irrationalise
Definition
- Verb (transitive):
- To make something irrational: "irrationalise" means to cause something that is logical or reasonable to become illogical, unreasonable, or devoid of rational thought.
Usage Examples
- (The speech made the discussion unreasonable.)
- (Stress can make a careful person act irrationally.)
- (The policy made the workflow illogical.)
Advanced Usage
"to irrationalise a system": to deliberately or unintentionally remove rational structure from a system or process.
- The manager’s constant changes irrationalised the production line, causing chaos. (The changes made the production line illogical.)
"to irrationalise an argument": to undermine the logical basis of an argument.
- By introducing irrelevant facts, he irrationalised his own position. (He made his own argument unreasonable.)
Variants and Related Words
Irrational (adj): not logical or reasonable.
- His fear of spiders is completely irrational. (His fear is not based on reason.)
Irrationality (n): the quality of being illogical or unreasonable.
- The irrationality of the decision surprised everyone. (The lack of reason in the decision was surprising.)
Rationalise (v): the opposite of irrationalise; to make something logical or reasonable.
- She tried to rationalise her expenses by creating a budget. (She made her expenses logical.)
Synonyms
- Make unreasonable: to cause something to lack reason.
- Illogicise: a rare synonym meaning to make illogical.
- Undermine rationality: to weaken logical thinking.
Related Idioms
Throw reason out the window: to abandon logical thinking.
- When he gets angry, he throws reason out the window and irrationalises everything. (He becomes illogical when angry.)
Lose one’s marbles: to become irrational or insane (informal).
- After the accident, he seemed to lose his marbles and irrationalise every conversation. (He became unreasonable.)