refutation

By surface analysis, refute +‎ -ation. (This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

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• Rhymes: -eɪʃən

refutation (countable and uncountable, plural refutations)

1. An act of refuting or disproving; the disproving of an argument, opinion, testimony, doctrine or theory by argument or countervailing proof; evidence of falseness.

   Synonyms: refutal; confutation, disproof

   Near-synonym: rebuttal (see note)

   • 1913, William Horton Foster, “Refutation”, in Debating for Boys‎^[1], page 78:

     Apply these tests to his arguments and you will render your task of refutation easier. But in your refutation, be sure you refute. Don’t think for a minute that either heat or violence or sarcasm is a good answer.
2. (proscribed) A vocal answer to an attack on one's assertions.

• See refute.

• self-refutation

• “refutation”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.