1894 Brewer’s / A / Absurd
means strictly, quite deaf. (Latin, ab, intensive, and surdus, deaf.)
Reductio ad absurdum. Proving a proposition to be right by showing that every supposable deviation from it would involve an absurdity.
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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.