What does waste mean?

What does waste mean?. The world's largest and most trusted free online dictionary: definitions, synonyms, word origins, example sentences, word games, and more.

What does waste mean? - The Free Dictionary

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[n] any materials unused and rejected as worthless or unwanted(they collect the waste once a week much of the waste material is carried off in the sewers)[v] spend thoughtlessly; throw away(He wasted his inheritance on his insincere friends You squandered the opportunity to get and advance

waste

waste - The Free Dictionary

[n] any materials unused and rejected as worthless or unwanted
(they collect the waste once a week much of the waste material is carried off in the sewers)

[v] spend thoughtlessly; throw away
(He wasted his inheritance on his insincere friends You squandered the opportunity to get and advanced degree)

[a] located in a dismal or remote area; desolate
(a desert island a godforsaken wilderness crossroads a wild stretch of land waste places)

[n] useless or profitless activity; using or expending or consuming thoughtlessly or carelessly
(if the effort brings no compensating gain it is a waste mindless dissipation of natural resources)

[v] use inefficiently or inappropriately
(waste heat waste a joke on an unappreciative audience)

[n] the trait of wasting resources
(a life characterized by thriftlessness and waste the wastefulness of missed opportunities)

[v] get rid of
(We waste the dirty water by channeling it into the sewer)

[n] an uninhabited wilderness that is worthless for cultivation
(the barrens of central Africa the trackless wastes of the desert)

[v] run off as waste
(The water wastes back into the ocean)

[n] (law) reduction in the value of an estate caused by act or neglect

[v] get rid of (someone who may be a threat) by killing
(The mafia liquidated the informer the double agent was neutralized)

[v] spend extravagantly
(waste not, want not)

[v] lose vigor, health, or flesh, as through grief
(After her husband died, she just pined away)

[v] cause to grow thin or weak
(The treatment emaciated him)

[v] cause extensive destruction or ruin utterly
(The enemy lay waste to the countryside after the invasion)

[v] become physically weaker
(Political prisoners are wasting away in many prisons all over the world)

Other vocabulary

w, w-shaped, w. b. yeats, w. c. fields, w. c. handy, w. e. b. du bois, w. h. auden, w. h. hudson, w. k. kellogg, w. somerset maugham, w. v. quine, w. w. jacobs, w.c., w.m.d., wa, wabash, wabash river, wac, wackily, wacko, wacky, waco, wad, wadding, waddle, waddler, wade, wader, waders, wadi, a, a battery, a bit, a capella singing, a cappella, a cappella singing, a couple of, a few, a fortiori, a good deal, a great deal, a horizon, a hundred times, a kempis, a la carte, a la mode, a level, a little, a lot, a million times, a posteriori, a priori, a trifle, a'man, a-bomb, a-horizon, a-line, a-list, a-ok, a-okay

Dictionary

A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by consonantal root for Semitic languages or radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies, pronunciations, translation, etc. It is a lexicographical reference that shows inter-relationships among the data.

A broad distinction is made between general and specialized dictionaries. Specialized dictionaries include words in specialist fields, rather than a complete range of words in the language. Lexical items that describe concepts in specific fields are usually called terms instead of words, although there is no consensus whether lexicology and terminology are two different fields of study. In theory, general dictionaries are supposed[citation needed] to be semasiological, mapping word to definition, while specialized dictionaries are supposed to be onomasiological, first identifying concepts and then establishing the terms used to designate them. In practice, the two approaches are used for both types. There are other types of dictionaries that do not fit neatly into the above distinction, for instance bilingual (translation) dictionaries, dictionaries of synonyms (thesauri), and rhyming dictionaries. The word dictionary (unqualified) is usually understood to refer to a general purpose monolingual dictionary.

There is also a contrast between prescriptive or descriptive dictionaries; the former reflect what is seen as correct use of the language while the latter reflect recorded actual use. Stylistic indications (e.g. "informal" or "vulgar") in many modern dictionaries are also considered by some to be less than objectively descriptive.

The first recorded dictionaries date back to Sumerian times around 2300 BCE, in the form of bilingual dictionaries, and the oldest surviving monolingual dictionaries are Chinese dictionaries c. 3rd century BCE. The first purely English alphabetical dictionary was A Table Alphabeticall, written in 1604, and monolingual dictionaries in other languages also began appearing in Europe at around this time. The systematic study of dictionaries as objects of scientific interest arose as a 20th-century enterprise, called lexicography, and largely initiated by Ladislav Zgusta. The birth of the new discipline was not without controversy, with the practical dictionary-makers being sometimes accused by others of having an "astonishing" lack of method and critical-self reflection.