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Dull vs Null - What's the difference?

dull | null |

In transitive terms the difference between dull and null

is that dull is to soften, moderate or blunt; to make dull, stupid, or sluggish; to stupefy while null is to nullify; to annul.

As a noun null is

a non-existent or empty value or set of values.

dull

English

Alternative forms

* dul, dulle

Adjective

(er)
  • Lacking the ability to cut easily; not sharp.
  • :
  • Boring; not exciting or interesting.
  • :
  • :
  • Not shiny; having a matte finish or no particular luster or brightness.
  • :
  • :a dull''' fire or lamp;  a '''dull''' red or yellow;  mirror
  • *(Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) (1807-1882)
  • *:As turning the logs will make a dull fire burn, so changes of study a dull brain.
  • *
  • *:A great bargain also had been the excellent Axminster carpet which covered the floor; as, again, the arm-chair in which Bunting now sat forward, staring into the dull , small fire. In fact, that arm-chair had been an extravagance of Mrs. Bunting. She had wanted her husband to be comfortable after the day's work was done, and she had paid thirty-seven shillings for the chair.
  • Not bright or intelligent; stupid; slow of understanding.
  • *(William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
  • *:She is not bred so dull but she can learn.
  • *(William Makepeace Thackeray) (1811-1863)
  • *:dull at classical learning
  • *{{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)
  • , chapter=15 citation , passage=She paused and took a defiant breath. ‘If you don't believe me, I can't help it. But I'm not a liar.’ ¶ ‘No,’ said Luke, grinning at her. ‘You're not dull enough! […] What about the kid's clothes? I don't suppose they were anything to write home about, but didn't you keep anything? A bootee or a bit of embroidery or anything at all?’}}
  • Sluggish, listless.
  • *(Bible), (w) xiii. 15
  • *:This people's heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing.
  • *(Edmund Spenser) (c.1552–1599)
  • *:O, help my weak wit and sharpen my dull tongue.
  • *, chapter=7
  • , title= The Mirror and the Lamp , passage=[…] St.?Bede's at this period of its history was perhaps the poorest and most miserable parish in the East End of London. Close-packed, crushed by the buttressed height of the railway viaduct, rendered airless by huge walls of factories, it at once banished lively interest from a stranger's mind and left only a dull oppression of the spirit.}}
  • Cloudy, overcast.
  • :
  • Insensible; unfeeling.
  • *(Beaumont and Fletcher) (1603-1625)
  • *:Think me not / So dull a devil to forget the loss / Of such a matchless wife.
  • Heavy; lifeless; inert.
  • *(William Shakespeare) (c.1564–1616)
  • *:the dull earth
  • *(Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) (1807-1882)
  • *:As turning the logs will make a dull fire burn, so changes of study a dull brain.
  • (of pain etc) Not intense; felt indistinctly or only slightly.
  • Pressing on the bruise produces a dull pain.

    Synonyms

    * See also * See also * (not shiny) lackluster, matte

    Antonyms

    * bright * intelligent * sharp

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To render dull; to remove or blunt an edge or something that was sharp.
  • Years of misuse have dulled the tools.
  • * Francis Bacon
  • This dulled their swords.
  • To soften, moderate or blunt; to make dull, stupid, or sluggish; to stupefy.
  • He drinks to dull the pain.
  • * Shakespeare
  • Those [drugs] she has / Will stupefy and dull the sense a while.
  • * Trench
  • Use and custom have so dulled our eyes.
  • To lose a sharp edge; to become dull.
  • A razor will dull with use.
  • To render dim or obscure; to sully; to tarnish.
  • * Francis Bacon
  • dulls the mirror

    null

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A non-existent or empty value or set of values.
  • Zero]] quantity of [[expression, expressions; nothing.
  • (Francis Bacon)
  • Something that has no force or meaning.
  • (computing) the ASCII or Unicode character (), represented by a zero value, that indicates no character and is sometimes used as a string terminator.
  • (computing) the attribute of an entity that has no valid value.
  • Since no date of birth was entered for the patient, his age is null .
  • One of the beads in nulled work.
  • (statistics) null hypothesis
  • Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Having no validity, "null and void"
  • insignificant
  • * 1924 , Marcel Proust, Within a Budding Grove :
  • In proportion as we descend the social scale our snobbishness fastens on to mere nothings which are perhaps no more null than the distinctions observed by the aristocracy, but, being more obscure, more peculiar to the individual, take us more by surprise.
  • absent or non-existent
  • (mathematics) of the null set
  • (mathematics) of or comprising a value of precisely zero
  • (genetics, of a mutation) causing a complete loss of gene function, amorphic.
  • Derived terms

    * nullity

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • to nullify; to annul
  • (Milton)

    See also

    * nil ----