Ether

Quick meaning: Ether is a noun meaning (uncountable, colloquial) A particular quality created by or surrounding an object, person, or place; an atmosphere, an aura.

Meaning

(uncountable, colloquial) A particular quality created by or surrounding an object, person, or place; an atmosphere, an aura.

More Meanings

1. (uncountable, organic chemistry) Diethyl ether (C₄H₁₀O), an organic compound with a sweet odour used in the past as an anaesthetic.
2. (countable, organic chemistry) Any of a class of organic compounds containing an oxygen atom bonded to two hydrocarbon groups.
3. (uncountable) Starting fluid.
4. (transitive, slang) To viciously humiliate or insult.
5. (uncountable, literary or poetic) The substance formerly supposed to fill the upper regions of the atmosphere above the clouds, in particular as a medium breathed by deities.
6. (uncountable, colloquial) The atmosphere or space as a medium for broadcasting radio and television signals; also, a notional space through which Internet and other digital communications take place; cyberspace.
7. (uncountable, physics, historical) Often as aether and more fully as luminiferous aether: The hypothetical substance permeating space, functioning as a medium for electromagnetic waves to propagate through, and which does not exert resistance to the movement of matter; its existence is incompatible with Einstein's theory of relativity; famously found to be undetectable by the 1887 Michelson–Morley experiment.

Example Sentences

The luminous æther of his life was not obſcured by any ſhade dark enough to be denominated a defect.

"The ether. The earth browses upon a circular path in the fields of space, and as it moves the ether is continually pouring through it and providing its vitality."

The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge.

But the moſt valuable Qualities of the ÆTHER are it's medicinal ones; it having been found by repeated Experience to be an excellent Remedy in moſt nervous Diſeaſes; particularly in Fits of all ſorts, whether Epileptic, Convulſive, Hyſteric, Hypochondriac, or Paralytic: […]

Word Forms

• ethers
• ethyr
• ethering
• ethered

Synonyms for ether

Depending on context, synonyms include abase, abash, confuse, confound, debase, degrade.

Related Words

Related dictionary entries include aether, quintessence, ethoxyethane, anesthetic, luminiferous, flask.

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