GDict

defective

di'fektiv11 senses · 110 ms
Level C1TOEFL
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adj/dɪˈfɛktɪv/
  1. 1

    Having one or more defects.

    • If the workmanship is defective, they'll replace the shoes with a new pair.
    • Artillery officers sometimes have defective hearing.
  2. 2

    Lacking some forms; e.g., having only one tense or being usable only in the third person.

  3. 3

    Having a root whose final consonant is weak (ي, و, or ء).Arabic

  4. 4

    Not capable of representing all the phonemic distinctions of a language it is used to write.

  5. 5

    Spelled without matres lectionis, for example אמץ (ómets, “courage”) as opposed to the plene spelling אומץ where the letter vav ⟨ו⟩ indicates the vowel o.

adv/dɪˈfɛktɪv/
  1. 1

    Without matres lectionis (letters indicating vowels) written out.not-comparable

    • For the sake of comparison, note the distribution of these spellings in some other Hebrew sources: in the MT the vowel o after the first consonant of the root is written defective in approximately 3,600 cases as against 850 cases of plene s
noun/dɪˈfɛktɪv/
  1. 1

    A person or thing considered to be defective.

    • It is an offence, subject to the exception mentioned in this section, for a person to procure a woman who is a defective to have unlawful sexual intercourse in any part of the world.
    • There were many more kinds of mental institutions at mid-century, ones for "mental defectives and epileptics" and the mentally retarded, psychiatric wards in veterans hospitals, as well as "psychopathic" and private mental hospitals.
  2. 2

    A word written without matres lectionis (letters indicating vowels).

    • Thus, in the Pentateuch and in the earlier prophets the plenes are counted, whilst in the later prophets the defectives are enumerated.

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