Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Lacking intelligence or wit; foolish.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Destitute of wit or understanding; thoughtless; unreflecting; stupid.
- Not knowing; unconscious.
- Proceeding from thoughtlessness or folly; not under the guidance of judgment; foolish; indiscreet; senseless; silly.
Wiktionary
- adj. Destitute of wit or understanding; wanting thought; hence, indiscreet; not under the guidance of judgment.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Destitute of wit or understanding; wanting thought; hence, indiscreet; not under the guidance of judgment.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. (of especially persons) lacking sense or understanding or judgment
Etymologies
- From wit + -less. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“His lips trembled briefly, but otherwise, his face never let go of his expression of witless warmth.”
“Fox "News" has long been a fomenter of violent crime, encouraging the tin-foil hat crowd to embark on mercenary missions to take out liberals and other normal, thinking people in waves of violent crimes in churches, woman's health clinics, and pretty much anywhere they find them, and this was true of the so-called witless tea party protests of Obama's tax reform plan.”
“I thought it said that Bachmann and Coulter were both called "witless.”
“Before you welcome the show in, you should be warned that our theater critic found it "witless" and "pointless.”
“What kind of witless fools trade the lives of others just to say I told you so?”
“Given the natural course of events, most Americans will soon be scared ... 'witless' ... that this woman might eventually have her hand on the button.”
“To see someone who is massively accomplished become someone massively disabled, not in some tragic accident, but because their own body and brain turned on them scares most people witless which is about the kindest thing I can say about them.”
“GREENFIELD: Yes, I think that kind of witless conversation that political -- some political folks indulge in every time the president speaks, what does he have to do?”
“He pours a kind of witless corruption at the viewer and I can't think of another actor who could have done it with such a personal-seeming flavour.”
“« Speaking of "witless," I give you the virtuous William J. Bennett”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘witless’.
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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-more or -less
Words ending with *more or *less, more or less. Many of theses terms also appear on the list The -less Said, which see.
schemaless, jobless, endless, useless, unless, guileless, wireless, regardless, homeless, nevertheless, countless, doubtless and 434 more...
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I am costanza, lord of the "idiots"!
moron, dolt, knucklehead, buffoon, clown, imbecile, asinine, slow, witless, dimwitted, blockhead, clueless and 10 more...
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Ignorant
Adjectives meaning ignorant
inerudite, nescient, obtuse, unperceptive, insensitive, unknowledgeable, unsubtle, witless, fatuous, ignorant
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Wordwild's Delights
Delightful words to read and use
plangent, ribald, titubant, sidereal, pelagic, improvident, dolorous, parlous, baleful, precatory, pied, mephitic and 247 more...
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Reading Reading
Words from the works of Peter Reading - at least one from each (except the Schwitters-esque erosions, cut-ups etc).
overbright, pimpled, muskiness, effuse, stoup, maul, unlevel, viscid, perfidious, glibly, aloes, drouth and 449 more...
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Scriptie: The Return of the King
i can't carry it ..., at the end of all..., it's done, reach, eagles, veil, grass, water, cream, strawberries, barley, summer and 200 more...
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The -less Said...
hopeless, bootless, groundless, luckless, artless, feckless, hapless, joyless, useless, penniless, childless, peerless and 310 more...
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stpeter's Words
abase, abasement, abashed, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abhorrent, abide, abject, ablation, abnegation and 3536 more...
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ash
ash
abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abide, abject, abjure and 4874 more...
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How Am I Bored? Let Me Count the Ways...
out of my gourd, shitless, gormless, to distraction, unbelievably, staggeringly, mind-numbingly, to death, witless, delirious, beyond boredom, out loud on toast... and 7 more...
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GRE 3500 W
waft, waggish, waif, wallow, wan, wane, warble, wanton, wastrel, watershed, wax, waylay and 31 more...
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A Wit List
wit, witty, witless, outwit, nitwit, witting, unwitting, inwit, witticism, witling, iwit, fat-witted and 64 more...
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the 'voice' of reason
A wise man once said: Threats are the last resort of a man with no vocabulary.
recreant, ninny, nincompoop, sapskull, lunatic, buffoon, domnoddy, half-wit, imbecile, spineless, craven, maggot and 26 more...
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Wit Words
Words in English that are derived from some form of the Proto-Indo-European root *weid, meaning to see or know
wit, witty, witless, outwit, nitwit, unwitting, inwit, wise, wisdom, wizard, video, vision and 3 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for witless.
reesetee Heehee. Jun 26, 2008
yarb Thanks you for having been what parents should be -
benigner than their witless brood deserves.
- Peter Reading, Post-Dated, from Nothing for Anyone, 1977 Jun 26, 2008