disparate

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French desparat, from Latin disparātus, past participle of disparō (“to divide”), from dis- (“apart”) + parō (“to make equal”), from par (“equal”).

adj

1. Composed of inherently different or distinct elements; incongruous.
   The board of the company was decidedly disparate, with no two members from the same social or economic background.
   The London Transport Museum was established, from disparate collections, at Covent Garden in 1980. 2012, Andrew Martin, Underground Overground: A passenger's history of the Tube, Profile Books, page 269
   Although third-rail operation in the region dates back more than a century, it was in the 1970s that tunnels under Liverpool's city centre opened to bring together previously disparate routes. February 8 2023, Tony Streeter, “Kirkdale: home to Merseyrail's new '777s'”, in RAIL, number 976, page 36
2. Essentially different; of different species, unlike but not opposed in pairs
3. Utterly unlike; incapable of being compared; having no common ground.
   Then disparate sense impressions come to disparate organs, as light to the eye, taste to the mouth, etc. 1898, John Wesley Powell, Truth and Error
   M. Bergson’s philosophy, unlike most of the systems of the past, is dualistic: the world, for him, is divided into two disparate portions, on the one hand life, on the other matter, or rather that inert something which the intellect views as matter. 1912, Bertrand Russell, The Philosophy of Bergson

noun

1. (chiefly in the plural) Any of a group of unequal or dissimilar things.