gullible
adjective
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“Let a gull steal my fries once, shame on the gull; let a gull steal my fries twice, shame on me.” So goes the classic, oft-repeated seaside maxim reminding people to guard against being gullible. Okay, that’s not really how the old saw goes, but on the off chance that you believed our little trick, you yourself were, however briefly, gullible—that is, “easily duped.” The adjective gullible grew out of the older verb gull, meaning “to deceive or take advantage of.” (That gull originally meant “to guzzle or gulp greedily,” and comes from an even older gull meaning “throat, gullet.”) Another relative is the noun gull, referring to a person who is easy to cheat. However, no matter how much the seabirds we call gulls love to pilfer our potatoes, that avian gull has no relation, and is instead of Celtic origin—we promise.
Synonyms
Examples of gullible in a Sentence
Maria Mocerino, Interesting Engineering, 25 June 2024
Despite the horror stories and warnings, the examples of fraudsters across the centuries, people are still just as gullible as Poisson.
—thehustle.co, 1 Mar. 2024
Readers love the stories of swindlers and their gullible targets, of grifters themselves being tricked, and every iteration in between.
—Vanessa Armstrong, The Atlantic, 17 June 2024
The cognitive scientist Hugo Mercier has similarly argued that people are less gullible than commonly believed.
—Josh A. Goldstein, Foreign Affairs, 7 Apr. 2023
See all Example Sentences for gullible 
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'gullible.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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Cite this Entry
“Gullible.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gullible. Accessed 7 Jul. 2024.
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