half-baked
/'hɑ:f'bæk/
Definition
- Adjective:
- Insufficiently cooked: Not cooked thoroughly or completely.
- Poorly conceived or thought out: Lacking careful planning, reasoning, or experience; foolish, impractical, or not fully developed.
Usage
- The primary meaning describes something, especially food, that is not fully cooked.
- The figurative and more common meaning describes ideas, plans, or people that are not well-considered, lack maturity, or are foolish.
Examples
- Literal (cooking):
- The bread was still half-baked and doughy in the middle.
- Figurative (ideas/plans):
- The committee rejected his half-baked proposal for lacking supporting data.
- She grew tired of his constant stream of half-baked schemes to get rich quick.
- Figurative (people):
- He dismissed the new intern as a half-baked idealist with no practical experience.
Advanced Usage
- Often used pejoratively to express strong criticism of an idea's lack of merit or forethought.
- Can imply that the subject is not only bad but also embarrassingly naive or silly.
- The politician's half-baked analogy only confused the audience further.
Variants and Related Words
- Half-bakedness (noun, informal): The quality of being half-baked.
- The sheer half-bakedness of the plan was obvious to everyone.
Synonyms
- Ill-conceived: Badly planned or judged.
- Foolish: Lacking good sense or judgment.
- Unrealistic: Not showing regard for the facts or the practical.
- Crude: Simple and not skillfully done or made.
- Immature: Not fully developed.
Antonyms
- Well-thought-out: Carefully considered and planned.
- Sound: Based on valid reasoning or evidence.
- Practical: Likely to be effective in real circumstances.
- Mature: Fully developed.
Related Idioms
- Half-baked idea: A classic collocation emphasizing an idea's lack of completeness or sense.
- Stop bothering me with your half-baked ideas and do some proper research.
Adjective
-
insufficiently cooked
-
foolish; totally unsound
-
a crazy scheme
-
half-baked ideas
-
a screwball proposal without a prayer of working
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