- Imbecility (Substantives), incapacity, vacancy of mind, poverty of intellect, shallowness, dullness, stupidity, asininity, obtuseness, stolidity, hebetude, doltishness, muddle-headedness, vacuity, short-sightedness, incompetence.
(Adjectives). Applied to persons: Intelligent, sagacious, receptive, quick, sharp, acute, shrewd, gumptious, canny, astute, sharp-sighted, quick-sighted, quick-eyed, keen, keen-eyed, keen-sighted, keen-witted, sharp-witted, needle-witted, penetrating, piercing, clear-sighted, discerning, discriminating, discriminative, clever, knowledgeable.
Wise, sage, sapient, sagacious, reasonable, rational, sound, common-sense, sane, sensible, judicious, judgmatic, enlightened, impartial, catholic, broad-minded, open-minded, unprejudiced, unbiased, unprepossessed, undazzled, unperplexed, judicial, progressive.
Cool, cool-headed, long-headed, long-sighted, calculating, thoughtful, reflective, oracular, heaven-directed, heaven-born.
Prudent, discreet, sober, staid, solid, considerate, provident, politic, diplomatic, tactful.
(Phrases). Wise as a serpent; wise as Solomon; wise as Solon.
Applied to actions: Wise, sensible, reasonable, judicious, well-judged, well-advised, prudent, prudential, politic 646, expedient.
Silliness, simplicity, childishness, puerility, babyhood; dotage, second childhood, fatuity, idiocy, idiotism 503.
Folly, absurdity, infatuation, irrationality, senselessness, foolishness, inconsistency, lip-wisdom, conceit, giddiness, extravagance, oddity, eccentricity, ridiculousness, desipience.
Act of folly 497, imprudence 699, rashness, fanaticism.
(Phrases). The fool's paradise; one's wits going wool-gathering; mentis gratissimus error.
(Verbs). To be imbecile, foolish, etc., to trifle, drivel, ramble, dote, radoter, blether; to fool, to monkey, to footle.
(Phrases). To play the fool; to play the giddy goat; to make an ass of oneself; to go on a fool's errand; to pursue a wild-goose chase; battre la campagne; to strain at a gnat; to reckon without one's host; to quarrel with one's bread and butter; semel insanivimus omnes; aliquando bonus dormitat Homerus.
(Adjectives). Applied to persons: Unintelligent, unintellectual, witless, reasonless, imbecile, shallow, borné, weak, soft, sappy, spoony, weak - headed, weak - minded, feeble - minded, half-witted, short-witted, half-baked, not all there, shallow-pated, shallow - brained, dull, stupid, heavy, obtuse, stolid, doltish, asinine, addle - headed, dull-witted, blunt, dull-brained, dim-sighted, vacuous.
Childish, infantine, infantile, babyish, childlike, puerile, callow; anile.
Fatuous, idiotic, lack-brained, drivelling, blatant, brainless, blunt-witted, beef-witted, fat-witted, fat-headed, insulse, having no head or brains, thick-skulled, blockish, Bœotian.
Foolish, silly, senseless, irrational, insensate, nonsensical, blunder-headed, chuckle-headed, puzzle- headed, muddle-headed, muddy-headed, undiscerning, unenlightened, unphilosophical; prejudiced, bigoted, purblind, narrow-minded, wrong-headed, tactless, crotchety, conceited, self-opinionated, pigheaded, mulish, unprogressive, one-ideaed, stick-in-the-mud, besotted, infatuated, unreasoning.