men whose timidity prevented them from making a first effort.
Harry Truman had the temerity to tell General MacArthur to shut up.

Historic means "important," "momentous," or "historically significant."
Historical means "relating to the past."
Examples:
America has entered one of its periods of historic madness, but this is the worst I can remember.
The Sixties are now considered a historical period, just like the Roman Empire.

As a noun, pore means a small opening, especially in an animal or plant. The verb pore means to read or study carefully.
The verb pour means to dispense a drink or other substance.
Examples:
The carbon dioxide storage method injects the gas into the microscopic pores of reservoir sediments 800 meters underground.
Merdine pored over the rules, searching for a loophole.
Happiness is a perfume which you cannot pour on someone without getting some on yourself.

The adjective simple means plain, ordinary, uncomplicated. The adjective simplistic is a pejorative word meaning overly simplified--characterized by extreme and often misleading simplicity.
Examples:
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler." (Albert Einstein)
"Pupils are being set simplistic science exam questions when they have been taught to a much higher level, scientists claimed today."

As a verb, rack means to torture or cause great suffering. The verb wrack means to wreck or cause the ruin of something.
Examples:
I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, racked with sorrow, but through it all I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing.
Lud had been going to wrack and ruin for centuries.

To allude to something means to make an indirect reference.
To elude means to evade or to escape understanding or attention.
Examples:
Some passages in the New Testament allude to incidents and prophecies in the Old Testament.
The meaning of this particular passage eludes me.

The noun flounder refers to a small flatfish. The verb flounder means to struggle, to make clumsy efforts to move or regain one's balance.
The noun founder refers to a person who establishes an institution or settlement. The verb founder means to sink or become disabled.
Examples:
Many people flounder about in life because they do not have a purpose, an objective toward which to work.
The Turkish man-of-war Ertogrul foundered at sea and 500 members of her crew were drowned.

The adjective sensual means affecting or gratifying the physical senses. Sensuous means pleasing to the senses, especially those involved in aesthetic pleasure, as of art or music. But as explained in the usage notes below, this fine distinction is often overlooked.
Examples:
If one wants another only for some self-satisfaction, usually in the form of sensual pleasure, that wrong desire takes the form of lust rather than love.
Her first book of poems included several close, sensuous descriptions of flowers.

As a noun, principal commonly means "administrator" or "sum of money." As an adjective, principal means "most important."
The noun principle means "basic truth" or "rule."
Examples:
Last summer, Edward DeMarco, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's regulator, scuppered the White House's plan to write down principal for half a million homeowners who'd fallen behind on payments, listing among his reasons that it would encourage others to stop paying. It was an argument of principle over principal: DeMarco's own analysis showed that the White House plan could save $3.6 billion.
Ms. Benson said that boredom was her principal reason for retiring.
According to the Peter Principle, a worker will rise to his or her level of incompetence.

The adjective veracious means honest, truthful, or accurate.
The adjective vociferous means loud, noisy, or vehement.
The adjective voracious means insatiable, excessively eager, or extremely hungry.
Examples:
"Her description of the dirtiness and squalor of the slave huts is undoubtedly veracious. They had almost no furniture, their beds being mere wooden frames with a bark covering; they abounded with fleas and other vermin."
"The Denver school board removed the film from the curriculum only to reinstate it after vociferous protest from community members."
"Whether or not you are a reader of adult books, you should, as a teacher of reading, be a voracious reader of children's books."