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Constitutional law is political because it results from choices rooted in fundamental social concepts like liberty and property.

This is from one multiple choice, and I made it wrongly by choosing conceptions.

What's the difference in the common meaning of concept and conception?

If this is not one multiple choice, can I use conceptions?

One common meaning:

{{concept,Noun}->an abstract or general idea inferred or derived from specific instances} {conception,Noun,Idea}->an abstract or general idea inferred or derived from specific instances

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  • Hello, HyperGroups! Have you looked up both concept and conception in the dictionary? What did you find?
    – user230
    Commented Jun 26, 2013 at 2:19
  • @snailboat They have common meaning: notion/idea in some dictionaries.
    – HyperGroups
    Commented Jun 26, 2013 at 2:23
  • Hmm, would you mind linking to that dictionary definition? I find it odd that they'd give them the same definition word for word. I'm interested to see what else they say about the words.
    – WendiKidd
    Commented Jun 26, 2013 at 2:31
  • @WendiKidd Ok,I've added one image of definition. This is got from WolframAlpha's WordData[], and I've looked up some English-Chinese dictionaries, they both have the common meaning notion/idea
    – HyperGroups
    Commented Jun 26, 2013 at 2:35
  • It's using WordNet data. I would suggest you use a different source of information. (I'm hesitant to call WordNet a dictionary!)
    – user230
    Commented Jun 26, 2013 at 2:43

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You use conception when talking about an idea or notion that someone has. When used in this sense, it always belongs to someone, or to a group of people. A concept is simply an idea or notion, in an abstract sense. It belongs to no one.

For example, you and I may agree that:

Freedom is a concept.

...in that we both agree that there exists an idea called "freedom." However, it is possible that:

Your conception of freedom differs from mine.

...in that if we were both asked to define freedom, we would give two different answers. Your mental model of the concept of freedom is your conception of it.

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