Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Absent; lacking.
  • adjective Not measuring up to standards or expectations.
  • preposition Without; missing.
  • preposition Minus; less.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Deficient or lacking.
  • Needy; poor.
  • Except; less; minus.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Absent; lacking; missing; also, deficient; destitute; needy.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Absent or lacking.
  • preposition without
  • verb Present participle of want.
  • noun The state of wanting something; desire.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective inadequate in amount or degree
  • adjective nonexistent

Etymologies

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Examples

  • He had no faith -- he was a hardened unbeliever -- and she could not make herself think of that at all -- could not stop herself from wanting -- _wanting_ him for her own, whatever happened.

    The History of David Grieve Humphry Ward 1885

  • What otherwise was wanting in the security for the Nabob's engagements was to be supplied as follows: "The most respectable persons of his family will be employed to counteract every other which may tend to warp him from it; and I am sorry to say _that such assistance was wanting_."

    The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 09 (of 12) Edmund Burke 1763

  • yea cause wanting to be the center of attention for college students is so much more high brow than say..wanting your book made into a movie

    Archive 2006-01-22 Miss Snark 2006

  • Despite the greater distribution channels Victory provided the band, Thursday were unhappy with some of the ways their image was used in the promotion of Full Collapse - one story tells of the label wanting to make whoopee cushions branded with the band's name.

    Drowned In Sound // Feed 2009

  • Despite the greater distribution channels Victory provided the band, Thursday were unhappy with some of the ways their image was used in the promotion of Full Collapse - one story tells of the label wanting to make whoopee cushions branded with the band's name.

    Drowned In Sound // Feed 2009

  • Despite the greater distribution channels Victory provided the band, Thursday were unhappy with some of the ways their image was used in the promotion of Full Collapse - one story tells of the label wanting to make whoopee cushions branded with the band's name.

    Drowned In Sound // Feed 2009

  • A highly intelligent man like the Unabomber is a highly despicable, inferior, being, but commenters here persist in wanting to confuse “less intelligent” and “inferior”, where one is a neutral, measurable fact and the other a social construct.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » 1. Science, Faith, and Not Ruling Out Possibilities 2010

  • Guy on Sunday Forum this morning called in wanting to annihilate the Palestinians.

    Let Go | ATTACKERMAN 2009

  • Someone writes back and says that line of argument makes sense (in wanting less regulation of the work week) but doesn't Bush just want to let employers exploit employees?

    Happiness Research Still Makes Me Unhappy, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty 2009

  • You seem not to have been honest in wanting a compromise.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » Pollak on Uniquely Israeli Stupidity 2010

Comments

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  • lacking

    She did not think her vocabulary was wanting, yet there were so many words that inevitably she found a few she didn't know.

    October 11, 2016