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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
inflexible
adjective
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
too
▪ It may be uneconomic or too inflexible to implement in hardware all of a computer's instruction set.
▪ It is too inflexible, too costly, and too rigid.
▪ They are too inflexible for that.
▪ Unfortunately such systems have proved too hard to use for non-experts and too inflexible to support learning rather than training.
▪ The City Force as an organization was too inflexible to oppose successfully.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ Although many students adored Albers, others found him inflexible and stifling.
▪ It is a huge, inflexible and impersonal organization.
▪ Some of his employees find him inflexible.
▪ The proposed law is poorly written and inflexible.
▪ The regulations are precise and inflexible in such matters.
▪ Union negotiators criticized the employers for being too inflexible on the issues of pay and working conditions.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Inflexible

Inflexible \In*flex"i*ble\, a. [L. inflexiblis: cf. F. inflexible. See In- not, and Flexible.]

  1. Not capable of being bent; stiff; rigid; firm; unyielding.

  2. Firm in will or purpose; not to be turned, changed, or altered; resolute; determined; unyieding; inexorable; stubborn.

    ``Inflexibleas steel.''
    --Miltom.

    A man of upright and inflexible temper . . . can overcome all private fear.
    --Addison.

  3. Incapable of change; unalterable; immutable.

    The nature of things is inflexible.
    --I. Watts.

    Syn: -- Unbending; unyielding; rigid; inexorable; pertinacious; obstinate; stubborn; unrelenting.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
inflexible

late 14c., "incapable of being bent, physically rigid," also figuratively, "unbending in temper or purpose," from Middle French inflexible and directly from Latin inflexibilis, from inflexus, past participle of inflectere (see inflect). In early 15c. an identical word had an opposite sense, "capable of being swayed or moved," from in- "in, on." Related: Inflexibly.

Wiktionary
inflexible

a. 1 Not flexible; not capable of bending or being bent; stiff; rigid; firm; unyielding. 2 Not willing to change, e.g. one's opinion or habits; obstinate; stubborn; resolute; determined.

WordNet
inflexible
  1. adj. extended meanings; incapable of change; "a man of inflexible purpose" [ant: flexible]

  2. not making concessions; "took an uncompromising stance in the peace talks"; "uncompromising honesty" [syn: uncompromising] [ant: compromising]

  3. literal meanings; "an inflexible iron bar"; "an inflexible knife blade" [ant: flexible]

  4. incapable of adapting or changing to meet circumstances; "a rigid disciplinarian"; "an inflexible law"; "an unbending will to dominate" [syn: rigid, unbending]

Wikipedia
Inflexible

Inflexible may refer to:

  • Stiffness, the rigidity of an object, the extent to which it resists deformation in response to an applied force
  • Beardmore Inflexible, a British three-engined all-metal prototype bomber aircraft of the 1920s
  • HMS Inflexible, one of several Royal Navy ships of this name
  • Inflexible class ship of the line built for the Royal Navy in the late 16th Century
  • Inflexible (S 615), a French nuclear submarine
  • LMS Jubilee Class 5727 Inflexible, a steam locomotive constructed in 1936.
  • ST Inflexible, a French tugboat

Usage examples of "inflexible".

And Cap Cicero, famous alpinist and guide, was an inflexible bully who lived by the adage My way or no way.

Judson was the author of those eloquent and forcible appeals to the government, which prepared them by degrees for submission to terms of peace, never expected by any who knew the haughtiness and inflexible pride of the Burman court.

The inflexible zeal of freedom and fanaticism animated the Donatists to refuse obedience to the usurpers, whose election they disputed, and whose spiritual powers they denied.

The Catholics were attached to the nephew of Justin, who, between the Nestorian and Eutychian heresies, trod the narrow path of inflexible and intolerant orthodoxy.

Meade was inflexible, and would not stand any bluff or bluster from the Fenian leaders.

Peanut touched her on the arm, and Misha felt herself draw away involuntarily from contact with his hornlike, inflexible fingers.

He likewise urged, as the principal motive to his inflexible severity against this man, that he had basely suffered Tom Jones to undergo so heavy a punishment for his sake, whereas he ought to have prevented it by making the discovery himself.

I am well aware that the Massagetae are not only the oldest and most pious, most cultured, and at the same time the bravest people on earth, that their invincible armies are the largest, their fleet the greatest, their character at once the most inflexible and the most amiable, their women the most beautiful, their schools and public buildings the most exemplary in the world, but also that in all the world they possess in the highest degree that virtue which is so highly esteemed and so sorely lacking in many other great peoples: namely, although conscious of their own superiority, they are charitable toward and considerate of foreigners, not expecting each and every poor stranger -- coming from an inferior country -- to have himself attained the heights of Massagetic perfection.

They still insisted with inflexible rigor on those parts of the law which it was in their power to practise.

Sadly his Aunt Edwina was inflexible and sour, tense and standoffish, a dyed-in-the-wool snob whose basic values were quite alien to him.

Yet he had himself acquiesced in her quiet but inflexible showing of the futility of attempting such an overturning of Giustiniani traditions, though he still went with dangerous frequency to the studio of the Veronese, to which she had procured him entrance upon his promise that he would not seriously consider that impossible possibility at which he had hinted.

Alexander ascended his tribunal, and with a modest firmness represented to the armed multitude the absolute necessity, as well as his inflexible resolution, of correcting the vices introduced by his impure predecessor, and of maintaining the discipline, which could not be relaxed without the ruin of the Roman name and empire.

He shook his head as the Hunters turned and started for the nearest slidewalk, pulling them along in their inflexible grips.

He sped on accordingly--did not once hesitate at turns, right or left, forks and crossroads, but keeping an inflexible course, he placed himself at such a point on the road as to leave it no longer doubtful, should Stevens pass, of the place which usually brought him up.

For the first time, it occurred to him to wonder what sort of man would have two suitcases full of money hidden carelessly in a closet, what sort of man would have pistols and machine guns on that closet floor, what sort of man would move with that square inflexible gait.