| Learning / English Dictionary |
INEFFECTUAL
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Not producing an intended effect
Example:
ineffective legislation
Synonyms:
ineffective; ineffectual; uneffective
Classified under:
Similar:
toothless (lacking necessary force for effectiveness)
unproductive (not producing desired results)
Also:
idle (not in action or at work)
inefficacious (lacking the power to produce a desired effect)
inefficient (not producing desired results; wasteful)
powerless (lacking power)
useless (having no beneficial use or incapable of functioning usefully)
Attribute:
effectiveness; effectivity; effectuality; effectualness (power to be effective; the quality of being able to bring about an effect)
Derivation:
ineffectuality; ineffectualness (lacking the power to be effective)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Lacking in power or forcefulness
Example:
like an unable phoenix in hot ashes
Synonyms:
ineffective; ineffectual; unable
Classified under:
Similar:
impotent (lacking power or ability)
Derivation:
ineffectuality; ineffectualness (lacking the power to be effective)
Sense 3
Meaning:
Producing no result or effect
Example:
an unavailing attempt
Synonyms:
futile; ineffectual; meaningless; otiose; unavailing
Classified under:
Adjectives
Similar:
useless (having no beneficial use or incapable of functioning usefully)
Derivation:
ineffectuality; ineffectualness (lacking the power to be effective)
Context examples:
There were three minnows in the pool, which was too large to drain; and after several ineffectual attempts to catch them in the tin bucket he forbore.
(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)
Come!” Receiving no answer to these taunts, he would mount in his wrath to the words “swindlers” and “robbers”; and these being ineffectual too, would sometimes go to the extremity of crossing the street, and roaring up at the windows of the second floor, where he knew Mr. Micawber was.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
Pardon this gush of sorrow; these ineffectual words are but a slight tribute to the unexampled worth of Henry, but they soothe my heart, overflowing with the anguish which his remembrance creates.
(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)
I pass over Mr. Wickfield's proposing my aunt, his proposing Mr. Dick, his proposing Doctors' Commons, his proposing Uriah, his drinking everything twice; his consciousness of his own weakness, the ineffectual effort that he made against it; the struggle between his shame in Uriah's deportment, and his desire to conciliate him; the manifest exultation with which Uriah twisted and turned, and held him up before me.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
I was like the Arabian who had been buried with the dead and found a passage to life, aided only by one glimmering and seemingly ineffectual light.
(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)
