conspiracy

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a plot to carry out some harmful or illegal act, especially a political plot

   My sibling often has some interesting beliefs that Seinfeld was actually a conspiracy.

2. 2
   noun

   An agreement or arrangement between multiple parties to do something harmful, immoral or subversive; an instance of collusion.

   Conspiracies, like all other exercises of human ingenuity, are of very different kinds. The gloomy plots arranged in old Italian halls...

3. 3
   noun

   A secret agreement to do something.

   The former programme of the entertainments, which were to result from this generous conspiracy to assist a man whom fortune had buffeted, was eagerly looked for, not only for the reunion of old favorites that it promised to bring about, but out of sympathy for the sentiment which has prompted this graceful act of kindness.

4. 4
   noun

   An agreement to work together to bring something about; an act or instance of conspiring.

   But this I call civil life […] living [together] in good and politic order, one ever ready to do good to another, and as it were conspiring [together] in all virtue and honesty. […] You said right now that this civil life was a politic order and, as it were, a conspiracy in honesty and virtue, […]

5. 5
   noun

   A group of lemurs.

   Indeed, as I sat, forlorn, never having found my particular conspiracy of lemurs (how about that for a name for a group of lemurs? The name lemur itself comes from the Latin for “spirits of the dead”) …

6. 6
   noun

   A situation in which different phonological or grammatical rules lead to similar or related outcomes.

   That is, further exploration of phonological systems of various languages may turn up evidence motivating conspiracies that have been regarded thus far as impossible.[…]This study of labial palatalization conspiracy is a contribution to the 'too many solutions'/'too few data' problem.

7. 7
   noun

   A conspiracy theory; a hypothesis alleging conspiracy.

   Rather than propagating conspiracies about the evils of wealthy Jewry, they beat up poor Roma in back alleys.

8. 8
   verb

   To conspire.

   He knew I would come for him when I discovered what he did, so he, he conspiracied to put me in prison.

Etymology

From Middle English conspiracie, from Anglo-Norman conspiracie, from Latin cōnspīrātiō, from conspire + -acy.