Abject vs Degenerate - What's the difference?
abject | degenerate | Related terms |
(obsolete) Rejected; cast aside.
Sunk to or existing in a low condition, state, or position.
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Cast down in spirit or hope; degraded; servile; grovelling; despicable; lacking courage; offered in a humble and often ingratiating spirit.
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Showing utter hopelessness; helplessness; showing resignation; wretched.
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(obsolete) To cast off or out; to reject.
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(obsolete) To cast down; hence, to abase; to degrade; to lower; to debase.
English heteronyms
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(of qualities) Having deteriorated, degraded or fallen from normal, coherent, balanced and desirable to undesirable and typically abnormal.
* Shakespeare
* Jonathan Swift
* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-03
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, title=The Smallest Cell
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(of a human or system) Having lost good or desirable qualities.
(of an encoding or function) Having multiple domain elements correspond to one element of the range.
(mathematics) A degenerate case is a limiting case in which a class of object changes its nature so as to belong to another, usually simpler, class.
(physics) Having the same quantum energy level.
One is degenerate, who has fallen from previous stature.
To lose good or desirable qualities.
* 1870 , Shirley Hibberd, Rustic Adornments for Homes of Taste (page 170)
To cause to lose good or desirable qualities.
Abject is a related term of degenerate.
As adjectives the difference between abject and degenerate
is that abject is (obsolete) rejected; cast aside while degenerate is (of qualities) having deteriorated, degraded or fallen from normal, coherent, balanced and desirable to undesirable and typically abnormal.As nouns the difference between abject and degenerate
is that abject is a person in the lowest and most despicable condition; a castaway; outcast while degenerate is one is degenerate, who has fallen from previous stature.As verbs the difference between abject and degenerate
is that abject is (obsolete) to cast off or out; to reject while degenerate is to lose good or desirable qualities.abject
English
Etymology 1
* From (etyl) .Adjective
(en-adj)Usage notes
* Nouns to which "abject" is often applied: poverty, fear, terror, submission, misery, failure, state, condition, apology, humility, servitude, manner, coward.Synonyms
* beggarly, contemptible, cringing, degraded, groveling, ignoble, mean, mean-spirited, slavish, vile, worthlessVerb
(en verb)- (John Donne)
References
degenerate
English
Adjective
(en adjective)- faint-hearted and degenerate king
- degenerate from their ancient blood
citation, passage=It is likely that the long evolutionary trajectory of Mycoplasma went from a reductive autotroph to oxidative heterotroph to a cell-wall–defective degenerate parasite. This evolutionary trajectory assumes the simplicity to complexity route of biogenesis, a point of view that is not universally accepted.}}
- ''The genetic code is degenerate because a single amino acid can be coded by one of several codons.
Derived terms
* (physics) degenerate matterNoun
(en noun)- You are a degenerate , boy. You're a disgrace to your ancestors.
Verb
(degenerat)- His condition continued to degenerate even after admission to hospital.
- Another bird quickly learned to imitate the song of a canary that was mated with it, but as the parrakeet improved in the performance the canary degenerated , and came at last to mingle the other bird's harsh chitterings with its own proper music.
