Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Purposeless |
PurposelessAdjective1. Not evidencing any purpose of goal. 2. Lacking import; "a pointless remark"; "a life essentially purposeless"; "senseless violence". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "purposeless" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1781. (references) |
Synonyms: PurposelessSynonyms: pointless (adj), senseless (adj). (additional references) |
| Antonym: purposeful (adj). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Intention | Random, indiscriminate, promiscuous; undirected; aimless, driftless, designless, purposeless, causeless; without purpose. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Purposeless |
| English words defined with "purposeless": Driftless ♦ hugger-mugger ♦ mumbo jumbo ♦ Objectless ♦ senselessly. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "purposeless": Plague. (references) |
| Domain | Title |
Books | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | Tardive dyskinesia is characterized by repetitive, involuntary, purposeless movements. (references) | |
In complex partial seizures, the individual may hallucinate, stagger, perform automatic and purposeless movements, or experience impaired consciousness or confusion. (references) | ||
Some people with absence seizures have purposeless movements during their seizures, such as a jerking arm or rapidly blinking eyes. Others have no noticeable symptoms except for brief times when they are "out of it." Immediately after a seizure, the person can resume whatever he or she was doing. (references) | ||
Lexicography | Devil's Dictionary | PLAGUE, n. In ancient times a general punishment of the innocent for admonition of their ruler, as in the familiar instance of Pharaoh the Immune. The plague as we of to-day have the happiness to know it is merely Nature's fortuitous manifestation of her purposeless objectionableness. |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Purposeless" is generally used as an adjective (general or positive) -- approximately 100.00% of the time. "Purposeless" is used about 31 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Adjective (general or positive) | 100% | 31 | 62,296 |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expression using "purposeless": pointless purposeless. Additional references. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
purposeless | 4 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "purposeless"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Albanian | i pavendosur (dubious, hesitant, indecisive, irresolute, sticky, suspensive, undecided, undetermined, unresolved, unsettled, unsteady), i paqëllimtë (unmeant, unpremeditated, unwitting). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Arabic | بلا هدف (adrift, aimless, aimlessly), بلا غاية (aimless). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bulgarian | слабохарактерен (flabby, flaccid, frail, weak, weak-kneed), нерешителен (double-minded, faltering, half hearted, hesitant, hesitative, indecisive, indeterminate, irresolute, shilly shally, suspensive, undecided, undetermined, unready, unresolved, weak), безсмислен (absurd, aimless, futile, inane, insensate, inutile, meaningless, mindless, needless, nonsense, nonsensical, pointless, preposterous, senseless, sorry, stupid, tomfool, unmeaning, vacuous, vain), безцелен (aimless, desultory, meaningless, objectless, pointless), безволев, празен (airy, airy fairy, bare, barren, blank, empty, hollow, idle, inane, light, loose, piffling, pithless, sounding, superficial, uncharged, unsubstantial, untenanted, vacant, vacuous, vain, void, yeasty). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Chinese | 目的 (Aimless). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Czech | bezúèelný (aimless). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Finnish | tarkoitukseton (aimless, pointless, useless, without point). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
French | sans but, qui n'a pas de but, irrésolu, indécis. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
German | zwecklos (futile, of no use, pointless, useless). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Greek | άσκοποσ (aimless, feckless, goalless, impractical, inane, needless, objectless, pointless, purportless). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hungarian | céltalan (aimless, meaningless, misguided, objectless, otiose, pointless). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Italian | senza scopo (aimless, objectless). