preposterous
adjective

- completely unreasonable and ridiculous; not to be believed:

Cambridge Dictionary

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ORIGIN

1540s, “contrary to nature, reason, or common sense,” from Latin praeposterus “absurd, contrary to nature, inverted, perverted, in reverse order,” from prae “before” + posterus “subsequent, coming after,” or literally “before following behind” — which is absurd indeed, but a good way to remember it!

This original sense gradually shaded into “foolish, ridiculous, stupid, absurd.”

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The word preposterous has much power, especially if uttered with indignant intonation. Note these common examples:

- preposterous allegation = völlig absurde Anschuldigung
- preposterous demand = widersinnige Nachfrage
- preposterous price = unsinniger Preis

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SYNONYMS

English is bursting with word meanings close to preposterous. A small selection:

asinine, deranged, bonkers,  farcical, flakey, off-the-wall, in left field, madcap, half-baked, nuts, incomprehensible, non compos mentis, crackbrained, feather-brained, hare-brained, bird-brained, pea-brained, rattlebrained, loony, cockeyed, cockamamie, crackpot, featherheaded, foolheaded, dunderheaded, boneheaded, blockheaded, woodenheaded, screwball, whacky, imbecilic, dopey, cretinous, wackadoo, surreal, outrageous, scandalous, disgraceful, contemptible, monstrous, shameful...

What do the eccentricities of a language say about the people who speak it? Let me know what you think.

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Practice OWAD in an English conversation, say something like:

“The number of PREPOSTEROUS fake news stories in 2020 has made many people very sceptical of social media.”

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Paul Smith