foolishness
Americannoun
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lack of wisdom or good judgment; foolish quality.
Oh, the foolishness of thinking that wealth brings happiness!
-
foolish talk, ideas, or behavior.
How could someone with such a clever mind as yourself talk such foolishness?
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a foolish act, error, habit, etc..
Shakespeare, who looks at all men as if from Mount Olympus, notes their foibles and foolishnesses, and yet smiles on them all.
Other Word Forms
- overfoolishness noun
- unfoolishness noun
Etymology
Origin of foolishness
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
She had gambled on the family’s foolishness and self-delusion, and she had won by a length, as they say at the Derby.
From Literature
Mr. Clooney has never had a better role, and he burrows deeply into it with a self-interrogating combination of narcissism, foolishness, bravado and charisma.
Observers have long shrugged off the danger with the complacent idea that students will see through their professors’ foolishness—if not right away, then when they enter the “real world.”
But even if a sketch doesn’t quite work, you could rest in knowing its discomfort is temporary, with the irritant or foolishness changing every few minutes.
From Salon
As Dickens prophetically reminds us, ours is hardly the first age of wisdom and of foolishness, the first epoch of belief and of incredulity.
From Los Angeles Times
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
