sophist

noun soph·ist \ ˈsä-fist \

|Updated on: 29 Jul 2018

Definition of sophist

1 : philosopher

2 capitalized : any of a class of ancient Greek teachers of rhetoric, philosophy, and the art of successful living prominent about the middle of the fifth century b.c. for their adroit subtle and allegedly often specious reasoning

3 : a captious or fallacious reasoner

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Recent Examples of sophist from the Web

So why, then, should liberal publications go out of their way to hire polite sophists with boring, bankrupt ideas (i.e. Brett Stephens), or stylish trolls with cruel ones (i.e. Kevin Williamson)?

— eric levitz, Daily Intelligencer, "The Liberal Media Can Have Ideological Diversity Without Conservatives," 6 May 2018
Conservative sophists lined up behind this strategy, insisting the Republican method was a completely normal negotiation.

— jonathan chait, Daily Intelligencer, "Why Trump Is Using Hostage Tactics on Family Separation," 18 June 2018
In Plato’s most famous dialogue, the Republic, Socrates falls into conversation with the bold and intimidating Thrasymachus, who is a sophist—that is, one who offers instructions on how to argue a case, no matter its merit.

— rebecca newberger goldstein, WSJ, "Truth Isn’t the Problem—We Are," 15 Mar. 2018
Whether a sophist like Milo Yiannopoulos may speak at a public university like Berkeley is less a question of what the law is than of what the law should be.

— andrew marantz, The New Yorker, "How Social-Media Trolls Turned U.C. Berkeley Into a Free-Speech Circus," 23 May 2016
Not even the most shameless sophist will argue that anything like that happened.

— hugh hewitt, The Denver Post, "The U.S. Constitution isn’t a restaurant menu," 10 Mar. 2017

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'sophist.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.