as in impenetrability
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Recent Examples of unknowability
In defense, the Shirilla family’s lawyer opted for a bench trial instead of a jury trial, and prevented Mackenzie from taking the stand, hoping her blackout condition—and the sheer fact of unknowability in the final moments—would be enough to prove her innocence.
—
Jake King-Schreifels, Time, 15 May 2026
These two flavors of unknowability, which originated decades apart and in different fields, were long considered completely unrelated.
—Ben Brubaker, Quanta Magazine, 11 May 2026
For Rachel, who has always feared the unknown, there is liberation in accepting this inherent unknowability.
—Louis Peitzman, Vulture, 27 Mar. 2026
Kyle’s complexity—her unknowability—is what has made her the franchise’s central character for fifteen years.
—Literary Hub, 24 Feb. 2026
Chrisjen's unknowability is her super-strength.
—Richard Edwards, Space.com, 14 Dec. 2025
Zhao’s adaptation, at its best, embraces the unknowability of this premise.
—David Sims, The Atlantic, 27 Nov. 2025
Instead, what makes the triptych of thematically connected snapshots memorable is its deftly unfussy observation of the unknowability that can endure among people who share the same bloodlines.
—David Rooney, HollywoodReporter, 31 Aug. 2025
Jake King-Schreifels, Time, 15 May 2026
These two flavors of unknowability, which originated decades apart and in different fields, were long considered completely unrelated.
—Ben Brubaker, Quanta Magazine, 11 May 2026
For Rachel, who has always feared the unknown, there is liberation in accepting this inherent unknowability.
—Louis Peitzman, Vulture, 27 Mar. 2026
Kyle’s complexity—her unknowability—is what has made her the franchise’s central character for fifteen years.
—Literary Hub, 24 Feb. 2026
Chrisjen's unknowability is her super-strength.
—Richard Edwards, Space.com, 14 Dec. 2025
Zhao’s adaptation, at its best, embraces the unknowability of this premise.
—David Sims, The Atlantic, 27 Nov. 2025
Instead, what makes the triptych of thematically connected snapshots memorable is its deftly unfussy observation of the unknowability that can endure among people who share the same bloodlines.
—David Rooney, HollywoodReporter, 31 Aug. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for unknowability
- impenetrability
- inscrutability
- incomprehensibility
- mysteriousness
- unintelligibility
- vagueness
- profundity
- murkiness
Noun
-
What The Dark Wizard does differently is grapple with Potter’s impenetrability without being able to resolve it, and consider how that indecision might change our perceptions of his life and his May 2015 death while BASE jumping in Yosemite.—
Roxana Hadadi,
Vulture,
7 May 2026
-
Byrne is generous with his time and attention, but there’s also a Warholian air of mystery about him—a gentle impenetrability, a feeling of separateness.—
Amanda Petrusich,
New Yorker,
10 Nov. 2025
Noun
-
What these critics don’t reckon with enough is that inscrutability is also a feature of the world.—
Luis Parrales,
The Atlantic,
28 Apr. 2026
-
And that requires the opposite of inscrutability.—
Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson,
semafor.com,
6 Mar. 2026
Noun
-
This was only the start of the incomprehensibility of this segment.—
Bethy Squires,
Vulture,
6 Feb. 2026
Noun
-
That intrigue and mysteriousness still rest in the canyon walls today.—
Madison Dapcevich,
Outside,
13 Sep. 2025
Noun
-
Patches of unintelligibility are nothing new in Pynchon, but usually a coherent world view gleams upward from the murk.—
Kathryn Schulz,
New Yorker,
22 Sep. 2025
Noun
-
The students on campus, with little information and more than enough vagueness to envision the worst, did just that.—
Jake Goodrick,
Sacbee.com,
9 May 2026
-
Esenin-Volpin’s work was a call for a new kind of mathematics that could, in some sense, tolerate vagueness.—
Quanta Magazine,
Quanta Magazine,
29 Apr. 2026
Noun
-
But too few of those ideas yield satisfying conclusions, resulting in a drama that becomes treacly and insubstantial, reaching for a profundity that remains elusive.—
David Rooney,
HollywoodReporter,
16 May 2026
-
Aiming for profundity, all this final sequence manages to achieve is the philosophical heft of a discount fortune cookie.—
Marya E. Gates,
IndieWire,
13 May 2026
Noun
-
As Raul grapples with telling the story of Elsa’s life, he’s confronted by the murkiness of borrowing from real people for the purposes of fiction.—
Baz Bamigboye,
Deadline,
19 May 2026
-
After Daniel Jones tore his ACL late last season, the quarterback position has some murkiness for the Colts entering 2026.—
Nick Harris,
Fort Worth Star-Telegram,
14 May 2026
Cite this Entry
“Unknowability.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/unknowability. Accessed 21 May. 2026.
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