| 释义 |
imponderable, a. and n.|ɪmˈpɒndərəb(ə)l|
[f. im-2 + ponderable. (Cf. F. impondérable Dict. Acad. 1835.)]
A. adj. Not ponderable.
a. (Freq. in Physics.) Having no weight; destitute of weight: applied formerly to light, heat, electricity, etc., regarded as material substances, and later to the luminiferous ‘ether’. Also fig., incalculable, unthinkable.
1794G. Adams Nat. & Exp. Philos. I. xi. 449 Phlogiston, a substance as imponderable as fire. 1822J. Imison Sc. & Art II. 33 Light..is reckoned among the imponderable bodies. 1851H. Mayo Pop. Superst. (ed. 2) 70 Mind, like electricity, is an imponderable force. 1854Emerson Lett. & Soc. Aims, Poetry & Imag. Wks. (Bohn) III. 146 The invisible and imponderable is the sole fact.
fig.1814Southey Roderick xxi. 192 Creeds like colours being by accident are therefore in the scale imponderable. 1959Manch. Guardian 29 Jan. 5/5 It is not so much the calculable cost but the possible, imponderable one if things go wrong.
b. Having no appreciable weight; of extremely small weight or amount.
1846G. E. Day tr. Simon's Anim. Chem. II. 23 The bile-pigment in healthy bile is imponderable. 1963D. W. & E. E. Humphries tr. Termier's Erosion & Sedimentation x. 194 They [sc. stratification joints] seem to result from those ‘imponderable’ particles..which remain in suspension.
B. n. An imponderable substance or agent. Now chiefly fig., in sense ‘something that cannot be estimated’.
1842–3Grove Corr. Phys. Forces 110 If it be admitted that one of the so-called imponderables is a mode of motion. 1858O. W. Holmes Aut. Breakf.-t. vi. 53 It is the imponderables that move the world,—heat, electricity, love. 1866Duke of Argyll Reign Law iii. (ed. 4) 158 Nothing which our scales can measure is lost when the ‘vital force’ is gone. It is the Great Imponderable. 1927Sunday Express 22 May 12/4 It is not always possible to show gratitude by a gift... If we wish to keep ourselves free from the dreadful disease of ingratitude we should strive to remember these imponderables of life. 1938S. Beckett Murphy 20 Murphy's respect for the imponderables of personality was profound. 1952M. McCarthy Groves of Academe (1953) vi. 110 ‘Fitness to teach’ was an imponderable which he had no intention of pretending to weigh. 1960Times 24 Oct. (Financial Rev.) p. xvii/5 Here the largest imponderable is first whether sufficient wool can be produced to meet the demand and secondly the challenge of synthetics. 1963D. W. & E. E. Humphries tr. Termier's Erosion & Sedimentation xviii. 355 He [sc. A. Lombard] distinguishes between the ‘imponderables’ which are the salts in process of precipitation,..and the ‘ponderables’ which sink rather quickly. 1964M. Gowing Britain & Atomic Energy ix. 267 The British contribution was largely made up of imponderables. 1969Times 17 Oct. 10/4 (heading) Farm imponderables in calculating cost of entry to Europe.
Hence imˈponderableness; imˈponderably adv., without any weight.
1847Craig, Imponderableness, the state of being imponderable. 1890Lippincott's Mag. May 675 He saw her in that filmy light, imponderably poised. |