| baffle |
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noun
- A device used to restrain or regulate, e.g. sound, light, gas, or a fluid.
- Tanker trucks use baffles to keep the fluids in them from sloshing around inside.
verb (baffl, ing)
- Totally bewilder; confuse or perplex.
- I am baffled by the contradictions and omissions in the instructions.
| | | balance |
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noun
- A pair of scales.
- (uncountable) equilibrium, Equilibrium in movement.
- (uncountable) support, Support for both viewpoints, substances etc or neither; neutrality.
- A list accounting for the debits on one side, and for the credits on the other
verb (balanc, ing)
- (transitive) to make (items) weigh up.
- (transitive) (figurative) to make (concepts) agree.
- (transitive) to hold (an object or objects) precariously.
- (transitive) to make the credits and debits of (an account) correspond.
- (intransitive) to be in equilibrium.
- (intransitive) to have matching credits and debits.
| | band |
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noun
- A strip of material wrapped around things to hold them together.
- A strip along the spine of a book where the pages are attached.
- A group of musicians, especially (a) wind and percussion players, or (b) rock musicians.
- A type of orchestra originally playing janissary music; i.e. marching band.
- A group of people loosely united for a common purpose (a band of thieves).
- (physics) A part of radio spectrum.
- (physics) A group of energy levels in a solid state material. Valence band, conduction band.
- (Canadian English) A group of aboriginals that has official recognition as an organized unit by the federal government of Canada.
verb
- (intransitive) To group together for a common purpose.
- To fasten together with a band.
- (ornithology) To fasten an identifying band around (a bird's) leg.
| | bias |
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noun (wikipedia, Bias (disambiguation), bias)
(es, -, pl2=biasses)
- (countable) (uncountable) inclination towards something; predisposition, partiality, prejudice, preference, predilection
- 1748. David Hume. Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral. London: Oxford University Press, 1973. § 4.
- : nature has pointed out a mixed kind of life as most suitable to the human race, and secretly admonished them to allow none of these biasses to draw too much
- (countable) (textile) the diagonal line between warp and weft in a woven fabric
- (electronics) a voltage or current applied for example to a transistor electrode
- (statistics) the difference between the expectation of the sample estimator and the true population value, which reduces the representativeness of the estimator by systematically distorting it
verb (bias, es)
- (transitive) To place bias upon; to influence.
- Our prejudices our views.
| | blank |
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noun
- A bullet that doesn't harm; a cartridge inserted into a gun that fires no projectile.
- A void space on a paper.
- A space to be filled in on a form or template.
- (archaic) A kind of base silver money, first coined in England by Henry V., and worth about 8 pence; also, a French coin of the seventeenth century, worth about 4 pence. Nares.
- (engineering) A piece of metal prepared to be made into something by a further operation, as a coin, screw, nuts.
- (context, dominoes) A piece or division of a piece, without spots; as, the double blank"; the six blank." In blank, with an essential portion to be supplied by another; as, to make out a check in blank.
- The space character; the character resulting from pressing the space-bar on a keyboard.
verb
- (transitive) To make void; to erase.
- I blanked out my previous entry.
- To prevent from scoring, as in a sporting event.
- The team was blanked.
adjective (all rarely used - by definition, blank is absolute and technically cannot be partial)
- Without color; lacking characteristics which give variety.
- Free from writing, printing, or marks; having an empty space to be filled in; as, blank paper; a blank check; a blank ballot.
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