falsehood
/ˈfɔːlshʊd
/ /ˈfɒlshʊd/noun [mass noun]
1The state of being untrue: the truth or falsehood of the many legends which surround her...
- The problems of another transitional period provide the substance of Stage Beauty, an intelligent, entertaining examination of the line between illusion and reality, truth and falsehood, love and sex.
- These utterances/acts are outside the consideration of truth or falsehood; they are semantically empty - they can produce only meanings.
- It requires our full humanity - our rationality, our ability to sort out truth from falsehood, our intuition, our compassion, our vision, and our morality.
1.1 [count noun] A lie: a downright falsehood...
- You can teach falsehoods and half truths issue a diploma and call someone educated.
- There is a grain of truth in both these stories, surrounded by falsehoods.
- As a little boy I was much given to inventing deliberate falsehoods and this was always done for the sake of causing excitement.
Synonyms
lie, fib, untruth, false statement, falsification, fabrication, invention, piece of fiction, fiction, story, yarn, made-up story, trumped-up story, cock and bull story, flight of fancy, figment of the imagination;
barefaced lie, (little) white lie, half truth, departure from the truth, red herring
informal tall story, tall tale, fairy story, fairy tale, whopper
British informal porky, porky pie, pork pie
humorous terminological inexactitude
1.2Lying: the right to sue for malicious falsehood...
- The settlement was reached after Judd sued the magazine for malicious falsehood and false attribution.
- They cannot be sued for libel, malicious falsehood or conspiring to give false evidence.
- In malicious falsehood, the plaintiff has to prove that the statement is false.
Synonyms
lying, mendacity, untruthfulness, fibbing, fabrication, invention, perjury, perfidy, perfidiousness, lack of veracity, telling stories, misrepresentation, prevarication, equivocation;
deceit, deception, deceitfulness, pretence, artifice, falseness, two-facedness, double-dealing, double-crossing, dissimulation, treachery
Irish informal codology
informal kidology