different between listless vs insensitive

English

Etymology

From Middle English lystles, equivalent to list (“desire”) +? -less. Compare Dutch lusteloos (“lethargic, listless”). Doublet of lustless.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?l?stl?s/

Adjective

listless (comparative more listless, superlative most listless)

1. Lacking energy, enthusiasm, or liveliness.
   • 1818, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, Frankenstein, ch. 18:

     I passed whole days on the lake alone in a little boat, watching the clouds and listening to the rippling of the waves, silent and listless.

   • 1861, Charlotte M. Yonge, The Stokesley Secret, ch. 6:

     What an entirely different set of beings were those Stokesley children in lesson-time. . . . Poor, listless, stolid, deplorable logs, with bowed backs and crossed ankles, pipy voices and heavy eyes!

   • 1901, William Somerset Maugham, The Hero, ch. 21:

     The scene with Mrs. Wallace had broken his spirit, and he was listless now, indifferent to what happened.

   • 2005 Nov. 29, Aryn Baker, "John Hardy: Bali Guy," Time:

     “Listless, inattentive, distracted,” he recited. “A daydreamer. Tries his best, but is too slow.”

Derived terms

• listlessly
• listlessness

Translations

Anagrams

• slitless

English

Etymology

in- +? sensitive

Pronunciation

• (US) IPA^(key): /?n?s?ns?t?v/

Adjective

insensitive (comparative more insensitive, superlative most insensitive)

1. Expressing or feeling little or no concern, care, compassion, or consideration for the feelings, emotions, sentiments, or concerns of other people; inconsiderate or incompassionate
2. Not expressing normal physical feeling;
   • 1897, Bram Stoker, Dracula

     It is something like the way dame Nature gathers round a foreign body an envelope of some insensitive tissue which can protect from evil that which it would otherwise harm by contact.

3. Not expressing normal emotional feelings; cold; tactless; undiplomatic
   • 1895, Grant Allen, The British Barbarians

     Somehow, when Bertram Ingledew let it once be felt he did not wish to be questioned on any particular point, even women managed to restrain their curiosity: and he would have been either a very bold or a very insensitive man who would have ventured to continue questioning him any further.

   • 1994, Jann Arden, "Insensitive" (song)

     Oh I really should have known by the time you drove me home, / By the vagueness in your eyes, your casual good-byes, / By the chill in your embrace and the expression on your face, / That told me you might have some advice to give / On how to be insensitive.

Synonyms

• unaffected
• unsensitive

Antonyms

• sensitive

Derived terms

Translations