Exterminate

Quick meaning: Exterminate is a verb meaning (transitive) To kill or otherwise permanently eliminate all of (a population, often of pests or undesirables), usually intentionally.

Meaning

(transitive) To kill or otherwise permanently eliminate all of (a population, often of pests or undesirables), usually intentionally.

More Meanings

1. (figuratively, transitive) To bring a definite end to; to finish completely.

Example Sentences

We'll use poison to exterminate the rats.

The public school failed to exterminate truancy.

Somewhat unsurprisingly, unleashing the most powerful navy on the planet with carte blanche to exterminate slavers on sight saw a dramatic and sudden collapse in slaver numbers in the late 1840s and early 1850s.

The geth are a humanoid race of networked A.I.s. They were created by the quarians 300 years ago as tools of labor and war. When the geth showed signs of self-evolution, the quarians attempted to exterminate them. The geth won the resulting war. This example has led to legal, systematic repression of artificial intelligences in galactic society.

Word Forms

• exterminates
• exterminating
• exterminated

Synonyms for exterminate

Depending on context, synonyms include annihilate, eradicate, extermine, uproot, extirpate, kill off.

Related Words

Related dictionary entries include kill off, eradicate, extirpate, uproot, annihilate, kill.

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