Definitions

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

  • noun A substance that gives nourishment; food.
  • noun Insipid intellectual nourishment.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Food, in the widest sense; aliment; nutriment; that which nourishes an animal or vegetable organism; by extension, that which nourishes or supports any physical process, as fuel for a fire.
  • noun Hence, food for thought; intellectual or spiritual nourishment or support.

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

  • noun The means of nutriment to animals or plants; food; nourishment.
  • noun That which feeds or sustains, such as fuel for a fire
  • noun Trite or simplistic writing, sentiments, etc.; pablum{3}.

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

  • noun food or fodder, particularly that taken in by plants or animals.
  • noun material that feeds a fire.
  • noun figuratively food for thought.
  • noun bland intellectual fare; an undemanding diet of words.

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

  • noun insipid intellectual nourishment
  • noun any substance that can be used as food

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin pābulum; see pā- in Indo-European roots. Sense 2, by confusion with pablum.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin pābulum ("food, nourishment"), from pāscō ("I feed, nourish").

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Examples

Comments

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  • Similar to pablum?

    May 11, 2010

  • Same thing, different spelling.

    May 14, 2010