10 most misused English words

I am guilty of misusing a few of these (don’t tell anyone).

From Listverse:

10. REFUTE
“Refute” means to “disprove with evidence” and yet it’s commonly used, even by professional writers, to mean “rebut” which carries a similar meaning but isn’t quite so strong, as it can also mean “argue against.”

9. INSTANT
Nowadays, it’s almost universally assumed that “instant” actually means “quickly” or “without intervention.” Obviously, it doesn’t. It actually refers to a precise moment in time.

8. ENORMITY
“Enormity” means “extreme evil”, but it’s often used to mean “enormousness”.

7. LESS
Less is used when comparing quantities that can’t be counted; for example, “I’d like less milk.” If you’re comparing quantities (like bagels, for example) then “fewer” should be used.

6. CHRONIC
Chronic is originally a medical term meaning “long term”; it has the same root as “chronometer”. Someone suffering from chronic pain has long term pain. It’s often used to mean “very bad” – in fact “acute” should be used instead.

5. LITERALLY
This is such a widely known misused word that examples are less common, as most people know to avoid the term – which should be used to describe something that is actually happening (for example, “He literally danced with joy.”) but should not be used for emphasis (“Steam was literally coming out of his ears.”)

4. PANACEA
“Panacea” means a cure all; it comes from the same Greek root as “panorama”. It shouldn’t be used to imply a cure for a single thing.

3. DISINTERESTED
Does “disinterested” mean the same as “uninterested”? No.  “Disinterested” means that a party is independent; so a dispute might be settled by a disinterested party. “Uninterested” means the party has no interest.

2. DECIMATE
Decimation was a Roman punishment where one in ten men was killed. So when something is decimated, it implies that ten percent of it is destroyed.

1. ULTIMATE
From the Latin, this means the last in a list of items. But it’s so widely used to indicate the best.

The full article at Listverse includes some great examples of misuse (misusage?).
>> Read it here