Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Open to doubt or challenge; problematic.
  • adjective Not yet determined or specified.
  • adjective Of dubious morality or respectability.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Capable of being questioned or inquired of; inviting or seeming to invite inquiry or conversation.
  • Liable to question; suspicious; doubtful; uncertain; disputable: as, the deed is of questionable authority; his veracity is questionable.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective rare Admitting of being questioned; inviting, or seeming to invite, inquiry.
  • adjective Liable to question; subject to be doubted or called in question; problematical; doubtful; suspicious.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Problematic; open to doubt or challenge
  • adjective Of dubious respectability or morality

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective subject to question
  • adjective able to be refuted

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

question +‎ -able

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Examples

  • I. iv.43 (180,4) questionable shape] [By _questionable_ is meant provoking question.

    Notes to Shakespeare, Volume III: The Tragedies Samuel Johnson 1746

  • The problem was, he seemed smart enough to avoid that and to always make her word questionable in front of a third party.

    Surrender the Dark L. A. Banks 2011

  • The problem was, he seemed smart enough to avoid that and to always make her word questionable in front of a third party.

    Surrender the Dark L. A. Banks 2011

  • They decide to try to change the story from the economic meltdown by attacking Obama for what they call questionable past associations when McCain has the Keating 5 in his past.

    McCain Lawyer: McCain Did Nothing Wrong Amid Keating Five Scandal 2009

  • Why are you trying to distinguish between what you call questionable and cartoonish anyway?

    Hillary Privately Urging Her Pledged Delegates To Vote For Obama At Convention 2009

  • He says his subcommittee found $16 billion in what he calls questionable transactions from three major banks, including Citigroup, which made an $8 billion loan to Dubai in December.

    CNN Transcript Mar 10, 2009 2009

  • Investigators from six states showed up unannounced to Wachovia's headquarters because of what they call questionable business practices.

    CNN Transcript Jul 18, 2008 2008

  • Now when I read in the passage from two years ago about Muslims and killing Jews, he admitted that this school did have some what he called questionable passages in its textbooks but have since taken them out.

    CNN Transcript Oct 18, 2007 2007

  • BASH: He did not answer a question about who may be responsible for 380 tons of high-level explosives missing in Iraq, but his campaign did, saying they believe John Kerry attacked the president a day earlier based on what they call questionable information.

    CNN Transcript Oct 26, 2004 2004

  • The report criticizes what it calls questionable accounting methods used by the Obama administration to count "green jobs" and says the term is vague and poorly defined.

    msnbc.com: Top msnbc.com headlines 2011

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