different between countervail vs refutation

English

Etymology

From Anglo-Norman countrevaloir ( = Old French contrevaloir), from Latin contr? val?re (“to be worth against”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?ka?nt?ve?l/

Verb

countervail (third-person singular simple present countervails, present participle countervailing, simple past and past participle countervailed)

1. (obsolete) To have the same value as.
2. To counteract, counterbalance or neutralize.
3. To compensate for.
   • c. 1700, Roger L'Estrange, Seneca's Morals

     countervail a very confiderable Advantage to all Men of Letters

   • 1988, Richard Ellmann, The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry, 2nd ed. (New York: W.W. Norton, 1988), p. 539.

     If [Wilfred] Owen preserves his youthful romanticism, or at least a shell of it, he uses it to countervail the horrifying scenes he describes, just as he poses his own youth against the age-old spectacle of men dying in pain and futility.

Translations

Anagrams

• involucrate

English

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -e???n

Noun

refutation (countable and uncountable, plural refutations)

1. An act of refuting or disproving; the disproving of an argument, opinion, testimony, doctrine or theory by argument or countervailing proof; evidence of falseness.

   Synonyms: confutation, disproof

2. A vocal answer to an attack on one's assertions.

Usage notes

• See refute.

Translations

References

• refutation in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.