| Main Entry: | |
| Part of Speech: | noun |
| Definition: | ghost; figment of the imagination |
| Synonyms: | apparition, chimera, daydream, delusion, dream, eidolon, figment, hallucination, haunt, ignis fatuus, illusion, mirage, nightmare, phantasm, revenant, shade, shadow, specter, spirit, spook, vision, wraith |
| Antonyms: | reality |
| Main Entry: | delusion |
| Part of Speech: | noun |
| Definition: | misconception, misbelief |
| Synonyms: | apparition, blunder, casuistry, chicanery, daydream, deception, deceptiveness, dream, eidolon, error, fallacy, false impression, fancy, fantasy, figment, fool's paradise, ghost, hallucination, head trip, ignis fatuus, illusion, lapse, mirage, misapprehension, mistake, optical illusion, oversight, phantasm, phantom, pipe dream, self-deception, shade, speciousness, spuriousness, trickery, trip, vision |
| Notes: | allusion is an 'indirect mention,' illusion is 'false impression,' and delusion is 'deception' which is much stronger than illusion hallucination is from disturbed sensory perceptions; delusion is from disturbed thinking an illusion is an image or conception of something actual or real that presents itself to the mind in an abnormal or distorted manner; a delusion is a false belief about oneself or other people that persists despite its being at variance with the facts |
| Antonyms: | actuality, certainty, fact, reality, surety, truth |
| Main Entry: | elusive |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | evasive, mysterious |
| Synonyms: | ambiguous, baffling, cagey, deceitful, deceptive, difficult to catch, elusory, equivocal, evanescent, fallacious, fleeting, fraudulent, fugacious, fugitive, greasy, illusory, imponderable, incomprehensible, indefinable, insubstantial, intangible, misleading, occult, phantom, puzzling, shifty, shy, slippery, stonewalling, subtle, transient, transitory, tricky, unspecific, volatile |
| Notes: | elusive is used when what is being avoided is physical capture or apprehension, whereas evasive is used when what is being avoided is direct or relevant response to a verbal challenge illusory means based on or having the nature of an illusion; elusive means difficult to describe or skillful at eluding capture |
| Antonyms: | attracting, confronting, encountering, enticing, facing, inviting |
| Main Entry: | fancy |
| Part of Speech: | verb |
| Definition: | imagine, create |
| Synonyms: | be inclined to think, believe, conceive, conjecture, dream up, envisage, envision, fantasize, feature*, guess, head trip, image, infer, make up, make up off top of one's head, phantom, picture, realize, reckon, spark, spitball, suppose, surmise, think, think likely, think up, trump up, vision, visualize |
| Main Entry: | ghost |
| Part of Speech: | noun |
| Definition: | spirit of the dead |
| Synonyms: | apparition, appearance, banshee, daemon, demon, devil, eidolon, ethereal being, haunt, incorporeal being, kelpie, manes, phantasm, phantom, poltergeist, revenant, shade, shadow, soul, specter, spook, vampire, vision, visitor, wraith, zombie |
| Antonyms: | being, entity |
| Main Entry: | ghostly |
| Part of Speech: | adjective |
| Definition: | spooky |
| Synonyms: | apparitional, cadaverous, corpselike, deathlike, divine, eerie, eidolic, ghastly, ghostlike, haunted, holy, illusory, insubstantial, pale, phantasmal, phantom, scary, shadowy, spectral, spiritual, supernatural, uncanny, unearthly, vampiric, wan, weird, wraithlike, wraithy |
| Main Entry: | hallucination |
| Part of Speech: | noun |
| Definition: | dream, delusion |
| Synonyms: | aberration, apparition, fantasy, figment of the imagination, head trip, illusion, mirage, phantasm, phantasmagoria, phantom, trip*, vision, wraith |
| Notes: | hallucination is from disturbed sensory perceptions; delusion is from disturbed thinking |
| Antonyms: | experience, fact, reality, truth |
| Main Entry: | obsession |
| Part of Speech: | noun |
| Definition: | fixation; consumption with belief, desire |
| Synonyms: | attraction, ax to grind, bug in ear, case*, complex, compulsion, concrete idea, craze*, crush, delusion, enthusiasm, fancy, fascination, fetish, hang-up, idée fixe, infatuation, mania, monkey*, must, neurosis, one-track mind, passion, phantom, phobia, preoccupation, something on the brain, thing*, tiger by the tail |
| Antonyms: | indifference |
| Main Entry: | poltergeist |
| Part of Speech: | noun |
| Definition: | ghost |
| Synonyms: | apparition, appearance, banshee, demon, doppelganger, haunter, kelpie, phantasm, phantom, revenant, specter, spirit, spook, vision, visitor |