Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Not qualified in legal terms: a defendant who was incompetent to stand trial.
- adj. Inadequate for or unsuited to a particular purpose or application.
- adj. Devoid of those qualities requisite for effective conduct or action.
- n. An incompetent person.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Not competent; wanting ability or qualification; unable; incapable; inadequate.
- In law, not competent; not qualified; incapacitated. In the law of evidence incompetent is most appropriately used of evidence not fit for the purpose for which it is offered. Irrelevant indicates that kind of incompetence which results from having no just bearing on the subject. Inadmissible indicates that form of incompetence which results from there being no suitable allegation in the pleading to justify admission. See
incapacity , 2. - Synonyms Insufficient, unfit, disqualified.
- n. An incompetent person; one who is mentally or physically deficient.
Wiktionary
- adj. Unskilled, lacking normally expected degree of ability.
- adj. Unable to make rational decisions, insane or otherwise cognitively impaired.
- n. A person who is incompetent.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Not competent; wanting in adequate strength, power, capacity, means, qualifications, or the like; incapable; unable; inadequate; unfit.
- adj. Wanting the legal or constitutional qualifications; inadmissible.
- adj. Not lying within one's competency, capacity, or authorized power; not permissible.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. not qualified or suited for a purpose
- adj. not doing a good job
- adj. legally not qualified or sufficient
- n. someone who is not competent to take effective action
- adj. showing lack of skill or aptitude
- adj. not meeting requirements
Examples
“SOHIL: (Foreign language spoken) LAWRENCE: Sohil, a 26-year-old student, says the rally is to condemn the American killing of civilians, as well as the U.S. support for what he calls the incompetent government of President Karzai.”
“This is in China, where they're having a problem with what they call incompetent drivers.”
“AZASM vice-president Donald Mankga said his organisation was identifying schools employing what it termed incompetent white teachers, and said these teachers would be removed.”
“Sohil, a 26-year-old student, says the rally sought to condemn the American killing of civilians and the U.S. support for what he calls the incompetent Karzai government.”
“Trump blames the problems on what he calls incompetent state bureaucrats and laments that had he been allowed to proceed, the facility would have been open by now.”
“Thousands of car drivers in the Ukrainian capital angrily blew their horns for several minutes Monday, protesting what they call incompetent and corrupt government policies that led to a devastating financial crisis.”
“Honesty had been the single trait most closely associated with Bush, but in the current survey "incompetent" is the descriptor used most frequently.”
“And a big part of calling them stupid or incompetent is to get them to be more rigorous next time round, and it works because no honest scientist wants to be seen as lacking rigor.”
“The (false) idea that teens are inherently irresponsible and incompetent is pushed by many powerful forces in America, most recently by people quite fraudently claiming that teen turmoil is the inevitable result of a "teen brain" (see my new article, "The Myth of the Teen Brain," in Scientific American Mind).”
Abolish High School?, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty
“It's ok if a doctor kills you ... being incompetent is how us republicans do things .”
Lists
‘incompetent’ hasn't been added to any lists yet.
jmjarmstrong JM heard about an incompetent ship captain who grounds the warship he walks on. Aug 25, 2011