Crossword clues for impair
impair
- Spoil naughty child, 10
- Look after current politician causing damage
- Reduce quality of broadcast following 1pm broadcast
- Rascal to disclose damage
- Blunt, married couple on island
- Harm one married couple
- Damage caused by mutation originally, mate - one's on top of it
- Undermine brat with a look
- Do damage to
- Get in the way of
- Affect adversely
- Make worse
- Render less effective
- Weaken, as judgment
- Diminish, as ability
- Cause harm to
- Antonym of "enhance"
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Impair \Im*pair"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Impaired; p. pr. & vb. n. Impairing.] [Written also empair.] [OE. empeiren, enpeiren, OF. empeirier, empirier, F. empirer, LL. impejorare; L. pref. im- in + pejorare to make worse, fr. pejor worse. Cf. Appair.] To make worse; to diminish in quantity, value, excellence, or strength; to deteriorate; as, to impair health, character, the mind, value.
Time sensibly all things impairs.
--Roscommon.
In years he seemed, but not impaired by years.
--Pope.
Syn: To diminish; decrease; injure; weaken; enfeeble; debilitate; reduce; debase; deteriorate.
Impair \Im*pair"\, v. t.
To grow worse; to deteriorate.
--Milton.
Impair \Im"pair\, a. [F. impair uneven, L. impar; im- not + par equal.] Not fit or appropriate. [Obs.]
Impair \Im*pair"\, n. Diminution; injury. [Obs.]
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
late 14c., earlier ampayre, apeyre (c.1300), from Old French empeirier (Modern French empirer), from Vulgar Latin *impeiorare "make worse," from assimilated form of in- "into, in" (see in- (2)) + Late Latin peiorare "make worse" (see pejorative). In reference to driving under the influence of alcohol, first recorded 1951 in Canadian English. Related: Impaired; impairing.
Wiktionary
(context obsolete English) Not fit or appropriate. v
1 (context transitive English) To weaken; to affect negatively; to have a diminishing effect on. 2 (context intransitive archaic English) To grow worse; to deteriorate.
WordNet
Usage examples of "impair".
Assimilative debility is indicated by an impaired digestion and a consequent suppression, or an abnormal state of the secretions.
It matters not whether he is professional or amateur, so he is untouched by academicism and has not done so much reading or writing as to impair his mental digestion and his clarity of vision.
The nostrums advertised extensively over the country as specifics for this disease, while they may, in some instances, prevent the attacks for a short time, irritate the stomach, impair digestion, lower vitality, and permanently injure the system, often rendering the disease incurable.
After a while his organs had begun to degenerate, depleted calcium levels had reduced his bones to brittle porcelain sticks, muscles had atrophied, and fluid bloated his tissues, impairing his lungs, degrading his lymphatic system.
Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.
Thus a contract made by the governor pursuant to a statute authorizing the appointment of a commissioner to conduct, over a period of years, a geological, mineralogical, and agricultural survey of the State, for which a definite sum had been authorized, was held to have been impaired by repeal of the statute.
This, as with barbiturates, is extremely dangerous when taken, if the user is infected or impaired.
Great pains are taken to obtain the materials at the right season of the year, properly cured so that none of their remedial qualities may be impaired.
Just as Mister Chicago predicted, a handful of deadheads came out of their fugue with their minds severely impaired, their personalities little changed from the way they had been before they were taken off the drugs.
The author exhibited a series of eighteen inks which had either been made with metallic iron or with which metallic iron had been immersed, and directed attention to the fact that though the depth and body of color seemed to be deepened, yet in every case the durability of writings made with such inks was so impaired that they became brown and faded in a few months.
And Boutins, in 1769, published an account of the diseases common to the East Indies, in which he stated that when Rice is eaten more or less exclusively, the vision becomes impaired.
Alton is endangering his life, or materially impairing his health, I wish it mitigated as far as it can be consistently with his safe detention.
In consequence the pulse grows small and weak, and the patient cannot exercise or labor as usual, and finally the lower limbs begin to swell, then the face and body, the skin looks dusky, the appetite is impaired, the kidneys become diseased, there is difficulty in breathing, and the patient, it is said, dies of dropsy, yet dropsy was the result of a disease of the heart, which retarded the circulation and enfeebled the system, and which was actually the primary cause of death.
Its only conflict with euthenics appertains to such euthenic measures as impair the adaptability of the race to the better environment they are trying to make.
An impaired hypothalamic hormone secretion led to an inadequate gonadotrophic secretion, which in turn blocked ovulation .