Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Lacking quickness of perception or intellect.
- adj. Characterized by a lack of intelligence or sensitivity: an obtuse remark.
- adj. Not distinctly felt: an obtuse pain.
- adj. Not sharp, pointed, or acute in form; blunt.
- adj. Having an obtuse angle: an obtuse triangle.
- adj. Botany. Having a blunt or rounded tip: an obtuse leaf.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Blunt; not acute or pointed: applied to an angle, it denotes one that is larger than a right angle, or of more than 90°. See cuts under angle.
- In botany, blunt, or rounded at the extremity: as, an obtuse leaf, sepal, or petal.
- Dull; lacking in acuteness of sensibility: stupid: as, he is very obtuse; his perceptions are obtuse.
- Not shrill; obscure; dull: as, an obtuse sound.
Wiktionary
- adj. zoology Blunt; not sharp.
- adj. Intellectually dull or dim-witted.
- adj. Indirect or circuitous.
- adj. Of sound: deadened or muffled.
- adj. geometry Of an angle: greater than 90 degrees but less than 180 degrees.
- adj. geometry Of a triangle: with one obtuse angle.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Not pointed or acute; blunt; -- applied esp. to angles greater than a right angle, or containing more than ninety degrees.
- adj. Not having acute sensibility or perceptions; not alert, especially to the feelings of others; dull; stupid.
- adj. Dull; deadened.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. slow to learn or understand; lacking intellectual acuity
- adj. lacking in insight or discernment
- adj. (of a leaf shape) rounded at the apex
- adj. of an angle; between 90 and 180 degrees
Etymologies
- From Latin obtusus, past participle of obtundere ("to strike at or upon, beat, blunt, dull"), from ob ("upon") + tundere ("to strike"). (Wiktionary)
- Middle English, from Old French, from Latin obtūsus, past participle of obtundere, to blunt; see obtund. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Scalia rejected what he called the "obtuse" argument by the attorneys for consumers who challenged CompuCredit that Congress had not intended for companies to force disputes into binding arbitration.”
“You need a new thesaurus, your reliance on the word obtuse is getting annoying.”
“All he’s doing is what all of you phonies do – speak in obtuse generalities.”
“Oh and maybe the reason they’re all quite obtuse is that being in a chick-lit novel themselves they never read chick-lit, or seen a chick-flick and so don’t come to recognise the signals like the rest of us?”
““I don’t much like hearing him called obtuse and superficial, but I suppose I should like still less to hear Sybell praise him.”
“You get into the story for a couple of pages, then you realize that the characters are too bizarre, the world-view does not fit, the plot does not compute, and even the words themselves that author uses are baroque, esoteric, obtuse ... in other words, if you approach it lightly, Chabon's prose is not going to make much sense.”
“If you can't see how even the most resolutely period-costumed production of Don Carlos maybe just might have some pertinence to current political realities, then you're just plain obtuse.”
“I don't much like hearing him called obtuse and superficial, but I suppose I should like still less to hear Sybell praise him.”
“He was quite alive to the disgrace of being called obtuse, and quick enough to avenge himself at the moment.”
“That prompted WRC-TV's Tom Sherwood to call Fenty "obtuse" for not telling these guys to knock it off more directly.”
The Washington Post: Fenty asks write-in supporters to back Gray
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘obtuse’.
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shapes
words for shape
( randomness, visual. descriptive )triangular, conical, round, broad, congruous, hexagonal, globular, curved, oval, rectangular, parallel, crumpled and 142 more...
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501
Classic
mete, ire, bane, bilk, boor, elan, ado, toil, onus, aberration, abstruse, anomaly and 401 more...
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Leaves
phyllodial, phyllodium, phyllodineous, leaf, lamina, petiole, stoma, cuticle, stomata, apex, vein, craspedodromous and 122 more...
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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501
Classic
abhor, mirth, obtuse, iota, vex, irk, teem, pith, moot, mete, ire, bane and 401 more...
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SAT Words
But only the ones that I don't already know.
abase, abash, abominate, abstruse, acclivity, accolade, accost, adroit, adulate, adulterate, adumbrate, affray and 241 more...
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From reading
Collected from reading
venerate, reprobate, reticent, adoration, ethereal, ephemeral, equivocal, contumacious, heinous, solicitous, agnostic, aberration and 335 more...
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501
Classic
aberration, abstruse, anomaly, assiduous, august, banal, boisterous, dulcet, epitome, impudent, insolent, mellifluous and 401 more...
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501
Classic
aberration, abstruse, anomaly, assiduous, august, banal, boisterous, dulcet, epitome, impudent, insolent, mellifluous and 401 more...
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Words build meanings from origins( et...
These come from gamma meditation ,I think.
discursive, exogenous, machinations, purportedly, sumptuous, congruity, cantankerous, incongruous, festoon, hessian, ratiocinative, stratigraphic and 2046 more...
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Philosophic , etymology
every major discipline has uniquely developed esoteric nomenclature to facilitate interdisciplinary dissemination
quale , qualia, elegy, tacet, lexicon, annunciate, caste, eros, contrive, purlicue, irony, venacular, dilapidate and 567 more...
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People are Scum
words that one may enjoy using to describe other people or their actions
degenerate, reprobate, scapegrace, capricious, sycophant, arbitrary, infernal, abominable, iniquitous, nefarious, philistine, sadistic and 39 more...
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PART 2: 100 Word You Should Know To B...
Here are 40 advanced English words which should you be able to use them in a sentence will impress even educated native speakers! Perfect if you want to impress the examiner in examinations like: I...
jubilant, knell, lithe, lurid, maverick, maxim, meticulous, modicum, morose, myriad, nadir, nominal and 28 more...
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Insult Words
A rich collection of all the ways you can insult someone's intelligence.
idiot, cretin, moron, dimwit, nincompoop, meathead, addlepate, dingbat, dumbbell, dunce, fool, halfwit and 31 more...
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gre2
aberrant, aberration, aboveboard, abrasive, abstemious, acme, admonish, affable, affluent, alacrity, allegory, alleviate and 1861 more...
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Extrude
quondam, tchotchke, lugubrious, inspissated, fissiparous, vituperation, absolutisation, artisanal, funicular, sacerdotal, abstruse, oviparious and 38 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for obtuse.
Noelle Knight "'No, he's not. He's in Seattle,' I said. Willfully obtuse." -Club Dead, by Charlaine Harris Feb 5, 2011
uselessness An angle about to take a big bite of some flapjacks. Feb 4, 2007
oroboros This word, uttered by Tim Robbins' character (Andy Dufresne)in the movie "The Shawshank Redemption", made an implacable enemy of the prison Warden, to wit: "How can you be so obtuse?" Feb 3, 2007