“different” or "various" at the beginning of the sentence

Question

Is it correct to start a sentence with the word "different"? for example:

Different table structures are listed below.

or should it be:

Various table structures are listed below.

Does it make any difference?

More context:

• I would like to point out and describe similarities and differences among several tables
• there are more than 2 tables I would like to compare
• I am going to compare only the tables included in the list (no other tables were presented before)
• tables have some common features but of course are not the same

Answer 1

As a native speaker of American English, your first sentence sounds perfectly normal to me, as does the second. I can't think of why, grammatically, there would be any difference.

As a matter of personal opinion, the use Various seems to imply that there will be more than two (I don't know why it sounds that way, but it rings as true as saying "few"), where with Different I can see there being only two tables.

Answer 2

In your example, both different and various can be used interchangeably and mean that somethings are not the same.

However, various only says there is variety, whereas different draws attention to how there is variety.

For example, if one says

There are various cultures in the world.

A followup question might be

How are they different?

However, if one says

There are different cultures in the world.

One would not ask

How are they various?

but rather

What are the differences?

There needs to be at least two somethings for there to be a difference, but more than two for them to be various somethings.