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pig Latin | urposelesspay sem objetivo (aimless, objectless), sem finalidade (objectless), inútil (abortive, bootless, castaway, empty, fruitless, futile, good-for-nothing, naught, needless, no-go, nugatory, rat-trap, sterile, superfluous, supervacaneous, trashy, unavailable, unavailing, unnecessary, unproductive, unprofitable, useless, vain, worthless). (various references) бесцельный (aimless, directionless, objectless, unaimed). (various references) besciljan (aimless, objectless). (various references) sin objetivo (aimless, objectless, unfocused), irresoluto (double-minded, feeble minded, indecisive, irresolute), indeciso (indecisive, irresolute, procrastinator, undecided, undecisive, waverer, waveringly), inútil (empty, good for nothing, helpless, naught, needless, no go, of no avail, of no use, pointless, profitless, unavailing, unfit, unprofitable, unserviceable, unsuccessful, unsuitable, useless, vain, waste, wasted). (various references) meningslös (futile, insignificant, meaningless, mindless, nonsensical, senseless, wanton), ändamålslös. (various references) boş (airy, barren, blank, bootless, captious, chimerical, desert, disengaged, empty, expressionless, fallacious, flat, for hire, free, frivolous, frothy, futile, gaseous, hollow, idle, inane, ineffective, ineffectual, invalid, leisure, meaningless, nugatory, null, pointless, puerile, punk, spare, tenantless, thin, trumpery, unbuilt, unbuilt-on, unengaged, unfounded, unoccupied, unprofitable, unrecorded, unwritten-on, vacant, vacuous, vain, void, waste, windy, wishywashy, without any foundation, without foundation, yeasty), anlamsız (absurd, barren, blank, dead pan, empty, expressionless, for the birds, frivolous, grotesque, inane, incoherent, inept, inexpressive, insane, insignificant, meaningless, nonsense, nonsensical, of no significance, pointless, ridiculous, senseless, sodden, unmeaning, unreasonable, vacuous, vain, yeasty), amaçsız (aimless, at an end, objectless, pointless, vacuous, vagabond, wanton, without cause). (various references) ненавмисний (casual, extemporary, inadvertent, involuntary, undesigned, unintentional, unpremeditated), бузглуздий, безцільний (aimless, meaningless, objectless). (various references) vô ích không chủ định, không chủ tâm (involuntary, unintentional, unwitting), không có mục đích (objectless). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | supervacua, supervacuas, supervacue, supervacuis. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "purposeless": purposelessly, purposelessness, purposelessnesses. (additional references) | |
| |
"Purposeless" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: purposless. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "purposeless" (pronounced per"puslus) |
| 4 | -s l u s | baseless, ceaseless, classless, defenseless, faceless, fenceless, graceless, priceless, remorseless, senseless, sexless, useless, voiceless. |
| 3 | -l u s | accomplice, acropolis, ageless, aimless, airless, Amaryllis, anomalous, atlas, bacillus, backless, balas, blameless, bloodless, bolus, boneless, bottomless, boundless, brainless, breathless, calculus, callous, callus, careless, Carolus, cashless, childless, cloudless, clueless, Colas, colorless, cordless, countless, cutlass, digitalis, directionless, doubtless, driverless, ductless, earless, effortless, endless, expressionless, eyeless, fabulous, fatherless, fearless, featherless, featureless, feckless, fellas, flawless, flightless, frictionless, frivolous, fruitless, Gallus, garrulous, gladiolus, godless, groundless, guileless, guiltless, hairless, hapless, harmless, headless, heartless, helpless, homeless, hopeless, hornless, humorless, incredulous, irregardless, issueless, jealous, jobless, keyless, lactobacillus, landless, lawless, leaderless, leafless, legless, libelous, lifeless, limbless, limitless, listless, loveless, luckless, malice, marvelous, meaningless, meatless, megalopolis, merciless, meticulous, metropolis, mindless, miraculous, motherless, motionless, nameless, nautilus, nebulous, necklace, necropolis, needless, odorless, overzealous, Oxalis, painless, palace, paperless, peerless, pendulous, penniless, perilous, pilotless, pitiless, pointless, polis, populace, populous, powerless, prothallus, querulous, reckless, regardless, relentless, restless, ridiculous, riskless, rootless, rudderless, ruthless, scandalous, scoreless, scrupulous, scurrilous, seamless, selfless, shameless, shapeless, shiftless, skinless, sleepless, sleeveless, smokeless, solace, soulless, speechless, spineless, spotless, stainless, stateless, stimulus, stylus, surplus, syphilis, tantalus, tasteless, thankless, thoughtless, ticketless, tieless, timeless, tireless, toothless, topless, treeless, trellis, tremulous, unscrupulous, valueless, victimless, warrantless, weightless, windlass, windowless, wireless, witless, wordless, worthless, zealous, zipless. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "e-e-l-o-p-p-r-s-s-s-u" | |
-1 letter: superposes. | |
-2 letters: espousers, oppresses, peloruses, prolepses, repousses, superpose, supposers. | |
-3 letters: espouser, espouses, espresso, peoplers, peploses, pepluses, plessors, popeless, purposes, repousse, repulses, soleuses, sporules, supposer, supposes, suppress. | |
-4 letters: elopers, espouse, leprose, leprous, lessors, loesses, loppers, oppress, peepuls, pelorus, peopler, peoples, peruses, plessor, plusses, poseurs, presses, propels, prosses, pulpers, pulsers, purples, purpose, reposes, repulse, resoles, slopers. | |
| Words containing the letters "e-e-l-o-p-p-r-s-s-s-u" | |
+2 letters: purposelessly. | |
+3 letters: purposefulness. | |
+4 letters: purposelessness. | |
+5 letters: purposefulnesses. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Commercial | 5. Quotations: Non-fiction 6. Usage Frequency 7. Expressions 8. Expressions: Internet | 9. Translations: Modern 10. Translations: Ancient 11. Derivations 12. Rhymes | 13. Anagrams 14. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
