Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Words or signs having no intelligible meaning: a message that was nonsense until decoded.
- n. Subject matter, behavior, or language that is foolish or absurd.
- n. Extravagant foolishness or frivolity: a clown's exuberant nonsense.
- n. Matter of little or no importance or usefulness: a chatty letter full of gossip and nonsense.
- n. Insolent talk or behavior; impudence: wouldn't take any nonsense from the children.
- adj. Genetics Of or relating to a mutation in a structural gene that changes a nucleotide triplet into a stop codon, thus prematurely terminating the polypeptide chain during protein synthesis.
- interj. Used to express disagreement or exasperation.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Not sense; that which makes no sense or is lacking in sense; language or words without meaning, or conveying absurd or ridiculous ideas; absurd talk or senseless actions.
- n. Trifles; things of no importance.
- n. Synonyms Folly, stuff, twaddle, balderdash.
Wiktionary
- n. Letters or words, in writing or speech, that have no meaning or seem to have no meaning.
- n. An untrue statement.
- n. Something foolish.
- n. A type of poetry that contains strange or surreal ideas, as, for example, that written by Edward Lear.
- n. A damaged DNA sequence whose products are not biologically active, that is, that does nothing.
- v. To make nonsense of
- v. To attempt to dismiss as nonsense.
- v. To joke around, to waste time
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. That which is not sense, or has no sense; words, or language, which have no meaning, or which convey no intelligible ideas; absurdity.
- n. Trifles; things of no importance.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. having no intelligible meaning
- n. a message that seems to convey no meaning
- n. ornamental objects of no great value
Examples
“To believe in nonsense is an unforgeable demonstration of loyalty.”
“Why bother voting for a democrat when this nonsense is allowed?”
“I'm wondering of some of this nonsense is airline-specific? joeposts replied to comment from Bryan C”
Do new post-pantsbomber TSA security directives kill inflight WiFi? (UPDATED) Boing Boing
“Devoting any tax dollars to this nonsense is a waste of time and money.”
“Putting a halt to this nonsense is akin to standing in front of an avalanche hoping to stop it dead in its tracks.”
Politics vs. Economics, II, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty
“As someone said upthread, this nonsense is a function of the size of the organization rather than the “ownership”, though the availability seemingly bottomless public purse may well add a certain gay abandon to the wastefulness.”
“Our police forces have absolutely no connection with each other, but the nonsense is the same.”
PC Ellie Bloggs - The Manic Impressive « POLICE INSPECTOR BLOG
“I don't know what this nonsense is about them being only for thirtysomething men.”
“She scolded her young mistress very often during the night for what she called nonsense; but was true to her, and worked hard for her.”
“They like to exhibit their conquest; they cannot dispense with attentions; they forget that the demonstration of any peculiar condition of things in society must make some one uncomfortable: the young ladies are uncomfortable because they are not equally happy; the young gentlemen detest what they call nonsense; the old think there is a time for all things.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘nonsense’.
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UK Usage - Find US Equivalent
All these terms have a (different) American English equivalent. Wonder if you can identify them?
abridgement (abri..., accoutrement, accoutre, acknowledgement (..., opposite, advert, adaptor, adapter, sticking plaster, advertise, adviser (advisor ..., adze, aesthete and 1196 more...
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4084 more...
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Wordplay & Pun
wordplay, pound, conceit, clinch, joke, quibble, equivoque, double-entendre, quillet, calembour, carriwitchet, paranomasia and 89 more...
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Verbal Blunders
Speech errors and speech disfluencies
boner, gaffe, malapropism, Freudian slip, blooper, speech disfluency, phonological anti..., phonological pers..., gibberish, repetition, blend, slip of the tongue and 17 more...
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Expressions of disbelief or disagreement
bollocks, come off it, rubbish, as if, bullshit, guff, i don't believe it, are you mad, tosh, nonsense, garbage, bunkum and 51 more...
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'no matter' matters
only the essence counts!
no matter
only matter
How mattering? (maddening?)
It is of no mind! (no mind)essentic, teleologing, resonance, sonorous, fire opal, Kagerou, maravilla, Otaniemi, whirr, chirr, yarn, trundle and 29 more...

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