Adjective

(en adjective)

Easily broken into small fragments, crumbled, or reduced to powder.

* 1977 , (Angela Carter), The Passion of New Eve :

Spiders had woven their vague trapezes between the friable heads of dead peonies in enormous glass jars streaked with tide marks where the water had evaporated long ago.

* 1983 , (Lawrence Durrell), Sebastian'', Faber & Faber 2004 (''Avignon Quintet ), p. 1020:

This light, friable type of material offered excellent insulation against both desert heat and also the cold of darkness during the winter.

(of soil) Loose and large-grained in consistency.

(of poisons) Likely to crumble and become airborne, thus becoming a health risk

April 1987 , Old-House Journal

It is when asbestos-containing products are friable that hazardous asbestos fibers are likely to be released and sent airborne.

Adjective

(en adjective)

Capable of being moulded; malleable, flexible, pliant.

* 1749 , (Henry Fielding), , Folio Society 1973, p. 103:

the rage betook itself at last to certain missile weapons; which, though from their plastic nature they threatened neither the loss of life or of limb, were, however, sufficiently dreadful to a well-dressed lady.

* 1898 , Journal of Microscopy (page 256)

Plastic mud, brownish tinted, rich in floatings.

* 2012 , Adam Zeman, ‘Only Connect’, Literary Review , issue 399:

while the broad pattern of connections between brain regions is similar in every healthy human brain, their details – their number, size and strength – are thought to underpin our individuality, as synapses are ‘plastic ’, shaped by experience.

(dated) Creative, formative.

* Prior

the plastic hand of the Creator

* Alexander Pope

See plastic Nature working to his end.

(biology) Capable of adapting to varying conditions; characterized by environmental adaptability.

Of or pertaining to the inelastic, non-brittle, deformation of a material.

Made of plastic.

* {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham)

, title=(The China Governess) , chapter=Foreword citation , passage=A canister of flour from the kitchen had been thrown at the looking-glass and lay like trampled snow over the remains of a decent blue suit with the lining ripped out which lay on top of the ruin of a plastic wardrobe.}}

Inferior or not the real thing; ersatz.

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* {{quote-book, title=The pirate's dilemma: how youth culture is reinventing capitalism

, page=, author=Matt James Mason, year=2008, passage=Frustrated by a globalized music industry force-feeding them plastic pop music, hackers, remixers, and activists began to mobilize...}}

(slang) Fake, snobbish. Usually refers to a person.

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