Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. That cannot undergo precise evaluation: imponderable problems.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Not ponderable; not capable of being weighed; without gravity.
- n. In physics, a thing which has no weight: a term formerly applied to heat, light, electricity, and magnetism, on the supposition that they were material substances, and still used of the hypothetical universal medium, ether.
Wiktionary
- adj. Not ponderable; without sensible or appreciable weight; incapable of being weighed.
- n. An imponderable substance or body; specifically, in the plural, a name formerly applied to heat, light, electricity, and magnetism.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Not ponderable; without sensible or appreciable weight; incapable of being weighed.
- n. An imponderable substance or body; specifically, in the plural, a name formerly applied to heat, light, electricity, and magnetism, regarded as subtile fluids destitute of weight but in modern science little used.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a factor whose effects cannot be accurately assessed
- adj. difficult or impossible to evaluate with precision
Examples
“We have no knowledge that the luminiferous ether is attracted by gravity; it is sometimes called imponderable because some people vainly imagine that it has no weight; I call it matter with the same kind of rigidity that this elastic jelly has.”
“In effect, then, the physicist has dispossessed the many imponderables in favor of a single imponderable -- though the word imponderable has been banished from his vocabulary.”
A History of Science: in Five Volumes. Volume III: Modern development of the physical sciences
“There are far too many factors-too many that are "imponderable" - whose weight just cannot be estimated.”
“These are what Dennett later calls imponderable questions -- whether we ought to fund exploitation of the poor, lay minefields, smuggle nuclear weapons in suitcases, make nerve gases, and drop bombs!”
“It did not allow enough for what we may call the imponderable elements.”
“We are all affected by this grief, caused by the imponderable, which is always a risk despite the measures made to insure maximum safety.”
“Another imponderable is a fresh winter snow that could cause hardships for people trying to get out to vote.”
“Another imponderable is the financial health of George Gillett's portfolio.”
“Confirmatory evidence that energy is a molecular motion and not an "imponderable" form of matter accumulated day by day.”
A History of Science: in Five Volumes. Volume III: Modern development of the physical sciences
“Carnot did not, indeed, reach the clear view of his predecessors as to the nature of heat, for he still thought it a form of "imponderable" fluid; but he reasoned none the less clearly as to its mutual convertibility with mechanical work.”
A History of Science: in Five Volumes. Volume III: Modern development of the physical sciences
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘imponderable’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4084 more...
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Adjectival Arcana
A roster of adjectives that infrequently surface in typical conversation and writing. Many are dredged from scientific or other technical jargon or sieved from examples of disused archaic forms.
unitegmic, acaulescent, reticuloendothelial, ingressive, uniate, acanthopterygian, ossific, epiphysial, perivisceral, acœlomatous, cestoid, acælomate and 7762 more...
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List 2
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